Social Issues

Inmates, sex offenders may test same-sex marriage law
Legalizing same sex marriage has raised a host of questions for Minnesota officials -- from the relatively simple, like how to replace the words "husband" and "wife" on forms, to the more complicated, such as whether two incarcerated people can marry.
The author of a new report showing Minnesota's senior hunger problem is well below the national average of 15 percent said it is still enough to be worrisome.
A non-profit group has begun harvesting surplus fruit to fill metro food shelves. The operation runs through October.
Photos: Inside Makoko, Nigeria’s Venice
Before this city became what it is today -- a monstrous destination that's probably more than twice as large as New York City (depending on which survey you believe) -- a neighborhood between the mainland and the posh Victoria Island started spreading into the sea. That was more than 100 years ago. Now, at least 85,000 Lagosians live in Makoko. They still do what their ancestors came for: the fishing. But the state is trying to evict the area, citing health concerns among other reasons.
Minn. 'hunger count' high despite better economy
A new report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture says about one in 10 Minnesota households doesn't have access to enough food for healthy living.
All over the country, lawyers who defend poor people in criminal cases have been sharing their stories about painful budget cuts. But an unprecedented recent court filing from the Justice Department has cheered the typically overburdened attorneys who represent the poor and could have dramatic implications for the representation of indigent defendants.
A researcher's observation of poor populations found that as people grew richer, they became more individualistic. Community ties frayed and weakened. A new study makes the argument that the same thing has happened in the U.S. over a longer period.
A meeting between the Wyoming chapter of the NAACP and an organizer for the Ku Klux Klan is believed to be the first of its kind. KKK organizer John Abarr, from Great Falls, Mont., filled out an NAACP membership form and made a $20 donation, but said he did not ask anybody at the meeting if they would like to join the KKK.
1 in 3 Minn. marriage licenses went to same-sex couples since Aug. 1
Since Minnesota became the 12th U.S. state to legalize gay marriage, at least 1,640 same-sex couples applied to be married. Counties aren't required to report such data to the state, so the AP built a database through calls to all 87 counties.
Minn. sees rush to same-sex marriage
Same-sex couples received nearly 1 in 3 marriage licenses issued in Minnesota since they were allowed to wed, The Associated Press found in a statewide survey of the first month's impact of the new gay marriage law.