Searching for a moral mandate in Prop 2
By Peter LukeLong-term gay partners of state employees will not receive health benefits under revised labor contracts up for Michigan Civil Service Commission approval this week. Such benefits, common at Michigan's universities and private corporations, would extend health and life insurance to the same-sex domestic partners of state employees. But voter approval in November of Proposal 2, the gay marriage ban, puts the legality of those benefits in doubt. So the contract provisions have been suspended by the Granholm administration and state unions until the courts decide if they are legal. Also moot for now is a resolution in the Michigan House that condemns the provisions' potential, undetermined financial cost as a "great burden on the citizens of Michigan." The resolution was sponsored by two-dozen House Republicans who have, or presumably will, serve six years. Like all lawmakers, once they turn 55 and are out of office, they'll be eligible for lifetime health insurance courtesy of those same taxpaying citizens of Michigan. Those citizens would have to work decades for the same employer to earn a comparable benefit. But the Legislature evidently believes it is no burden for taxpayers to fund the medical care of former three-term politicians and their spouses. No doubt some of those lawmakers consider state-funded lifetime prescription drug coverage just compensation for defending the moral values of Michigan. Since every election provides the template for the next one, expect a lot of talk about morality in the next two years given that the Nov. 2 election apparently was all about moral values. It must have been or else Michigan voters wouldn't have approved Proposal 2. And since they did, opponents of domestic partner benefits who supported Proposal 2 now say voters were targeting those benefits when they voted "yes." "In addition to its questionable constitutionality, extending same-sex benefits to state employees is clearly contrary to the will of the people of the state as recently expressed at the polls," says the House resolution. As will Proposal 2's authors when they get to court. Funny, when opponents of Proposal 2 sought to include the amendment's potential impact on those benefits in the ballot language, Proposal 2 supporters objected. That issue was for judges to decide, not voters. And so the courts will decide what is meant by Michigan's new constitutional language, which says "the union of one man and one woman in marriage shall be the only agreement recognized as a marriage or similar union for any purpose." Opponents of same-sex marriage will apparently now argue that Proposal 2 really was a lot broader in its legal scope than the simplistic explanation provided to voters at the polls. Benefits long provided by Michigan's public universities will likely also be targeted. College officials who declined to campaign against Proposal 2 really do reside in ivory towers if they believe they won't face a tough legal fight on this. It's a fight they may well lose. If domestic partner benefits are ultimately determined to be illegal in Michigan, then so too will the concept of civil unions that provide the legal benefits of marriage to same-sex couples. Civil unions are supported by the public, according to the polls. Still, Proposal 2 was simply one decision made by voters that doesn't preclude them from deciding something else down the road. In fact, the measure didn't even enact a ban on same-sex marriage. The Legislature did that in 1996. Michigan courts could decide that enacting civil unions, given Proposal 2, will require voter-approved constitutional change. Any future move in the Legislature to enact civil unions, however, likely would prompt opponents to seek a public vote anyway. Gay-rights proponents could ask voters to decide. They just have to collect the signatures to put it on the ballot. As for domestic partner benefits, state and union officials estimate that potential beneficiaries number in the dozens. There are about 57,000 state employees. Passage of Proposal 2 did do one thing: Politicians now have a mantle on which to display their moral superiority. So be it. . Contact Peter Luke at (517) 487-8888 or e-mail him at
pluke@boothnewspapers.com.
