Setback for Equality

Voters in three states approve bans on same-sex marriage.

Washington Post Editorial - Saturday, November 8, 2008

THE PASSAGE in California this week of a state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage was a profound disappointment. The vote came after gay-rights advocates legally challenged a 2000 referendum that defined marriage as the union of one man and one woman. Despite enjoying some of the strongest protections for domestic partnerships anywhere in the country, California advocates argued that gay couples in the state were being discriminated against because they could not legally label their relationships "marriages." The California Supreme Court agreed in a 4 to 3 ruling in May, essentially asserting that civil unions were the equivalent of "separate but equal."

Nearly 5.5 million California voters turned out on Tuesday to rebuff the court and to reiterate what they had said just a few years earlier: "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California." While this vote appears mercifully not to have undone the state's domestic partnership protections, it has almost undoubtedly derailed the political momentum that recently led state lawmakers to pass legislation -- ultimately vetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) -- recognizing gay marriage.

We strongly disagree with the California voters as well as with those in Arizona and Florida who backed similar prohibitions; Florida went even further, setting up hurdles to civil unions or domestic partnerships by declaring that "no other legal union that is treated as marriage or the substantial equivalent thereof shall be valid or recognized." Committed same-sex couples should be afforded the same legal protections as people in heterosexual unions are. Social justice demands nothing less.

The tide in this country will continue to flow in the direction of tolerance and equality, though progress may come in fits and starts. We understand why the semantics are important to many gay couples and to others who support the cause. But civil unions or domestic partnerships that, by whatever name, protect all families and afford them full benefits and responsibilities under the law should be welcomed as a first step wherever they can be achieved.

It also may be time to press Washington to move in the right direction. President-elect Barack Obama opposes the Defense of Marriage Act, which bars the federal government from legally recognizing same-sex couples and gives states the right to ignore same-sex marriages or civil unions performed in other jurisdictions.

A Democratically controlled Congress may also be sympathetic. A good first step would be a measure to allow the federal government to extend the same benefits to couples in civil unions, domestic partnerships or marriages, whether they are gay or heterosexual.