Postscript

On Friday, the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriage should be legal in the state of Connecticut.  Connecticut becomes the third state after Massachusetts and California to legalize same-sex marriages.  While the Caifornia court decision made the point that civil unions are not the same as marriage, the Connecticut decision took this argument a step further and became the first court to use argue that civil unions are a violation of the state constitution’s equal protection clause.  Justice Palmer wrote in the majority opinion:

[W]e cannot discount the plaintiffs’ assertion that the legislature, in establishing a statutory scheme consigning same sex couples to civil unions, has relegated them to an inferior status, in essence, declaring them to be unworthy of the institution of marriage. In other words, ‘‘[b]y excluding same-sex couples from civil marriage, the [s]tate declares that it is legitimate to differentiate between their commitments and the commitments of heterosexual couples.  Ultimately, the message is that what same-sex couples have is not as important or as significant as ‘real’ marriage, that such lesser relationships cannot have the name of marriage” . . . Although marriage and civil unions do embody the same legal rights under our law, they are by no means equal.  The former is an institution of transcendent historical, cultural and social significance, whereas the latter is not . . . Despite the truly laudable effort of the legislature in equalizing the legal rights afforded same sex and opposite sex couples, there is no doubt that civil unions enjoy a lesser status in our society than marriage. . . . Interpreting our state constitutional provisions in accordance with firmly established equal protection principles leads inevitably to the conclusion that gay persons are entitled to marry the otherwise qualified same sex partner of their choice. To decide otherwise would require us to apply one set of constitutional principles to gay persons and another to all others.  The guarantee of equal protection under the law, and our obligation to uphold that command, forbids us from doing so. In accordance with these state constitutional requirements, same sex couples cannot be denied the freedom to marry.

While civil unions may confer many, if not all of the same legal benefits as marriage upon same-sex couples, the two terms have very different histories and elicit completely different reactions from people, thus making them unequal.  After lenghty analysis, the court also decided, after using criteria laid out by the Supreme Court, to include sexual orientation as a quasi-suspect class, something that the federal courts have not been willing to do.  This decision is a big step forward in the gay marriage movement and hopefully will spur other neighboring states to amend their marriage laws.