A Step in the Right Direction for Washington State

On my way home from school I happened to glance at a Seattle Times newspaper stand as I walked by. I was very happy to read that the Washington State Senate has passed a bill creating 'domestic partnerships' which provide some of the same legal rights as marriage does. Governor Gregoire has said she supports the bill, so she is expected to sign it if it passes the house. Domestic parnerhips will provide hospital visitation, inheritance, funeral arrangement rights, as well as a few other rights. Hopefully this is just a stepping stone to establishing equal marriage rights for gay couples in the next few years.
The Seattle Times article has an interesting map showing the states that have same-sex partnership laws and the states that have legislation pending. Washington will be the seventh such state.

I have to applaud Sen. Dale Brandland from Bellingham who was the only republican to vote for the bill. Dale cited hearing Charlene Strong speak as the reason he voted for the bill. Charlene spoke in the senate earlier about being denied the right to visit her life partner, who later died, in the hospital after her partner was trapped in her basement studio by rising storm water. Way to go Dale; way to put principle over party.

I should note that in general I oppose conferring special economic rights on married couples, but because the current government sanctioning of marriage is not likely to change anytime soon, I support equal application to heterosexual couples and homosexual couples.

Freedom To Marry Week

February 12-17 is Freedom To Marry week, started by the organization Freedom To Marry, during which groups around the country have parties, host debates, write op-ed pieces and collect signatures on the Marriage Resolution which states:

Because marriage is a basic human right and an individual choice,
RESOLVED, the State should not interfere with same-gender couples who choose to marry and share fully and equally in the rights, responsibilities and commitment of civil marriage.

I went out with the Libertarian group at the UW and to collect signatures. We bought a ton of cheap after-Valentine's day candy and had a tabling event on the HUB lawn. Astrid and I even made a pretty banner with hearts that said "Freedom To Marry week; Liberty Requires Tolerance," but it was really windy so we couldn't put it up. We collected a TON of signed resolutions, and we had a good time. Two groups of Mormons were out, one tabling and one on mission. We talked to them and tried to get them to sign the resolution, and they seemed surprisingly amiable to it. The tabling group read the proposal, and talked a little bit about how the Prophets didn't really say anything about the issue but they didn't seem very interested in the issue and didn't sign the resolution. Later, we talked to the guys on mission, and they said they couldn't sign it while they were on mission, but gave us a thumbs up on the issue. There was also a Muslim guy who came to talk to us who said it would be lying if he signed it since it was against his religion, but I pointed out that the resolution wasn't about religious marriage, just civil marriage so he said he did support that, and ended up signing the resolution. Yay!
A bit on my position on marriage:
While I don't think that the government should sponsor the marriage relationship, I realize that it is not going to stop any time soon. If the government is going to sponsor marriage, then I think it has to do it evenly, and not discriminate. Hence my support for Freedom To Marry.