NewsWrap
for the week ending December 4, 2004
(As broadcast on This Way Out program #871, distributed 12-6-04)
[Written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Graham Underhill, Rex Wockner, and 
Greg Gordon]


Reported this week by Christopher Gaal and Cindy Friedman


  South African gays and lesbians could be legally marrying within a year, 
following a landmark ruling this week by the Supreme Court of Appeal.  Marie 
Fourie and Cecilia Bonthuys, a couple for twelve years, challenged the definition 
of marriage in common law as between "a man and a woman", given South 
Africa's constitutional prohibition of sexual orientation discrimination.  That 
definition was the reason the Pretoria High Court refused to recognize their 
marriage two years ago.  But this week it was openly gay Judge Edwin Cameron who 
announced the higher court's majority opinion that the definition should read, 
"Marriage is the union of two persons to the exclusion of all others for life."  
Fourie and Bonthuys believe they can marry right away, but Lesbian and Gay 
Equality Project director Evert Knoesen says that's not true for others -- yet:
Evert Knoesen:  "Even though the judgment was in favor of the appellants it's 
not possible for people of the same sex to be currently married.  This is due 
to the limitations in the current marriage formula and other regulations in 
the Marriage Act.  We have to go ahead with legal action to fix up those 
somewhat more minor legal problems, and we foresee that within the next twelve 
months or so same-sex couples will indeed be married, but the principle has been 
won."
Some people believe there are many other laws which will have to be amended 
as well, plus revisions to official forms -- and the government, which opposed 
the couple in this case, is not always timely in making such revisions in 
response to court actions.
And while South African courts have awarded a long string of important 
victories to gays and lesbians, legislators have lagged far behind.  That's not 
surprising since a recent major poll found that 78% of South Africans believe 
homosexual acts are "always wrong" while less than seven percent believe they're 
"not wrong at all".
This week's ruling drew immediate protest from the opposition African 
Christian Democratic Party as well as a number of religious groups.


  Legislatures in several other nations are actively considering legal 
recognition of gay and lesbian couples.
New Zealand gays and lesbians are hoping for their Government's bill to 
create civil unions legally equivalent to marriage to be enacted this month.  It 
had its second reading in the parliament this week and passed by a vote of 
65-to-55.  That may seem similar to the vote on the first reading of 66-to-50, but 
there are many reports that support is eroding in the face of intense 
lobbying.  Although it may be close, the bill is generally expected to win its final 
vote in the coming week.  Opponents are now trying two tactics: amending the 
bill to open civil unions to any two adults including blood relations and to 
require a referendum on the issue.


  The Czech Republic's Chamber of Deputies debated a registered partnerships 
bill on its second reading last week.  Although deputies from several parties 
introduced the bill together, the only party that isn't divided on the bill is 
opposed to it.  Debate centered on allegations that partnerships would 
threaten and weaken heterosexual families.  The final vote is about two weeks away 
and its outcome is still unclear.  Czech Deputies have rejected 3 similar 
proposals in the past.


  Poland's Senate gave 62% preliminary approval this week to a bill to create 
registered partnerships, although if the many Senators abstaining had all 
joined the opposition it would have created a tie.  The vote is remarkable for 
heavily Roman Catholic Poland.  The Senate agreed to property and inheritance 
rights and next-of-kin status for same-gender partners, but rejected joint tax 
returns, adoptions and the use of a shared surname.  The bill moves now to the 
lower house, where it's expected to fail.


  Germany's Senate last week approved a bill to upgrade the status of 
existing registered partnerships there.  The Senate followed the lower house in 
adding survivor's pension rights and co-adoption of a partner's children to the 
numerous benefits of registration.  But German partnerships still fall short of 
marriage in areas including inheritance and taxation.
  In Canada last week, a parliamentary committee denied a floor vote to a 
private member's bill to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman.  
Through provincial court rulings, most Canadian gays and lesbians can now 
marry, but the federal Government has chosen to await the Supreme Court of Canada's 
response to its questions before introducing national legislation for 
marriage equality.  The high court's findings are expected in the coming week.


  Also in Canada, the Ontario Court of Appeal -- the province's highest court 
-- last week emphatically upheld retroactive survivor payments from the 
Canada Pension Plan for same-gender partners.  Although Canada had established 
equal treatment under the pension program in 2000, it had provided for it 
retroactive only to 1998.  Gay and lesbian couples won a ruling from a trial court 
that extended the benefits back to 1985, the year the national Charter of Rights 
and Freedoms went into effect to prohibit discrimination.


