>
>Mass. High Court Rules for Gay Marriage
>By JENNIFER PETER, Associated Press Writer
>
>BOSTON - The Massachusetts high court ruled Wednesday that only full, equal
>marriage rights for gay couples — rather than civil unions — would be
>constitutional, erasing any doubts that the nation's first same-sex
>marriages could take place in the state beginning in mid-May.
>
>The court issued the opinion in response to a request from the state Senate
>about whether Vermont-style civil unions, which convey the state benefits of
>marriage — but not the title — would meet constitutional muster.
>
>"The history of our nation has demonstrated that separate is seldom, if
>ever, equal," the four justices who ruled in favor of gay marriage wrote in
>the advisory opinion. A bill that would allow for civil unions, but falls
>short of marriage, makes for "unconstitutional, inferior, and discriminatory
>status for same-sex couples."
>
>The much-anticipated opinion sets the stage for next Wednesday's
>constitutional convention, where the Legislature will consider an amendment
>that would legally define marriage as a union between one man and one woman.
>Without the opinion, Senate President Robert Travaglini had said the vote
>would be delayed.
>
>The soonest a constitutional amendment could end up on the ballot would be
>2006, meaning that until then, the high court's decision will be
>Massachusetts law no matter what is decided at the constitutional
>convention.
>
>The Supreme Judicial Court ruled in November that same-sex couples have a
>constitutional right to marry, and gave the Legislature six months to change
>state laws to make it happen.
>
>But almost immediately, the vague wording of the ruling left lawmakers — and
>advocates on both side of the issue — uncertain if Vermont-style civil
>unions would satisfy the court's decision.
>
>The state Senate asked for more guidance from the court and sought the
>advisory opinion, which was made public Wednesday morning when it was read
>into the Senate record.
>
>When it was issued in November, the 4-3 ruling set off a firestorm of
>protest across the country among politicians, religious leaders and others
>opposed to providing landmark rights for gay couples to marry.
>
>President Bush (news - web sites) immediately denounced the decision and
>vowed to pursue legislation to protect the traditional definition of
>marriage. Church leaders in the heavily Roman Catholic state also pressed
>their parishioners to oppose efforts to allow gays to marry.
>
>And legislators were prepared to vote on a proposed amendment to the state
>constitution that would seek to make the court's ruling moot by defining as
>marriage as a union between one man and one woman — thus expressly making
>same-sex marriages illegal in Massachusetts.
>
>What the case represented, both sides agree, was a significant new milestone
>in a year that has seen broad new recognitions of gay rights in America,
>Canada and abroad, including a June U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites)
>decision striking a Texas ban on gay sex.
>
>Legal experts, however, said that the long-awaited decision, while clearly
>stating that it is unconstitutional to bar gay couples from marriage, gave
>ambiguous instructions to the state Legislature.
>
>Lawmakers remained uncertain if civil unions went far enough to live up to
>the court's ruling — or if actual marriages were required.
>
>When a similar decision was issued in Vermont in 1999, the court told the
>Legislature that it could allow gay couples to marry or create a parallel
>institution that conveys all the state rights and benefits of marriage. The
>Legislature chose the second route, leading to the approval of civil unions
>in that state.
>
>The Massachusetts decision made no mention of an alternative solution, but
>instead pointed to a recent decision in Ontario, Canada, that changed the
>common law definition of marriage to include same-sex couples and led to the
>issuance of marriage licenses there.
>
>The state "has failed to identify any constitutionally adequate reason for
>denying civil marriage to same-sex couples," the court wrote. "Barred access
>to the protections, benefits and obligations of civil marriage, a person who
>enters into an intimate, exclusive union with another of the same sex is
>arbitrarily deprived of membership in one of our community's most rewarding
>and cherished institutions."
>
>The Massachusetts case began in 2001, when seven gay couples went to their
>city and town halls to obtain marriage licenses. All were denied, leading
>them to sue the state Department of Public Health (news - web sites), which
>administers the state's marriage laws.
>
>A Suffolk Superior Court judge threw out the case in 2002, ruling that
>nothing in state law gives gay couples the right to marry. The couples
>immediately appealed to the Supreme Judicial Court, which heard arguments in
>March.
>
>The plaintiffs argued that barring them from marrying a partner of the same
>sex denied them access to an intrinsic human experience and violated basic
>constitutional rights.
>
>Over the past decade, Massachusetts' high court has expanded the legal
>parameters of family, ruling that same-sex couples can adopt children and
>devising child visitation right for a former partner of a lesbian.
>
>Massachusetts has one of the highest concentrations of gay households in the
>country with at 1.3 percent of the total number of coupled households,
>according to the 2000 census. In California, 1.4 percent of the coupled
>households are occupied by same-sex partners. Vermont and New York also
>registered at 1.3 percent, while in Washington, D.C., the rate is 5.1
>percent.