Same-sex marriage in Vermont
[11] On July 22, 1997, three same-sex couples sued the state and the Shelburne, South Burlington, and Milton town clerks that had denied them marriage licenses in the Chittenden County Superior Court.
The couples were Stan Baker and Peter Harrigan, Nina Beck and Stacy Jolles, and Lois Farnham and Holly Puterbaugh.
The court ruled that Vermont's statutes limiting marriage to different-sex couples were constitutional because they served the public interest by promoting "the link between procreation and child rearing".
Whether this ultimately takes the form of inclusion within the marriage laws themselves or a parallel "domestic partnership" system or some equivalent statutory alternative, rests with the Legislature.
Whatever system is chosen, however, must conform with the constitutional imperative to afford all Vermonters the common benefit, protection, and security of the law.The court set no deadline, but suspended its judgement for "a reasonable period".
"[15] When the House Judiciary Committee took up the question in February 2000, 3 of its members favored same-sex marriage, while 11 backed something equivalent that was discussed as a "civil rights package".
[13] The state House of Representatives voted 76 to 69 in favor of legislation creating civil unions with the same legal rights and obligations as marriage on March 15, 2000.
I believe this bill enriches all of us as we look with new eyes at a group of people who have been outcasts for many, many generations.The New York Times called Vermont's civil unions "same-sex marriages in almost everything but the name".
[22] The debate on civil unions was acrimonious and deeply polarizing, touching every corner of the state and spurring a prominent popular backlash that began even before the legislation was signed under the slogan Take Back Vermont.
A few opened because they had been asked to and a handful of licenses were issued and ceremonies held,[24] including one for Holly Puterbaugh and Lois Farnham, plaintiffs in Baker, at the First Congregational Church in Burlington.
It had been used previously to protest a property tax and represented anger at the state government across an array of issues even as the campaign's focus was on civil unions.
[27] Garrison Nelson, a political science professor at the University of Vermont, called the fall campaign "a real, honest-to-goodness, social issue bonfire".
[28] One of the Republicans who lost was two-term Senator Peter Brownell, who described being lobbied by clergy on both sides and asked: "So whose religion am I obligated statutorily to abide by?
"[27] The Roman Catholic Bishop of Burlington, Kenneth Angell, testified against the civil union bill before a House committee and sent mailings with such headings as "How Would Jesus Vote?"
Dean won reelection and the Democrats held their majority in the state Senate, which would block any attempt to repeal of the civil unions legislation, though their margin of control was just 16 to 14.
[31][38] At the same time, The Burlington Free Press and the Rutland Herald began printing announcements of civil unions just as they did wedding notices.
[39] Voters in Maine narrowly defeated a measure prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, which its supporters attributed in part to the fact that their opponents "had that little extra bit of ammunition regarding Vermont.
"[40] In the spring of 2001, the legislatures of Rhode Island and Connecticut held hearings on civil union legislation, and in mid-April, seven couples filed a lawsuit to force Massachusetts to recognize same-sex marriages.
[31] In June 2004, Thomas C. Ely, the Episcopal Bishop of Vermont, announced rites for priests to use while blessing same-sex civil unions.
"[38] Civil unions were hardly mentioned as an issue in the 2002 gubernatorial election, a three-way race won by Jim Douglas, a Republican who was not interested in renewing the contentious debate.
[43] That November, even as 11 states voted for amendments to their constitutions that would ban same-sex marriage, several of which banned civil unions as well, in Vermont, Democrats took back control of the state House of Representatives and an exit poll conducted for the Associated Press reported that 40% of Vermont voters supported same-sex marriage, an additional 37% backed civil unions, and 21% supported neither.
Its April 2008 report made no recommendations but detailed the differences between civil unions and marriage, including the terminology and rights and obligations associated with each status.
[56] A comprehensive study from the University of California, Los Angeles in March 2009 concluded that extending marriage to same-sex couples would boost Vermont's economy by over $30.6 million in business activity over three years, which would in turn generate increases in state and local government sales tax and fee revenues by $3.3 million and create approximately 700 new jobs.
