Marriage And Civil Rights
For gay couples, battle to wed is about social equality.
By MICHAEL LANZA

On May 15 the California Supreme Court shook the country in a 4-3 decision, declaring the state's same-sex marriage ban unconstitutional - essentially legalizing gay marriage, the second state after Massachusetts to do so, and putting a spotlight on the contentious issue once again.

It's been framed as a battle of semantics - how our society defines marriage. But for those whose lives and relationships are held in limbo, it's about equality.

Gary Gilbert (l.) and Murdoch Matthew (r.) display their wedding rings. The couple was wed in Quebec.

"The word symbolizes absolute equality," Ellen Lewin, a Queens raised professor of anthropology at the University of Iowa, said. "It was very empowering to be treated like everyone else," Lewin said of her same-sex marriage in Canada.

In New York, the decision is giving new vigor to gay-rights activists after a disappointing conclusion to the state's own efforts to legalize same-sex marriage.

"Thank god someone finally saw it for what it is," Cathy-Marino Thomas, the executive director for Marriage Equality New York, said. The Queens native was married to her partner of 15 years, Sheila, in Provincetown, Mass. in 2005.

The New York bill, which would have recognized same-sex civil marriages while preserving the right of religious institutions to choose whom to marry, officially died without a vote in the State Senate in January after passing through the State Assembly last summer.

"I know that 20 years from now, we will look back and realize we were on the right side of this issue. Just like 20 years after the civil rights movement, many people looked back and thought that they were on the right side of the issue," State Assemblyman Jose Peralta (D-Jackson Heights) said in defense of his vote in favor of same-sex marriage. "Today I have the opportunity to treat my brothers and sisters in the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual) community not only with equality and justice, but also with over 1,300 benefits that I receive as a married man."

The Queens assemblymembers voted overwhelmingly in favor of the bill, approved by a margin of 85 to 61. Of the 18 elected representatives, only three voted against the measure - Margeret Markey (D-Maspeth), Anthony Seminerio (D- Richmond Hill) and Barbara Clark (D-Queens Village).

"Any bill that has come before us that would make life what it's supposed to be for people just because of who they are, because of their sexual orientation, I have supported because I don't think that people should be discriminated against based on their sexual orientation," Clark said. "But at some point, in my mind, you get to a point where it just goes beyond what I think is a real workable situation in the State of New York and this nation. I still believe that there is a reason for what we call reproduction, to repopulate our nation, and we won't be able to - same-sex couples cannot do that."

In the State Senate, Clark's argument was taken a step further by the conservative majority - who prevented the bill from being voted on.

"I'm absolutely opposed to it," State Sen. Serphin Maltese (R-Glendale) said. "The bill undoes 2,000 years of history and tradition. Marriage is a sacrament," he said. "There's a big difference between discrimination and same-sex marriage. Where you have discrimination, I'm voting in favor of gays.

"Recognition that (same-sex) marriage should be on the same level - It isn't something we should focus on right now," Maltese said. "If you ask any of my constituents, an overwhelming majority will say they're opposed to same-sex marriage."

Celebrating their Irish roots, Tom Molton (l.) and Brendan Fay (r.) wore kilts to their 2003 wedding in Ontario.

But a 2007 study by Siena College suggested New Yorkers are much more evenly divided than some would have you believe. The poll found that 43 percent of New Yorkers supported same-sex marriage, while 47 percent opposed it. The divide fell almost exclusively along political and religious lines, the poll said, with mostly democrats supporting same-sex marriage and a majority of republicans and independents who identified closely with their religion opposing the bill.

"It's mostly politics," Peralta said of lawmakers opposing the bill. "They started making it more personal, using the argument of personal upbringing."

But the argument of upholding tradition holds as much weight as past arguments for historic injustices for many same-sex couples.

"It's an empty argument with no backup," Thomas said. "It's merely another inequality - as it was with slavery, as it was with women voting."

For gay couples it's not about trampling on tradition, it's about living their lives as equals - with all the benefits the word marriage affords.

"People can't seem to separate civil rights from religious rights. We're looking for marriage on a civil level only," Thomas said. "If you put the word marriage on it, everyone knows what it means. There's a big difference when you say, 'that's my domestic partner,' and when you say 'that's my wife.'"

Thomas and other same-sex couples are confident that people will come around eventually. "Not only will they see the logic of it, they will see the common sense of it. Society is coming to the issue now and seeing it as an equality issue," she said.

But Thomas admits that acceptance won't come easy. "We have a long way to go," she said.