|
The Star-Ledger
Lawyers call civil
unions a 'failed experiment,'
back gay marriage
by Robert Schwaneberg,
nj.com from the Web, September 26, 2007, 9:21P
Civil unions in New Jersey are "a
failed experiment," the president of the state's largest organization of lawyers
said tonight.
Lynn Newsome, president of the New Jersey State Bar Association, said while
civil unions were supposed to give same-sex couples all the benefits of marriage
by a different name, they are "burdensome and flawed," and "have been shown to
perpetuate a second-class legal status."
Speaking at a hearing by a state commission to evaluate whether New Jersey's
7-month-old civil unions law is working, Newsome said the 17,000-member bar
association supports, "as one of its highest priorities," legislation allowing
same-sex couples to marry.
The law was passed to comply with last October's ruling by the state Supreme
Court that same-sex couples are entitled to all the benefits and obligations
that state law confers on married couples.
The hearing, the first of three by the commission, is being held at the New
Jersey Law Center in New Brunswick.
Read more in Thursday's Star-Ledger.
|
