Jul 14, 2006  |  By: LOU CHIBBARO J  | COMMENTS     

Gay rights advocates say they will press ahead with lawsuits seeking to overturn laws banning same-sex marriage in at least seven more states following a ruling last week by New York’s highest court, which rejected a similar suit.

Just four days after that decision, the California Court of Appeals heard arguments from gay marriage proponents who claimed, as they did in New York, that prohibiting same-sex couples from marrying violates the state constitution’s equal protection clause.

“The judges in California are not likely to make the same mistake that the New York court made,” said Jennifer Pizer, an attorney for Lambda Legal Defense & Education Fund, who presented oral arguments before the California court.

The California attorney general’s office did not defend the state’s heterosexual-only marriage law by adopting the reasoning of the New York court that “the welfare of children” justified excluding gay couples from marrying.

Instead, according to Pizer, the A.G. argued “the discriminatory status quo should remain because the comprehensive domestic partnership [statute in California] is good enough.

“But, we’re not arguing under the ‘good enough’ protection clause,” she noted, “it’s the equal protection clause.”

Pizer and other gay rights attorneys criticized a 4-2 ruling that the New York Court of Appeals handed down July 6 upholding the state’s marriage law. The ruling held that the New York State Legislature acted within the bounds of the state constitution more than 100 years earlier when it restricted marriage to a union between a man and a woman.

 The ruling said the legislature based its action, in part, on the legitimate belief that heterosexual marriage protects the welfare of children. It rejected arguments by Lambda on behalf of 44 same-sex couples in New York that such a belief was irrational and based on anti-gay bias.

“Plaintiffs have not persuaded us that this long-accepted restriction is a wholly irrational one, based solely on ignorance and prejudice against homosexuals,” wrote Judge Robert S. Smith. Writing for a court plurality that included himself and two other judges, Smith said the New York marriage law was constitutional and any change in the law would have to come from the state legislature.

A fourth judge also sided with upholding the statute, lending a majority to the ultimate result. Two out of the six judges hearing the case dissented from the decision and would have required the state to marry gay couples. A seventh judge did not participate in the case.

While the New York court held that limiting marriage to heterosexual couples served the legitimate aim of protecting the welfare of children raised in those households, a study released one day after that ruling concluded that allowing gay couples to marry would benefit children raised by those couples.

Anti-gay laws ‘hurt families’

The Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics report was based on a review of recent and past studies and showed that same-sex civil marriage would be beneficial to children of same-sex parents.

“We conclude that civil marriage is beneficial to children, regardless of the gender of the parents, because it strengthens families and helps foster financial and legal security, psychosocial stability, and an augmented sense of societal acceptance and support,” said Ellen C. Perrin, director of Tufts-New England Medical Center’s pediatrics center in Boston and one of the authors of the study.

“This study reaffirms that hundreds of thousands of American children are thriving in homes headed by same-sex couples and that discriminatory laws denying marriage and civil unions will only hurt families, not protect them,” Perrin said.

Officials with Lambda Legal and the Empire State Pride Agenda, a New York gay advocacy group, said they would immediately launch a campaign calling on the New York State Legislature to pass legislation allowing same-sex couples to marry. Eliot Spitzer, the presumptive Democratic nominee for governor and odds-on favorite to win the post in the fall, has already promised his support.

Other national gay groups, including the Human Rights Campaign and the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force, said they would help activists in New York and other states push for same-sex marriage legislation.

“What I’m hearing from other state groups is disappointment in the New York decision, especially the wording,” said Toni Broaddus, executive director of the Equality Federation, which represents statewide gay groups.

“But what everyone also says is we are committed to work on this over the long haul,” said Broaddus.

She said achieving passage of laws permitting same-sex marriage could take 10 to 15 years in some states.

Other suits move forward

Gay rights attorneys, meanwhile, said they are moving forward with the California case and lawsuits challenging gay marriage ...