Civil Unions in Connecticut
EDITORIAL, NYTimes on the Web, March 7, 2005
Connecticut is seriously considering giving gay couples the ability to have their relationships legalized in civil unions.
A civil union bill took a critical step toward passage when it was approved, 25 to 13, by the Legislature's powerful Judiciary Committee recently, and supporters believe they have the votes in the House and Senate.
Gov. M. Jodi Rell has said she supports at least the concept of civil unions.
Gay rights advocates have mixed reactions, since they had hoped for a law that would give them the same rights and privileges as any married couple, and call it a marriage.
Love Makes a Family, the largest gay rights organization in Connecticut, lobbied against the civil union bill in committee, arguing that it would make gay couples "separate and unequal."
But later, the group changed its position. "We will not stand in the way of expanding our rights," wrote Anne Stanback, the president of Love Makes a Family, in The Hartford Courant.
Ms. Stanback and her allies were right to insist that gay couples should have the same right to marry and create families as other Americans and to urge the Connecticut Legislature to call their unions marriages.
But the existing measure goes far toward giving gay couples the rights and protections of marriage, and gay rights advocates also were correct when they decided not to make the perfect the enemy of the good this year in Hartford.
The measure would treat gays joined in civil unions as spouses in a myriad of important ways, including rights of inheritance and making medical decisions.
It's an important step in supporting the stability of gay families, and one that should not be dismissed because it does not take us right to the end of the road:
marriages recognized beyond a single state's borders.
If the civil union law is enacted, Connecticut and California will be the only states to have enacted broad laws of this kind voluntarily.
Vermont passed a civil union law under court pressure, and a court decision forced Massachusetts officials to recognize gay marriage.
It's no small thing for a state legislature to take this step on its own. The constitutional rights of every American are safest when they're protected not by the judiciary alone, but also by the strong support of the citizenry as a whole.
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