McLean County Clerk Kathy Michael will explain the procedures for couples who visit her office to apply for a license. Jim Bennett, Midwest regional director of Lambda Legal Defense, and Caroline Staerk, director of field programs for Equality Illinois, will discuss what the bill entails, what happens next and address any specific questions that audience members might have.

Also on hand will be local attorney Jon McLaughlin, who will provide information on the legal implications of the new civil unions law.

The civil unions law takes effect on June 1; on that date both same- and opposite-sex couples can apply for civil unions licenses that bestow many of the same rights and responsibilities as marriage licenses.

Illinois will join five other states that currently offer civil unions or domestic partnership licenses; an additional six states offer full marriage rights to same-sex couples.

The forum is a collaboration of the Advocacy Council for Human Rights; Lambda Legal Defense; and Equality Illinois. For more information call 309-212-4031 or e-mail info@achr-il.com.

When I was asked to come out of the “semi-retirement” I imposed upon myself when I started my Ph.D. studies so that I  might write a piece about the “Illinois Religious Freedom Protection and Civil Union Act,” I was hesitant at first. I suspect my hesitation will surprise some readers; after all, I’ve dedicated most of my columns here to ways that my family resembles all other families and to the expressed desire that the Ronald and I be allowed to marry.

So, why the hesitation? Hmmmmm, that answer will reveal a bundle of contradictions. For one thing, while I embrace and celebrate the fact that my husband and I will FINALLY receive SOME of the legal protections afforded automatically to heterosexual couples who choose to get married, I am also cognizant of those glaring words “finally” and “some.” Here’s the general gist of the bill, civil unions will “provide legal recognition of gay couples and give them some of the same benefits automatically available to married couples, including the right to visit a sick partner in the hospital, disposition of a deceased loved one’s remains and the right to make decisions about a loved one’s medical care” (Huffington Post 12/1/10). Here’s my dilemma. After years of living with an HIV+ partner, am I expected to celebrate that the state has now seen fit to give me the “right” to visit him and oversee his care should he ever be hospitalized? Should I be throwing a party over the fact that if Ron dies, the state has now agreed that after almost thirty years together I should be the one to decide what to do with his remains? Really? For these fundamental human rights, for these acts of dignity that the state should have recognized a hundred years ago—am I supposed to say “thanks?” I have to admit, there is still an angry part of me that wants to say “about *%*$^# time!” In other words, I am, I suspect, not as “grateful” as some would have me be.

And then there’s the whole concept of “civil” “unions.” If you’ve read my column before, you know I am addicted to words and to their rhetorical value. A brief overview of the word “civil” includes terms like “ordinary life” and “civic duty” and “polite social discourse.” Definitions associated with “union” include all sorts of ways of putting things together. Here’s a favorite from Dictionary.com, “the process or result of merging or integration of disjoined, severed, or fractured elements, as the healing of a wound or broken bone, the growing together of the parts in a plant graft, the fusion of pieces in a welding process, or the like.” Am I really ready to quietly enter into “polite social discourse” about the “healing of a wound” that has been inflicted on me by the state for most of my adult life? Am I willing to allow the unthinking multitude the comfort they can gain by equating a Civil Unions bill with unfettered equal rights? Can I dare to allow the mass media to overlook the continuance of anti-gay bullying in schools and the appalling rate of gay teen suicides with the Band-Aid of civil union-ship? For me, the obvious answer is “no.”

Trust me, the Ronald and I will get “unionized” on the first day we can. I suspect we will throw a party. As we have done in the past, we might even try to get media coverage—the world needs to see couples like us FINALLY receiving SOME of the benefits of marriage. We will feel a certain legal burden lifted. We will look into each other’s eyes one more time and share the unspoken exhilaration that comes with public celebrations of our relationship. There might even be cake and punch! I don’t want to negate how happy we are that this milestone bill has passed in the state of Illinois.

