Chicago Tribune Editorial - Legalize civil unions

Chicago Tribune Editorial - Legalize civil unions
Copyright © 2009, Chicago Tribune
April 27, 2009
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/editorials/chi-0427edit1apr27,0,3301225.story


The idea of letting gays and lesbians marry hasn't lost its power to polarize. Some 350 people rallied this month at the Iowa statehouse in Des Moines to protest the state Supreme Court's decision mandating recognition of gay marriage. Californians are still at odds after voters approved a November ballot initiative amending the constitution to ban it. Vermont legislators this month barely overrode the governor's veto of a bill legalizing gay marriage.

Unnoticed in the uproar is that most Americans favor extending the benefits and obligations of marriage to same-sex couples -- just as long as it goes by a different name. Call it marriage, and most people bridle. Call it a civil union, and some 55 percent of citizens are in favor.

It's safe to say public opinion in Illinois runs pretty much the same. Yet state lawmakers haven't gotten around to doing something that is both popular and valuable: providing state recognition of civil unions.

A bill sponsored by Rep. Greg Harris (D-Chicago), which appears to have a reasonable chance of passage, would change that. It would grant adult couples, gay or straight, the right to enter into civil unions that, under state law, would be equivalent to marriage in everything but name.

If it's enacted, gay couples will gain the right to do things that heterosexuals take for granted: make emergency medical decisions and funeral arrangements for a partner, visit each other in the hospital and share a nursing home room. More important, perhaps, it will protect kids by placing same-sex couples that split up under the same rules that govern divorce, while assuring access to survivor benefits when a de facto parent dies.

By this compromise, the state would promote long-term commitments and the well-being of children. But it would avoid the intense emotions that surge around anything altering the traditional definition of marriage, which for many people has deep religious meaning. Harris' bill stipulates that no religious entity may be forced to bless such unions.

This option won't satisfy fierce advocates on either side of the gay marriage debate. But it would bring Illinois law into line with the feelings of the public, which doesn't want to punish gays or their kids but also doesn't want to pronounce on matters of faith.

Legalizing civil unions won't end the battle over same-sex marriage. But it will offer protections that gay couples now don't have.