Domestic Partners

With six months left in his four-year term, Illinois state Treasurer (and candidate for U.S. Senate) Alexi Giannoulias signed an executive order on Sunday extending family-leave benefits to gay and lesbian employees in domestic partnerships. The new policy will allow gay and lesbian employees of his office to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid […]

The recent death of a Missouri State Highway Patrol trooper is once again putting the rights of same-sex couples under scrutiny. When Highway Patrol Cpl. Dennis Engelhard was killed in a Christmas Day traffic accident near Eureka, the agency described him as single with no […]

The second week of gay marriage on trial, the federal case challenging California’s Proposition 8, opened Tuesday with San Diego’s mayor as the star witness. Mayor Jerry Sanders, a Republican, testified he now supports gay marriage, saying his views evolved after learning one of his daughters was a lesbian who wanted to marry her partner. […]

On their first day back at work, Rhode Island lawmakers Tuesday wasted no time in overriding 15 vetos by Republican Governor Don Carcieri, including the bill to grant funeral decision-making rights to same-sex couples. The House, and then the Senate, voted to override Carcieri’s veto of a bill grating domestic partners the right to claim […]

Austria’s government agreed a new law Tuesday allowing civil partnerships for homosexual couples, although ceremonies at the civil registry’s office will still be banned, AFP reports. The compromise, achieved after weeks of wrangling between the ruling Social Democrats and their conservative coalition partner in government, will give gay couples equal rights to heterosexuals with regards […]

PROVIDENCE — Two days after vetoing a bill giving domestic partners the right to make funeral decisions for each other, a conciliatory Governor Don Carcieri told a gay-rights activist group he is open to supporting a domestic-partnership law that bestows many if not all of the rights of marriage, without the right to marry, the […]

PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island — An opponent of same-sex marriage, Governor Don Carcieri has vetoed a bill giving domestic partners the right to claim the bodies of — and make funeral arrangements for — their loved ones, reports the Nashua Telegraph. The socially conservative Republican said the proposed protection represents a “disturbing trend” of the incremental […]

D.C. Council member Phil Mendelson (D-At Large) released Monday a revised draft of the bill to legalize same-sex marriage in the nation’s capital, removing language that would have phased out city registration of new domestic partnerships, the Washington Blade reports. Mendelson, who chairs the Council committee that has jurisdiction over the bill, also broadened the […]

The battle over gay rights moves to New Jersey and the federal government, advocates said, after Tuesday’s narrow rejection of same-sex marriage by Maine voters. The Democrat-controlled legislature in New Jersey, which currently recognizes same-sex couples in civil unions, is under pressure to pass a bill authorizing gay marriage before Gov. Jon Corzine ends his […]

It was to be a night of hope and promise for the LGBT community, but instead the crushing defeat of Maine’s gay marriage law delivered another setback for gay rights advocates and overshadowed many other victories at the ballot box Tuesday. In Maine, voters on Tuesday rejected a law allowing gay marriage, a closely fought […]

The Wisconsin Supreme Court has rejected a lawsuit challenging Wisconsin’s domestic partner registry. The court offered no explanation in an order issued Tuesday. The law took effect in August, allowing gay couples to register with counties so they could get about 40 of the 150 rights afforded married couples, such as hospital visitation rights. Wisconsin […]

In a victory for gay rights supporters, voters in Washington state have approved Referendum 71, a measure to expand the state’s domestic partnership law. The results are a disappointment to religious conservatives, who had mounted an aggressive campaign against conferring additional benefits on committed gay couples and some senior couples. The so called “everything but […]

On Tuesday, voters will “approve” or “reject” the final expansion to the state’s domestic partnership law, which grants registered domestic partners additional state-granted rights currently given only to married couples. Referendum 71 gives voters the final decision over a bill passed by the Legislature and signed by the governor earlier this year. The so called […]

Washington state’s slow-but-steady approach to increasing rights and benefits to gay and lesbian couples hit its first snag just as the three-year process appeared to be complete. After lawmakers passed the state’s first domestic partnership bill in 2007, and then expanded it a year later, they completed the package with the so-called “everything but marriage” […]

From The Seattle Times: Apparently emboldened by recent legal victories — including a case being considered by the U.S. Supreme Court — groups opposed to Washington’s domestic-partnership law and working to defeat Referendum 71 are suing again in federal court, this time to lift the state’s limits on campaign contributions. With some major funding in […]

Microsoft has contributed $100,000 to the campaign to approve Referendum 71, which would uphold a state law to expand domestic-partnership benefits, the Seattle Times reports. The company made the donation on Friday to Washington Families Standing Together, a group supporting the law, which gives registered couples the same state-provided benefits as married couples. Here is […]

The domestic partnership benefits of hundreds of Wisconsin gay couples could be overturned in what’s becoming a growing legal battle. Currently, gay couples in Wisconsin can register for domestic partnerships rights, enacted through legislation that took effect August 3. Since then, about 1,000 couples have applied, according to gay rights advocacy group Fair Wisconsin. Now, […]

The Washington state attorney general’s office announced Friday it will appeal a federal judge’s ruling to keep secret the names of people who signed petitions calling for a public vote on expanded domestic partnership benefits. Spokeswoman Janelle Guthrie says Attorney General Rob McKenna will ask the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to review the […]

A federal judge on Thursday ordered the state of Washington to continue shielding the identities of people who signed petitions to force a vote on expanded benefits for gay couples. U.S. District Judge Benjamin Settle (pictured) in Tacoma granted the preliminary injunction involving petitions for Referendum 71 while a related case moves forward on the […]

Supporters of Washington’s “everything but marriage” gay partnerships are continuing their court battle over Referendum 71. R-71’s conservative sponsors have collected enough petitions to force a vote on the latest expansion of domestic partnership rights, but gay-rights activists say that state election officials accepted thousands of improper signatures, and filed a lawsuit in Thurston County […]