February 24, 2006
James Dobson, Gay Rights And Reciprocal Benefits
Is Focus On The Family's James Dobson a sudden supporter of gay rights?
Heavens to Betsy...Perish the thought. (He certainly would "never" do that, as he put it on a recent radio program.)
But Focus on the Family is backing a CO bill that would permit same-sex couples to care for each other during illness and to enter into binding legal contracts.
The bill, introduced by State Sen. Shawn Mitchell (R), would allow two people who can't get married to establish a "reciprocal beneficiary agreement" that allows them to make decisions about medical care and end-of-life dilemmas, would give them hospital visitation rights, extend domestic violence protections, would provide inheritance and property rights and even employee insurance benefits (provided their "reciprocal beneficiary's" company offers them.")
Those are actual, tangible rights that unmarried couples -- gays included -- don't have.
Focus on the Family argues that the bill codifies and streamlines what’s already legal: allowing two unmarried persons to enter into legal contracts. Also, the bill was introduced to blunt an argument raised by a separate domestic partnership referendum proposalthat a Dem lawmaker has written: chiefly, that gay couples are concretely and uniquely harmed by being prevented from, say, visiting a sick partner in the hospital. [MARC AMBINDER]
The flak from some evangelical groups has been fierce.
Politically, the bill does neatly address an argument to conscience.
Conservatives who oppose gay marriage and any state-sanctioned benefit scheme for same-sex couples can now say that of course they would not be so cruel as to endorse laws that prevent a gay man from visiting his dying partner in the hospital.
But it tracks, a little uncomfortably, with a view of rights and contracts that some radical liberal scholars promote -- government should make it much easier for any two people to enter into contracts. These folks are not fans of a special status for marriage in general.
Dobson says the bill does not favor gays over anyone else, but because it does not apply to couples eligible to get married, the law implies that there is societal value of two people who care for each other and live together -- be they two brothers looking for work, the oft-cited example of elderly sisters living together -- or even gays.
So what scares some opponents of gay rights is that the silence of the law about the value of gay relationships implies at least implicit consent. (Colorado's largest gay rights group, Equal Rights Colorado, "does not oppose" the bill because, at the very least, they recognize that it (a) has a good chance of passing and (b) would give same-sex couples tangible rights they currently don't have.
Reciprocal beneficiary laws tend to cut in gay activists' favor in court battles because they're proof of a legislative intent to value gay couples. The harm from these activists' perspective is that such laws undercut their political standing among the public by removing their most poignant example of oppression. That's the Bismarckian strategy that Dobson . In Hawaii, gay marriage was blocked by voter referendum precisely because gay activists found it hard to convince people that gay couples suffered under the current regime. Hawaii has a reciprocal beneficiary law.
Conservative proponents of marriage worry that once you create a "marriage-lite" institution, you'll eventually have to open it to straights on fairness grounds. And once straight couples have access to the rights and benefits of marriage without having to actually get married, the institution will be permanently weakened.
Getting married might become most uncool if straight couples could obtain the benefits of the institution without actually tying a single knot.
Posted at 10:35 AM
Comments
Conservative Christian rebuttal to Focus on the Family's position at andrewlongman.com
Editors | 02.24.06 06:35 PM
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SB06-166 Reciprical "stuff", does almost nothing except restate current legal solutions. It also restricts future rights for GLBT people.
Blue Bronc | 02.25.06 09:08 AM
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I think when most straight people get to the "we want benefits" stage, they just get married, even if it's just a Britney-marriage.
rhetoricus | 02.26.06 11:49 AM
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I do think if it's all about money why not to marry?
Erik | 03.11.06 03:20 AM
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I think we need a constitutional amendment to the constitution to ensure that like gay marriage, reciprocal benefits can be blocked! I'm not even happy that gay's can get contracts setup for themselves...I think this should be banned as well
Jon L | 03.26.06 07:44 PM
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