New Jersey: gays due marriage benefits but no right to marry
on Oct 25, 2006 at 3:18 pm
The New Jersey Supreme Court, relying on the state constitution, ruled on Wednesday that the state must provide same-sex couples the “same rights and benefits” that opposite-sex couples have under state marriage laws. The court split 4-3 in ruling that gay couples do not have a right to marriage, leaving that open as an option for the legislature to enact.
Here is the court’s statement of its holding: “Denying committed same-sex couples the financial and social benefits and privileges given to their married heterosexual counterparts bears no substantial relationship to a legitimate governmental purpose. The Court holds that under equal protection guarantee of Article I, Paragraph 1 of the New Jersey Constitution, committed same-sex couples must be afforded on equal terms the same rights and benefits enjoyed by opposite-sex couples under the civil marriage statutes. The name to be given to the statutory scheme that provides full rights and benefits to same-sex couples, whether marriage or some other term, is a matter left to the democratic process.”
The majority declared that “to bring the state into compliance with Article I, Paragvraph 1 so that plaintiffs can exercise their full constitutional rights, the legislature must either amend the marriage statutes or enact an appropriate statutory structure within 180 days of the date of this decision.” The majority, however, said that the legislature would be free to “frame a civil union style structure” or to open marriage to same-sex couples, at its option.
The court was divided 4-3 on the question of whether gay couples were entitled to marry. The dissenters argued that same-sex couples are equally entitled to formal marriage status under state law. The dissenters closed their opinion this way: “On this day, the majority parses plaintiffs’ right to hold that plaintiffs must have access to the tangible benefits of state-sanctioned heterosexual marriage. I would extend the court’s mandate to require that same-sex couples have access to the ‘status’ of marriage and all that the status of marriage entails.”
Because the ruling is based upon the state constitution, there appear to be no federal issues involved — unless the New Jersey legislature were to grant formal marital status to gay couples; that would implicate the federal Defense of Marriage Act, which denies federal benefits to marriages other than those of opposite-sex couples. At some point, the validity of that federal law is likely to be tested in the U.S. Supreme Court.
The ruling came in the case of Lewis, et al., v. Harris, et al. (docket A-68-05). The 90-page opinion (syllabus plus a 66-page majority opinion and 20-page concurring and dissenting option) is available at the state Supreme Court’s website, found here. If that site is not accessible, there is a link to the opinion here.
The majority opinion was written by Justice Barry T. Albin, and was joined by Justices Jaynee LaVecchia, Roberto A. Rivera-Soto and John E. Wallace, Jr. Chief Justice Deborah T. Poritz wrote the concurring and dissenting opinion, joined by Justices Virginia Long and James R. Zazzali.
