[preciousjeni]

Originally Posted by Drolefille

I think if we enacted "civil unions" for all it would essentially be a marriage contract with the word "Marriage" scribbled out and "Civil Union" written in.

Yes

Originally Posted by AGDee

So, a man will get down on one knee, present an engagement ring and say "Will you enter a civil union with me?" And, what is the verb then? "We are civil unioned?" "We invite you to celebrate the civil union of ... "

A current example of why you need not worry is Broken Down Irretrievably and Irreconcilable Differences as grounds for divorce. Broken Down Irretrievably is a legal term for one of two possible no fault divorces. Lawyers, help me please, because I'm not 100% sure! Colloquially, we say "irreconcilable differences." They mean the same thing, but one is legal and one is not. Civil union (legal) vs Marriage (colloquial) doesn't seem that off the wall to me.

Originally Posted by Kevin

From a policy standpoint, I will say that I'm in favor of marriage between any two consenting adults.

Right now, I'm representing a woman who after more than a decade with her partner, decided to call it quits. Both ladies are professionals, pay their taxes, have good jobs, are highly educated, and most of all, have lots of stuff. They did do a reasonably good job of estate planning, placed their home into joint tenancy, but my client, the one who left, is at an extreme disadvantage because there is no legal remedy designed for this situation. Therefore, if we do not get what we want in settlement, we have to go pounding a square peg into a round hole by filing a dissolution of partnership action. I very much do not want to have to appear before the District Judge in the relevant county (which is a small, extremely conservative county) with an action designed for unwinding businesses, which will essentially be a divorce proceeding.

I shudder to think at what would happen, if, for example, one of them (as both of them couldn't) adopted a child or gave birth and raised a child. The child would at this point be nearly a decade old and the non-adoptive parent/non biological mother would have zero parental rights.

And God forbid one of them predeceased the other during the relationship without leaving a will.

This is exactly what happened to my aunt. Ultimately, a lot of the bigger items (e.g. real estate) simply went to the person who technically owned it, meaning her name was on the deed. So, my aunt got booted from her home and ended up with their mountain "vacation" home even though both women had paid into both properties for many, many years.

The legal system often lags behind the times. In this particular instance, the legal system REALLY lags behind the times. You may not morally agree with what these folks are doing, but you can at least acknowledge that they should be afforded the opportunity to have the same legal rights and standing and protections as everyone else.

Hear, hear. Unfortunately, as you know, it doesn't work like that. I went from a devout evangelical protestant background to an Orthodox Christian church. In both cases, the parishioners are VERY rigid when it comes to homosexuality to the point that I have literally been told, "I don't want to live in a country where gays can destroy the sanctity of marriage."

Worse, talking to my father, he can intellectually separate legal marriage and religious marriage and understand why it is completely contrary to American ideals to deny marriage to consenting adults, BUT he can still say he would never vote for it.