[ql06] PUBLIC: New MA Gay Marriage Decision
- From: Stephen Kennedy <2srk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: ql06@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 04 Feb 2004 17:42:57 -0500
The Massachusetts Supreme Court has clarified its earlier decision on
gay unions, and again followed the Ontario decision. Separate but equal
civil unions are not good enough - only legal marriage will do.
It's nice to see US courts looking north for persuasive decisions.
/Published on Wednesday, February 4, 2004 by the Boston Globe /
* Massachusetts Supreme Court Rules Civil Unions Aren't Enough, Same-Sex
Couples Entitled to Marriage *
*by Jennifer Peter*
BOSTON -- The Massachusetts high court ruled Wednesday that only full,
equal marriage rights for gay couples -- rather than civil unions --
would meet the edict of its November decision, erasing any doubts that
the nation's first same-sex marriages would take place in the state
beginning in mid-May.
"The history of our nation has demonstrated that separate is seldom, if
ever, equal," the four justices who ruled in favor of gay marriage wrote
in the advisory opinion. The bill that would allow for civil unions, but
falls short of marriage, is makes for "unconstitutional, inferior, and
discriminatory status for same-sex couples."
The court issued the opinion in response to a request from the state
Senate about whether Vermont-style civil unions, which conveyed the
benefits -- but not the title of marriage -- would meet constitutional
muster.
The much-anticipated opinion sets the stage for next Wednesday's
Constitutional Convention, where the Legislature will consider an
amendment that would legally define marriage as a union between one man
and one woman. Without the opinion, Senate President Robert Travaglini
had said the vote would be delayed.
The Supreme Judicial Court ruled in November that same-sex couples have
a constitutional right to marry, and gave the Legislature six months to
change state laws to make it happen.
But almost immediately, the vague wording of the ruling left lawmakers
-- and advocates on both side of the issue -- uncertain if Vermont-style
civil unions would satisfy the court's decision.
The state Senate asked for more guidance from the court and sought the
advisory opinion, which was made public Wednesday morning when it was
read into the Senate record.
When it was issued in November, the 4-3 ruling set off a firestorm of
protest across the country among politicians, religious leaders and
others opposed to providing landmark rights for gay couples to marry.
President Bush immediately denounced the decision and vowed to pursue
legislation to protect the traditional definition of marriage. Church
leaders in the heavily Catholic state also pressed their parishioners to
oppose efforts to allow gays to marry.
And legislators were prepared to vote on a proposed amendment to the
state constitution that would seek to make the court's ruling moot by
defining as marriage as a union between one man and one woman -- thus
expressly making same-sex marriages illegal in Massachusetts.
The soonest a constitutional amendment could end up on the ballot would
be 2006.
What the case represented, both sides agree, was a significant new
milestone in a year that has seen broad new recognitions of gay rights
in America, Canada and abroad, including a June U.S. Supreme Court
decision striking a Texas ban on gay sex.
Legal experts, however, said that the long-awaited decision, while
clearly stating that it is unconstitutional to bar gay couples from
marriage, gave ambiguous instructions to the state Legislature.
Lawmakers remained uncertain if civil unions went far enough to live up
to the court's ruling -- or if actual marriages were required.
When a similar decision was issued in Vermont in 1999, the court told
the Legislature that it could allow gay couples to marry or create a
parallel institution that conveys all the rights and benefits of
marriage. The Legislature chose the second route, leading to the
approval of civil unions in that state.
The Massachusetts decision made no mention of an alternative solution,
but instead pointed to a recent decision in Ontario, Canada, that
changed the common law definition of marriage to include same-sex
couples and led to the issuance of marriage licenses there.
The state "has failed to identify any constitutionally adequate reason
for denying civil marriage to same-sex couples," the court wrote.
"Barred access to the protections, benefits and obligations of civil
marriage, a person who enters into an intimate, exclusive union with
another of the same sex is arbitrarily deprived of membership in one of
our community's most rewarding and cherished institutions."
The Massachusetts case began in 2001, when seven gay couples went to
their city and town halls to obtain marriage licenses. All were denied,
leading them to sue the state Department of Public Health, which
administers the state's marriage laws.
A Suffolk Superior Court judge threw out the case in 2002, ruling that
nothing in state law gives gay couples the right to marry. The couples
immediately appealed to the Supreme Judicial Court, which heard
arguments in March.
The plaintiffs argued that barring them from marrying a partner of the
same sex denied them access to an intrinsic human experience and
violated basic constitutional rights.
Over the past decade, Massachusetts' high court has expanded the legal
parameters of family, ruling that same-sex couples can adopt children
and devising child visitation right for a former partner of a lesbian.
Massachusetts has one of the highest concentrations of gay households in
the country with at 1.3 percent of the total number of coupled
households, according to the 2000 census. In California, 1.4 percent of
the coupled households are occupied by same-sex partners. Vermont and
New York also registered at 1.3 percent, while in Washington, D.C., the
rate is 5.1 percent
© Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
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