Organizations file briefs for Calif. same-sex marriage court cases

Four civil rights groups filed briefs with the California supreme court last week, arguing that the state violates its own constitution by denying same-sex couples the right to marry. The American Civil Liberties Union, Equality California, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and Lambda Legal filed the briefs for the coordinated marriage cases now before the court in response to the state’s defense of the discriminatory law.

Appellants in earlier cases asserted that same-sex couples do not have the right to marry under due process of the law because marriage, by definition, is between a man and a woman. The brief argues that the state’s prohibition of same-sex marriage infringes on basic rights and discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation and gender.

Another argument that the brief counters is the presumption that marriage is intended for procreation. However, the groups state that the elderly, infertile people, or those who cannot procreate have the right to marry as long as they are heterosexual, but gays and lesbians do not.

The court agreed to hear the case in 2006 after the state’s court of appeal reversed a decision by a San Francisco superior court judge who ruled that banning same-sex marriage was unconstitutional.

Lambda Legal senior counsel Jennifer Pizer said in a statement that anything less than marriage is a “confusing twilight zone” for gay and lesbian couples. “We know this because we answer the distress calls every day—calls that began with the first statewide domestic partner bill in 1999 and haven’t slowed as the law broadened over the years. To the contrary, the distress calls have increased as more couples register, hoping to shield their families, and encounter inconsistent, incomplete protections. We’ve welcomed the supreme court’s invitation to explain how far domestic partnerships fall short of full marriage.”

"By design," the brief reads, "domestic partnership is a functional status for providing legal benefits to same-sex couples while withholding the unique government approbation and support conveyed by marriage. Predictably, this creates a barrier that makes it difficult for others to understand, to respect, or to see lesbian and gay men's committed relationships as similar to their own. As the court of appeal rightly observed [in Knight v. Superior Court, 2005], 'the legislature has not...granted domestic partners the same statutes as marries spouses.'"

More than 250 religious and civil rights organizations will also file amicus briefs in support of same-sex marriage on September 17; some include the National Black Justice Coalition, the Asian Pacific American Legal Center, and the California Council of Churches.