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From the New Jersey Star-Ledger

Civil Unions Fall Short of Marriage, State Discovers


by Robert Schwaneberg
Friday, November 2, 2007

New Jersey's 8-month-old civil union law has failed to live up to its promise of giving same-sex couples all the protections of marriage by another name, the state's top official for enforcing civil rights said yesterday.

Civil Rights Director Frank Vespa-Papaleo, who chairs a commission that recently concluded three hearings on how the new law is working, said, "To me as a commissioner, the testimony revealed overwhelmingly that the civil union law has been a failure."

"It is not working as effectively as if the word 'marriage' were used," Vespa-Papaleo said. "That could be controversial. I could lose my job for saying that."

Vespa-Papaleo, who serves at the pleasure of the governor, was appointed to his job in 2002 by then-Gov. James E. McGreevey and was kept on by Govs. Richard Codey and Jon Corzine.

It is well known that Corzine is open to discussing gay marriage in 2009 but does not want to confront the issue during the presidential campaign, when it could be "hijacked by the right wing," in the words of his press secretary, Lilo Stainton.

Stainton said yesterday that Corzine "feels the law, from where he sits, is working OK" but does not regard it as "a complete success" in treating couples in civil unions the same as married couples.

Vespa-Papaleo said civil unions are a "magnificent advance," but the law requires his commission to study whether they are as good as marriage.

"That's not my yardstick; that's the yardstick laid out by the Legislature," he said. By that measure, he said, civil unions have failed.

As an example, Vespa-Papaleo cited the initial refusal of UPS to provide health benefits to the civil union partners of its unionized workers in New Jersey, even though it provides such benefits to married gay couples in Massachusetts. UPS ultimately reversed its position, but Vespa-Papaleo said that was due to persuasion by Corzine, who took up the cause of UPS drivers in New Jersey.

He said the three hearings that concluded Oct. 24 produced "real stories" of how couples in civil unions are denied rights extended to their married counterparts.

"We even had testimony that it will not necessarily improve over time. That's been the experience in Vermont, which has had civil unions for 7 1/2 years," Vespa-Papaleo said.

Supporters of gay marriage dominated the hearings. One of the few opponents to testify was Len Deo, president of the New Jersey Family Policy Council, who said that of more than 1,500 couples that have formed civil unions, only six had complained to Vespa-Papaleo's agency that their rights had been violated.

"That's an infinitesimal amount," Deo said yesterday. "Obviously, it's working pretty well. Anytime any new law is created, there are always little glitches that need to be worked out."

The gay advocacy group Garden State Equality has received 369 complaints of civil unions being dishonored, according to its chairman, Steven Goldstein, who is also vice chairman of the Civil Union Review Commission.

Vespa-Papaleo said it is "not uncommon for people to go to advocacy groups first. That's usually the path that civil rights takes."

John Tomicki, chairman of the New Jersey Coalition to Preserve and Protect Marriage, said he did not testify at the hearings because it would be "like going to a rigged sporting event." His coalition is circulating petitions in support of a constitutional amendment that would define marriage as the union of a man and a woman -- as it has been, he said, "for thousands of years."

Goldstein said opponents of gay marriage were largely absent from the hearings "because they don't have real-life stories to back up the argument that allowing gay marriage would hurt the institution."