But the next day, the very next day, I vow that I will wake up and start work again on obtaining fully vested legal rights, including the right to marry. I will gather together some of the joy from our celebration and I will refocus that energy on taking schools to task that don’t address anti-gay bullying. I will continue in my own life to try to fight for equal rights for all of my sisters and brothers. I will do all of this, I admit, with a new found sense of pride and freedom, and with the sobering reality that so many generations before my own weren’t given the possibility to celebrate this particular victory. I will be thinking of them, and of all of you, and yes—on that day, I will smile and go forward.

Until next time, I’ll keep counting the gray hairs!

TOM

Featured presenters at the forum will include Simon Aronoff, community educator with Lambda Legal Defense, and Caroline Staerk, director of field programs for Equality Illinois.

Also on hand will be local attorney Jon McLaughlin, who will provide information on an additional program to be held in the community prior to June 1, when the civil union law takes effect.

The forum is a collaboration of the Advocacy Council for Human Rights; Lambda Legal Defense; and Equality Illinois.

On February 23, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that its attorneys would stop defending DOMA, pursuant to an order by President Obama. Immediately afterward, Senator Dianne Feinstein announced her intent to introduce legislation in the Senate Judiciary Committee to repeal DOMA.

The plot thickens when you realize that DOMA has two major parts: Section 2 and Section 3.

Section 2 states that no state shall be required to recognize “any public act, record, or judicial proceeding of any other State… respecting a relationship between persons of the same sex that is treated as a marriage under the laws of such other State…” This was put in so that if two males or two females are married in Iowa, for example, the marriage need not be respected in Texas.

Section 3 states “In determining the meaning of any Act of Congress, or of any ruling, regulation, or interpretation of the various administrative bureaus and agencies of the United States, the word ‘marriage’ means only a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife, and the word ‘spouse’ refers only to a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife.” This means, for example, that social security benefits or immigration eligibility cannot be granted on the basis of marriage if both spouses are of the same sex. There are approximately 1100 provisions in the United States Code in which benefits are contingent on marital status.

It is the constitutionality of Section 3, rather than the entire law, that is on trial. This is an appeal; a lower court has already declared the Section to be unconstitutional. Enforcement will continue pending final judgment. For example, same-sex spouses still cannot receive social security benefits or Green Cards.

National Public Radio reported this week that Republican senators (and presumably any Democrats who may wish to) can find other attorneys to carry on the defense.

There are actually four DOMA cases in the courts, all pertaining to Section 3. The DOJ decision directly affects only two of the cases. The constitutionality of DOMA Section 2 has not been challenged legally.

None of the cases bears directly on the status of California’s Proposition 8. Proposition 8 abridged the right to marry, while DOMA blocks the federal benefits, rights and privileges that couples could otherwise receive once they are married.

The sources for this article are the Windy City Times  and Wikipedia.

The Advocacy Council has already received a number of questions about specifics of the new law so in collaboration with Equality Illinois and Lambda Legal we are hosting a civil unions information forum at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, April 12 (location to be determined).

Experts from Equality Illinois and Lambda Legal will be on hand to present specific information on the new law and answer any questions you might have about civil unions. We also hope to have a local attorney and someone from the County Clerk’s office on hand to describe the process for obtaining a civil unions license once the law takes effect in June.

In the meantime, we encourage you to check out two very good websites that contain useful information on the new law:

Equality Illinois
Lambda Legal

• We were married in Iowa…do we need to get a civil unions license too?
• We were married in Canada…does a civil unions license negate our marriage license?
• Will the new law require my employer to offer health benefits to my partner?

The Advocacy Council is working with Equality Illinois to plan a community forum to discuss the specifics of the new law which will take effect on June 1, 2011. Please watch this website for specific information on the forum.

In the meantime, Equality Illinois and the ACLU of Illinois have both created FAQs which might answer some of your concerns/questions; those documents can be accessed at

ACLU of Illinois
Equality Illinois
Lambda Legal  – Illinois Civil Law FAQ

Lambda Legal also is offering a help desk phone line (312) 663-4413 to answer specific questions about the civil unions law and other LGBT legal matters.

