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Page: Profile: Wren's Nest News Local
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Article: 17935
[Civil]
Date Posted:
5/31/2007
3:56:50 pm EDT
Wvox Stats
Views: 6,233
RSS: 23,333
Comments: 11
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New Hampshire Governor Signs Civil Unions Bill
Author: AP Source: MSNBC
Title: NEW HAMPSHIRE GOVERNOR SIGNS CIVIL UNIONS BILL
Gay couples in New Hampshire can start applying for many of the rights and responsibilities of marriage as early as January under a law Gov. John Lynch signed Thursday establishing civil unions.
“We in New Hampshire have had a long and proud tradition taking the lead in opposing discrimination,” Lynch said. “Today that tradition continues.”
Couples who enter civil unions will have the same rights, responsibilities and obligations as married couples. Same-sex unions from other states also would be recognized if they were legal in the state where they were performed.
Submitted by and Thanks to: Eran
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Community Thoughts: There are 11 comments posted | Reverse Sort |
| Which Back Of The Bus? | Jun 2nd. at 8:34:13 am EDT
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Terry (Irvington, Virginia) - Email Me
It's clear in these legal and political tactical frauds of civil union bills, lots of people are being forced to the backs of buses, and many of those end up crammed out the windows and some shoved onto the street and run over.
However, who's being sent to the rear, and who's getting the seats up front?
Anyone who values civil and human rights might well think the folks defined into civil union bills are at the front, the "marriage" crowd at the rear, and both poly's and persons who enter serious economic and functional relationships but don't believe in involving government in personal affairs are run over by the next bus of either flavor, due to far larger defects in legal and political process. Likewise, singles by choice who get the short end of the stick in many ways other than those related to mutual agency legal aspects of partnerships are also shafted, no matter what government calls special privileges and benefits designated in law for public favors to domestic partners who openly contract via government.
The primary need is not to eliminate "marriage laws" and separate but unequal injustices which civil union laws failing to repeal government meddling in "marriage" create, as if we haven't been there before. (Sex discrimination via bathroom and locker room building codes and discrimination law exemptions are another such major hurdle, to end religious prejudices (and their institutionalized, subconscious artifacts disjoined from historic church roots) behind "nudity" and "lewdness" laws which by design are inherently discriminatory.)
The primary need is a larger level playing field, such that there aren't thousands of tax, insurance, employment, government program, and other privileges or benefits which are unequal based on one's chosen family structures or legal hoop jumping skills or trade offs. That's a tricky mess in a system inherently designed to pander to special interests and circumvent if not maliciously clusterfvck legal obligations of equal protections and privacy.
By comparison, court decisions to ban "marriage laws" which go beyond civil partnership contract process for any number and sexes of persons choosing mutual legal agency, and political cleanups to match, are simple no-brainers by comparison. Only corrupt bigot neighbors, and the politicians they elect whose actions merit hanging or snipers under fundamental US law when lesser mechanisms fail, stand in the way of that comparatively simple legal reform. Such reform doesn't just get government out of personal sides of church operations, but in most states could end government licensing, bonding, or other legal regulation or coercion of clergy to act as unpaid state agents when officiating marriages (which not all states do, since it's no longer within state rights post-14th Amendment, nor justifiable based on historic assumptions that clergy are educated but persons marrying cannot always complete a simple half page form) .
Given the mess of legal and political process, more astute activists either oppose separate but not really equal civil union laws alongside archaic marriage laws, or promote them knowing they set up legal traps which will invite further litigation since this style of law mitigates one set of legal issues, while aggravating another, and ignoring the bigger picture of true level playing fields by default over the maze of underlying functional and economic issues linked to but not defined by either "marriage" or "civil unions". That bigger picture, incredibly vast and complex, is the tough challenge to somehow clean up, mostly by ending government involvement in so many areas of our lives that most current government programs cannot protect privacy rights or operate without de facto if not malicious discrimination, other than by their elimination.
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| Get Rid Of Marriage Entirely | Jun 1st. at 11:38:38 pm EDT
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Shadowbear (Hillsboro, Oregon) - Email Me
States should only have civil unions or domestic partnerships. Their mandate only extends to property issues and financial responsibility, not to "marriage" which is a religious issue. Catholics, Episcopalians & Mormons do not recognize civil divorce as ending the marriage, you must get a church divorce to be "unmarried." Marriage or handfasting or whatever else you call your magic regigious joining of two people is between you and your family & religious group, not the state. Likewise you should be able to form a domestic partnership with anyone, sex not withstanding (and I mean whether or not you have a romantic sexual relationship - just think of a couple of old crones wanting to own property together) that defines certain abilities - to jointly have health insurance from one partners employment, to inherit without probate, sign hospital consent forms etc. - these are all things the state might have a legitimate interest in and a registered partnership would make it clear who had what rights from whom.
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| Okay... | Jun 1st. at 10:50:21 pm EDT
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Erihu (Sunset Beach, North Carolina) - Email Me
If civil unions are simply an agreement not solemnized by a church, then don't all state have this already? My husband and I were married at the courthouse, and not by a judge, either, just a clerk. (We later had a handfasting, but I'm sure that's neither here nor there to the gov't) . So, is that a civil union, or a marriage? I understand that in New Hampshire, a civil union will have all the benefits of marriage. Well, except one apparently; their unions won't be recognized in states where civil unions aren't allowed. Which brings me back to my question; are marriages performed in a courthouse, not a church, considered civil unions? If so, then all states do this already, and at least for opposite sex couples, these unions are recognized in any other state. Why wouldn't ANY civil union, regardless of the gender of the participants, be recognized in every state?
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| As The US Supreme Court Said | Jun 1st. at 9:55:53 am EDT
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Dana D Eilers (North Chatham, Massachusetts) - Email Me
As forward as this might be, I keep remembering the words of the US Supreme Court in the school segregation cases: "Separate but equal is NOT equal."
Go to the back of the bus, Rosa.
Dana D. Eilers
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| Not Good Enough. | Jun 1st. at 8:04:46 am EDT
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Paul Matisz (Peterborough, Ontario) - Email Me
"Civil Unions" are not marriage. Even if all the "rights" are the same, calling it something different for same-sex couples is still discrimination.
Saying "you can't get married, but you can have a same-sex civil union" is a little like saying "you can ride the bus, but you still have to sit at the back."
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| As An Interesting Side Note, | Jun 1st. at 7:59:09 am EDT
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Eran Rathan (Old Town, Maine) - Email Me
New Hampshire marriage laws expressly forbid anyone from out-of-state marrying in NH if the purpose of marrying in NH is to avoid the laws of their home state or territory.
One wonders if that section of the laws were amended with this bill...
Eran Rathan
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| Good! | Jun 1st. at 1:00:43 am EDT
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Amtehuti (Queens, Florida) - Email Me
Now, if only that would happen here so the government would recognize what some of us already determined in our hearts: we don't need a patronizing government telling us what is or isn't "true" love.
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