Civil
unions become legal
'Step
in right direction' for some angers others
By
Rob Seman, Daily Record from Web, July 9, 2004
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Cindy Meneghin, left,
lifts a ladybug off the shoulder of her partner, Maureen Kilian, at
poolside at their Butler home. The couple are hoping to be allowed
to marry.
Bob Karp / Daily Record |
Cindy Meneghin has a goal. She'd like to be married before her children are.
She has some time, since her children are still in elementary school. And the Domestic Partnership Act, a law granting gay and lesbian couples some of the rights given to heterosexual married couples that goes into effect tomorrow, has given Meneghin and her partner, Maureen
Kilian, some hope that one day they will be married.
But despite the new law, Meneghin and Kilian, who live in Butler, |
as well as other gays and lesbians in Morris County, see gay marriages as still about 900 other rights away from being reality.
"It (the DPA) is a very good first baby step, but it's nothing compared to a walk down the aisle," Meneghin said.
Kilian and Meneghin, who have sued the state to allow gay marriage, won't be registering as domestic partners on Saturday or afterward.
Their case is on appeal.
"It's not appropriate for our marriage," Kilian said. "We need much more.
We are optimistic it will happen."
Gordon Sauer and Javier Montalvo, who live in Morris County, however, will be registering on Saturday in South Orange, one of the few New Jersey towns that will be open for registrations this weekend.
While Sauer and Montalvo, who have been together for 10 years, have owned a home jointly for four years, they said the law will give them added protection should one of them inherit the house after the other dies, such as exemption from state inheritance tax.
"To not have to worry about that is a tremendous step in the right direction," Sauer said.
Montalvo said the couple are seeking the ability to marry before the prospect of marriage itself.
"It (the new law) is a very good start, but it needs to go one step further," Montalvo said.
"Whether it be marriage or anything else. I'm not into the nomenclature."
Under the new law, registered couples are eligible to make critical health-care decisions for one another, visit each other in the hospital, and file for state income tax deductions for dependents, as well as for state inheritance tax-exemption.
The law also allows registered couples to receive benefits if they are employed by the state.
Domestic partners also are eligible for benefits from private employers, and municipal and county employees also may receive benefits if the employer chooses to provide them.
Morris County Freeholder Director Jack Schrier said that the county has not discussed a policy to extend benefits to domestic partners, but it likely will seek a legal opinion in case the issue arises.
Kilian said newly registered couples should be wary of what the law provides.
"I think some people are under the impression that they are entitled to health benefits from their partner's employer, and that's not the case," Kilian said.
Susan Harris, president of the Gay Activist Alliance in Morris County, said she hopes that many gay and lesbian couples will register on Saturday, but also said that many marriage rights remain elusive.
"I think it's a great next step, but when you compare the six benefits that the act gives compared to the thousands of benefits that marriage gives, it's just a first step," Harris said.
"There's still a big gap in equality."
Among those benefits is the cultural cachet that the term "marriage" brings, Harris said.
"When you say, 'my partner,' when you say, 'my civil union partner,' there's just not the same connotation that conveys the importance of what your loved one means to you," Harris said.
Harris, Meneghin and Kilian also noted that the state's new recognition of the rights of domestic partnership is not accepted by the federal government and isn't recognized in many other states.
"So even though someone has a domestic partnership in New Jersey, if they travel out of state and one of them ends up in an emergency room in Pennsylvania or Oklahoma or Texas there's no guarantee the nurse will let you into the triage room just because you say that person's my domestic partner," Harris said.
Harris said the bill that led to the New Jersey law began much stronger than its final form.
She took issue with the 180-day waiting period between same-sex relationships to register, as well as the part of the law that allows heterosexual couples ages 62 and older to become domestic partners.
The bill began by letting unmarried heterosexual couples of any age register, but that was pared down.
"That's not fair," Harris said. "There are many heterosexual people who don't want to get married but they want their relationship to be recognized."
"The gay community doesn't want special rights," Harris said. "We want the same rights as heterosexual people have."
Assemblyman Michael Patrick Carroll, R-Morris Twp., said the DPA is a "waste of money," since most gay and lesbian couples won't have children.
"At the end of the day the purpose of marriage is not to bless a relationship between two people because they love each other," Carroll said.
"It's to produce kids. And since the gays can't do that, there's no public purpose involved."
"Extending benefits to other relationships when there is no public purpose served is nothing more than a giveaway," Carroll said.
George DeCarlo, of Berkeley Heights, the head of the now-inactive Friends Against Sexual Orientation Discrimination and a member of the Green Party, said the DPA was the state Democratic Party's way of placating those on both sides of the issue.
"This is just a way to get around it so they placate lesbians and gays and they placate the religious right, who is also part of their constituency," DeCarlo said.
He instead suggested that couples seek to include their partners in wills, power of attorney documents and other documents involving funeral, burial and medical decisions.
"People have to pretend that when they get registered it didn't happen and they better go out and get those legal instruments," DeCarlo said.
"And for the next five to 10 years they can wonder why they had to go begging to the Democratic Party for more."
Carroll agreed that the law is placating both sides.
"They (members of the Democratic Party) wanted to give a gift to their own constituency," Carroll said.
"By the same token, it's not gay marriage, so it won't tick off the Catholic Church," Carroll said.
DeCarlo and his partner, Ryan Reyes, who both ran on a ticket for Assembly seats in the 21st District last year, obtained a civil union in Vermont in 2000, a joint tax return last year and, despite DeCarlo's feelings on the DPA, likely will register under the act on Saturday, DeCarlo said.
"You take every piddling thing you can get, I guess," DeCarlo said.
Because of the additional paperwork, some municipalities, such as Roxbury, will take appointments for domestic partnership registrations and marriage license applications next week.
"We're doing it (appointments) in order to be fair to everybody as well as ourselves," said Theresa Hennion, the registrar in Roxbury.
"This is extra work for the registrar and the deputy."
Rob Seman can be reached at rseman@gannett.com or (973) 428-6631.
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