  But Australia's Senate this week rejected a proposal to extend pension 
benefits to the same-gender partners of military personnel, flouting an order from 
the quasi-judicial United Nations Human Rights Commission.  Although the 
Australian Defence Force has been open to gays for years, it has never extended 
spousal benefits to their partners, and the Australian Government has ignored 
the UN body's order.  Openly gay Australian Democrat from West Australia Brian 
Greig introduced an amendment to the Veterans Bill for equal treatment, but the 
Coalition Government and Labor, the largest opposition party, joined in 
rejecting it.


  The U.S. ban on military service by open gays and lesbians took a hit in a 
federal appeals court this week.  A number of colleges, universities and law 
schools across the country had previously barred military recruiters from their 
campuses under policies that generally barred prospective employers that 
discriminated on the basis of sexual orientation.  But a 1996 measure known as the 
Solomon Amendment authorized withholding all federal funding from schools 
that refused to allow military recruitment.  That prospect of lost funds forced 
many schools to make the military an exception to their non-discrimination 
policies, particularly when the Department of Defense began to actively threaten 
schools after George W. Bush became President.  But 25 law schools joined to 
fight the requirement, filing a federal lawsuit claiming the Solomon Amendment 
violated their constitutional right to free speech.  A two-to-one majority of a 
panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit agreed, overturning a 
trial court ruling and declaring that the funding threat illegally compelled 
schools "to express a message that is incompatible with their educational 
objectives."
Harvard Law School, while not a party to the lawsuit, reinstated its ban on 
military recruiters as soon as the decision was handed down.


  In one of the most extensively reported stories ever about something that 
won't happen, the U.S. Supreme Court this week declined to hear a challenge to 
the Massachusetts state Supreme Judicial Court decision that opened marriage 
to same-gender couples there.  As is usually the case in the thousands of 
denials it issues each year, the justices offered no explanation.  The rejection 
was no surprise to legal groups working both for and against marriage equality.  
The historic Goodridge decision was made by a state court regarding a state 
law on a matter the U.S. constitution leaves to the states, so it's not easy to 
justify federal intervention.  The appeal by the Florida-based Liberty 
Counsel on behalf of Robert Largess of Massachusetts' Catholic Action League and 
eleven state legislators claims that their state court's action violates the 
constitutional guarantee of a "republican form of government" -- that the 
Massachusetts judiciary usurped the authority of the state legislature.  It's an 
unusual approach the nation's highest court has considered in just one case in 90 
years.  Massachusetts' state Attorney-General Thomas O'Reilly counters the 
claim, noting that the states' citizens retain control of the policy.  In fact 
this year the state legislature took the first step in a long process to amend 
the Massachusetts constitution to exclude gays and lesbians from marriage while 
allowing them its benefits through civil unions.


  Reporters raised the issue in a White House press briefing, where President 
George W. Bush's spokesperson Scott McLellan said, "The President remains 
firmly committed to moving forward on a constitutional amendment that would allow 
the voice of the people to be heard and involve states in this process.  And 
that's different from allowing the activist judges to redefine this without 
the people's voice being heard."  The press secretary referred repeatedly to 
"the sanctity of marriage" and the "sacred institution," and to the electoral 
success of 11 state constitutional amendments to restrict marriage to 
heterosexual couples, as he was pressed on the point that the proposed Federal Marriage 
Amendment appears to deny states the option to open marriage to gays and 
lesbians.


  And finally... reports continue to come in of lesbigays and liberals 
planning to leave the U.S. in the wake of President Bush's election to a second 
term.  But while most of them are hoping to emigrate to Canada, a group in Vermont 
is working to bring Canada home.
As a border state, there's always been a lot of traffic between Vermont and 
Quebec.  The group admires Canada's foreign policy, universal health care and 
lower crime rate.
And of course gay and lesbian couples can now legally marry in most of 
Canada, while Vermont was the first U.S. state to create civil unions carrying all 
the state-level benefits and responsibilities of marriage.
So the goal of the group VermontCanada -- their Web site is VermontCanada.org 
-- is to have Vermont secede from the U.S. and become Canada's 11th province.