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The New Jersey State Supreme Court ruled that same-sex same-sex civil unions are constituational, and therefore "must be afforded on equal terms the same rights and benefits enjoyed by opposite-sex couples under the civil marriage statutes.” But the court said that the NJ government will decide whether it's "marriage," taking a stance similar to Vermont. The court's 4-3 ruling stated, "The issue is not about the transformation of the traditional definition of marriage, but about the unequal dispensation of benefits and privileges to one of two similarly situated classes of people."
What next? The NJ legislature has 6 months to "either nclude gay couples or create new civil unions." And once that happens, we can imagine it may give Vermont a run for the money when it comes to same-sex marraiges/civil unions. We bet wedding planners and event space owners are really psyched.
Here's a helpful AP Q&A on the matter. The NY Times has a PDF of the decision. And in July, the NY State Court of Appeals rejected gay marriage.
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Yeah, there are so many benefits to being married.
And Massachusetts.
... except massachusetts doesn't allow out-of-staters to marry.
ssssssssssssssuper!
Um, uh, there are about 1,049 benefits awarded to heterosexual married couples, at last count, so yeah.
There ARE, "Um Uh Yeah" -- over 1,000 well-documented benefits, actually: medical decision-making, tax breaks, health insurance, hospital visitation, inheritance without a will, etc. You can scoff at it all you want, but this is a really good thing for same-sex couples in New Jersey.
constitu-ational!
Yea, Marriage is an all wonderful thing, just ask the breeders who're divorced and paying child support. Of course I'm all for gay marriages after all why should only straight people have to suffer.
new jersey is more progressive than new york?! what the hael is going on with this city/state?
New York State is actually much less progressive than New Jersey or Connecticut. You have to count all the red neck republicans that live upstate. If it was just the city, westchester and long island, then I'm sure NY would have made a similar ruling.
Praise the lord. This is awesome.
What's so awesome about this is:
1) no dissenting votes. 3 wanted marriage rights granted outright, the 4 majority said the legislature had to create law to meet the obligation; and
2) the majority said "the legislature has to do something to rectify this". The court didn't mandate (heh) this, and didn't make a right-friendly "activist decision against the wishes of voters" i.e. contradict an anti-marriage amendment. There was no law to contradict. And now there has to be one. Yay.
But will the media or the pols spin it that way? No, of course not.
Dear enigmaticjack,
I'm guessing you're straight?
What is awesome is that it looks like equal rights might have the possibility of existing in America, the "land of the free."
Fuck Civil Unions. Let em get married and be unhappy for two years before they get divorced like everyone else.
Is the reason financial? Beacuse that's usually the reason when conservatives hide behind the Bible.
The Cultural Left & Marriage
They can agree for any allowance they want to try and win what you want. Problem is the cultural left has a pedigree. They think marriage is archaic and patriarchal.
When Senator Daniel Patrick Monihan published his famous “Report on the Negro family” the cultural left called him a bigot.
When Dan Qualye eschewed Murphy Brown for making single Motherhood “just another lifestyle choice” the cultural left called him a bigot.
The MSM is replete with articles from the NYT and other sources of the cultural left about single women and men “choosing” to raise youngsters on their own. No moral condemnation is made or even suggested.
Illegitimacy is not a problem in New Delhi,. The correlation with a declining marriage culture is not income, couples live on a bowl of rice and stay together.
I’m afraid the illegitimacy rate is still 70% among the underclass. The lesbian couple next door implicitly states that marriage is androgynized and Fathers are not important.
If the cultural left has embraced monogamy and repented from their sexual revolution its news to me. My law school “family” law department was made up of two lesbian strident feminists and a polymorist. None of them asserted anything except all family forms are inherently equal, and the traditional family is archaic and patriarchal.
The important thing is not the answer to the question, but who writes the question. Your happy to know that your having your debate on your terms. The capacity of the public for sustained debate on any topic is limited. It’s a precious commodity. Your activists and activist judges have succeeded in pressing this issue. No matter what happens you move your ball down your court.
How do we provide a child with his natural mother and father living together under the same roof? Or.. What is the social utility of traditional morality? Or.. How has the feminist project undermined and alienated relations between the sexes? Or…What accounts for the disintegration of married intact families since the 1960’s? Or… How do we best alleviate and rebuild this broken structure? Or, what accounts for the decline in marriage and increase in cohabitation in Scandinavian countries that have adopted same-sex “marriage”? Or… How can we hope to build a marriage culture around a androgynized definition that separates a Childs natural parent from any necessary connection to his or her child? Or… why is the cultural left suddenly conceding the importance of the family unit when it has spent years calling it archaic a patriarchal? Where were these same people during the divorce revolution? Where were they when Senator Moynihan issued his report on black family disintegration? Could this sudden concession on the importance of marriage and monogamy be a momentary faint in a well documented history of considering all family forms as being inherently equal?
I disagree. I say that allowing SSA couples to marry will do irreparable harm to the institution of marriage by showing that marriage is outdated, any family form is adequate; a Childs own Mother & Father are not inherently necessary to that Childs future and proper upbringing and either sex is ultimately irrelevant to the institution.