NewsWrap for the week ending February 5, 2005 (As broadcast on This Way Out program #880, distributed 2-7-05) [Written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Graham Underhill, Rex Wockner, and Greg Gordon] Reported this week by Cindy Friedman and Jon Beaupré The Canadian Government this week introduced in the Parliament its bill to open marriage to same-gender couples. The actual text is very simple, stating four clauses: "This Act may be cited as the Civil Marriage Act. Marriage, for civil purposes, is the lawful union of two persons to the exclusion of all others. It is recognized that officials of religious groups are free to refuse to perform marriages that are not in accordance with their religious beliefs. For greater certainty, a marriage is not void or voidable by reason only that the spouses of are of the same sex." The much lengthier preamble emphasizes constitutional guarantees of equal treatment, cites the opinions of the Supreme Court of Canada and provincial courts, and asserts that "nothing in this Act affects the guarantee of freedom of conscience and religion". The preamble closes with the declaration, "[I]n order to reflect values of tolerance, respect and equality consistent with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, access to marriage for civil purposes should be extended by legislation to couples of the same sex." The bill also contains "consequential amendments" to eight existing federal laws. Perhaps the most significant would redefine "spouse" in the Divorce Act from its current hetero-specific phrasing to "either of two persons who are married to each other" -- the thousands of gay and lesbian Canadians who have already legally married in the wake of provincial court rulings have ironically not yet gained the right to divorce. Another consequential amendment removes gender specificity from the law that prohibits marriage between relatives. Others serve to ensure full recognition to same-gender marriages for taxation and other financial purposes. An extended debate on the bill is expected to begin at its second reading in the House of Commons in mid-February, a debate the Government hopes will end with it being sent to a Parliamentary committee formed specifically to review it. But the largest Opposition party, the Conservatives, have vowed to bring forward "every possible amendment" and use "every device we can" to fight the bill. And while the bill is expected to pass, it could be a very close vote. Enactment requires the support of at least 154 Members of Parliament, but a poll of the Commons by the "Globe & Mail" newspaper found only 139 MPs willing to declare their support. 118 declared their opposition. About half of the remaining 49 did not respond to the survey, with the rest either undecided or unwilling to state their position. None of the parliamentary parties is unanimous on the issue, but the biggest division is within the ruling Liberal Party itself. Some 25 or 30 Liberal backbenchers oppose the Government's bill and are free to vote their conscience, while the 38 Liberal Cabinet members are under party discipline to support it. The Tories are arguing most strongly that religious freedom is not adequately protected despite the Government's repeated reassurances. While no church could be forced to perform a marriage ceremony for a gay or lesbian couple, Tory Justice spokesperson Vic Toews cited some situations in which religious beliefs have clashed with equality rights in various provinces: participation in a church-based marriage preparation class, rental for a wedding of a space owned by a religious group, and a job requirement that civil marriage commissioners perform same-gender marriages despite their personal religious beliefs. In fact seven of the 67 marriage commissioners in Newfoundland -- more than 10%, and six of them mayors -- have chosen to quit their jobs by a provincial Justice Department deadline this week, rather than perform marriages for gays and lesbians in the latest province to allow that. At least one had unsuccessfully sought a religious exemption. While Canada's federal leadership moves legislation to establish marriage equality, the U.S. administration continues to move to prohibit it. In his State of the Union address this week, Republican President George W. Bush said: "Because marriage is a sacred institution and the foundation of society, it should not be re-defined by activist judges. For the good of families, children, and society, I support a constitutional amendment to protect the institution of marriage." While that federal constitutional amendment has been reintroduced, it is not expected to advance soon, but many U.S. state legislatures are working to amend their own state constitutions. This week the Kansas House of Representatives gave 70% final approval to a proposed amendment to both exclude same-gender couples from marriage and to restrict the rights of marriage to married couples. The Kansas Senate had already passed the measure, which will go before the voters in early April. Although a similar proposal last year fell short of the two-thirds majority required in the House and Senate, November elections ousted some of its opponents in favor of supporters who made the difference. Also this week, the South Dakota House affirmed by 80% a proposed constitutional amendment to define marriage exclusively as between a man and a woman. That measure will go next to the state Senate. Despite its heavy momentum, the movement for constitutional amendments against same-gender marriage is not a total juggernaut. In the Idaho Senate this week, one such proposal fell three votes short of the required two-thirds majority despite 60% support. But as in Canada, it's the courts in the U.S. that have led the way to marriage equality, and this week a New York state trial court ruled for it. New York's first legal decision to declare it unconstitutional to deny marriage to same-gender couples came from Justice Doris Ling-Cohan in a lawsuit brought by Lambda Legal on behalf of five gay and lesbian couples against New York City for denying them marriage licenses. The judge found the heterosexual requirement for marriage violates both the U.S. and the New York state constitutional guarantees of due process and equal protection under the law. She wrote that the gender-specific language of New York's Domestic Relations Law "shall be construed to apply equally to either men or women." But she also stayed the effect of that finding for 30 days to allow the defendant, New York City, to take action. This ruling has no force beyond the city limits, and for that reason the New York state Attorney-General's office has indicated it will not get involved despite Republican Governor George Pataki's belief the judge was wrong, but an appeal is being hotly debated within the city government. An appeal has already been filed in another similar New York lawsuit for marriage equality in which a state trial court upheld the exclusion of same-gender couples from marriage. At least 3 other New York state judges have also upheld the existing law, including one this week in Ulster County. One conservative news source went beyond the now-standard "activist judges" rhetoric to label Ling-Cohan in its headline "aberrant judge". An appeal of a recent ruling on U.S. military recruitment was urged this week by 80% of the U.S. House of Representatives. Recently a federal appeals court struck down the so-called Solomon Amendment, which allowed the government to withhold federal funding from universities that barred military recruiters from campuses. A number of schools had done so because the military's ban on service by open gays and lesbians violated their own policies against on-campus recruiting by discriminatory employers. But in the wake of the 1995 enactment of the Solomon Amendment, and particularly when threats of its enforcement were stepped up after Bush became President, schools heavily dependent on federal funds were forced to cave in. The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found the government was violating the schools' free speech rights, but the House resolution called on the Bush administration to further appeal that ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. Portugal's Social Democratic Prime Minister Pedro Santana Lopes is trying to make marriage equality an issue in campaigning for elections later this month. In a televised debate this week, the PM took a strong position against opening either marriage or adoptions to same-gender couples, and repeatedly challenged the leader of the Opposition Socialists José Socrates to take a stand. Socrates refused to do so, saying his party had chosen to take no position because there is not yet "a consensus in society" in Portugal. He claimed Santana Lopes was seeking only to create a distraction from economic issues. But the Prime Minister called the marriage and adoption questions "the issues of modernity," citing the marriage equality legislation introduced by the Socialist Government of neighboring Spain. Like Spain, Portugal is heavily Roman Catholic, but it remains to be seen if Santana Lopes' strategy works. Current polling predicts he'll be ousted, with the Socialists taking more than 45% of the vote and a majority of seats in the Parliament, while his Social Democrats take less than one third of the vote and their coalition partner the Popular Party less than 5%. And finally... The Netherlands' Immigration and Integration Minister Rita Verdonk this week unveiled the Government's draft bill to require some prospective foreign immigrants to be tested before their arrival on their understanding of the culture there. They'll be given a videotape to aid them in what's estimated to be 250-to-300 hours of preparation for taking the test. The official prep video includes a wedding of the sort that the Netherlands was the first nation in the world to legally recognize, because one of the test questions is: "Can 2 men marry?" Citizens of most of the First World nations including Japan can win exemptions from having to take the test, and maybe that's a good thing. The marriage question might be a breeze for Canadians and European Union members and perhaps New Zealanders, but it could be a tough one for Australians and Americans.