A special thank you to the organizations that were so instrumental in achieving this victory!

I have had my time of bitterness and now I choose to have my time of hope.

I cried as I viewed the President’s speech. I have longed for this, deeply. I longed for a vision of military service that could accept men and women like me, longed for it for 45 years. That number reveals my age but I don’t care. This is more important. This is the moment in history that, as Obama said, has been more than 200 years in the making.

As an adolescent, I gave up the hope of military service not out of fear of combat but rather out of fear that I would be rejected by our nation’s finest. From that realistic assessment, it was only a short distance to self-loathing, to an abandonment of the developmental task I faced, that of becoming an adult, a citizen, a lover. I chose to live for cheap thrills.

At some point I was responsible for my own delinquency, but prior to that, prior to turning eighteen, I was poisoned by society’s homophobia.

In the midst of the Vietnam War, I got a college deferment. I would rather have been designing weapons at China Lake or another military research center but I was, as I have said, afraid of being rejected and humiliated.

I know lesbians and gays can enlist and serve now. I viewed Obama’s speech a second time. But it hasn’t hit me psychologically. I have carried the burden of guilt for decades and now felt wedded to it, wedded to a historically irrelevant, lifeless mass of stone; almost wedded to it but not quite.

We have broken free of the snare that was Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. The President told the stories of military heroes such as Andy Lee in the Battle of the Bulge. As twisted and sick as the war is, the heroism, sacrifice and spilt blood of lesbians and gay men will stand out in it. Even the most conservative voters will recognize this, and if they don’t pick up on it then we will make it plain to them, as Obama did.

The word “hero”, once reserved for white males, will encompass people of all races, genders and sexual orientations. Eventually even the transgender folks will win their fight and be recognized as first-class citizens.

For example, Obama’s hero Andy Lee saved the life of his WW II friend, making it possible for him to return home and start a family. Family, get it? Andy Lee, a gay man, made it possible for his straight friend to start a family. Andy had Family Values.

Obama said thanks to the activists. Without their pressure, homophobia would still be enshrined in the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Furthermore, the plaintiffs in the courts, their financial backers and their lawyers forced the hand of Congress. One day the Supreme Court would have issued a summary decree, causing a major, major headache for the military. To the human rights activists of McLean County, of Illinois, of the world: keep fighting!

The President’s speech may be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cS26CciE0VQ.

The two couples participated in the project that highlights the struggles same-sex couples in Illinois face in the absence of a civil unions law. Civil unions could become a reality yet this year with passage of SB1716.

The videos can be viewed on youtube:

Suzie and Danielle

Elizabeth and Caroline

Please contact your elected officials today and ask them to support SB 1716! A vote could come as early as Tuesday, Nov. 30!

To find contact information for your elected officials go to www.votesmart.org.

1st – Make a call to Senator Elect Mark Kirk and ask for his immediate support of repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.  If you’re a veteran please be sure to let the staff at Kirk’s office know that when you place the call.  Please note: you do not have to be a veteran to call, it is just important to mention it if you are.  Senator Elect Mark Kirk’s DC office number: 202.225.4835.

2nd – Once you make the call, please encourage your friends and family to call as well.  You could even post the request on your facebook to widen your reach.  It’s important as many folks as possible call Mark Kirk’s office.

3rd – You can help collect petitions that will be hand delivered to Kirk his first week in office.  I will send those out to you upon your request. 

Feel free to call me and ask me any questions.  Once you make the call, email me so I can keep record of the number of calls being made.  If you can only do one of the above it’s still very important and appreciated.

My Contact info:
Lee Reinhart
ilnavyvet@yahoo.com
773.680.0620 

The General Assembly is back in Springfield for the fall veto session and could take action on the civil unions bill as well as other legislation including the legalization of medical marijuana and expansion of gambling.

Equality Illinois is working statewide to gain support for the civil unions bill (SB 1716), which would permit all committed couples to enter into a civil union. If passed by the Illinois General Assembly and signed by the Governor, The Act would grant equal access for all committed couples to the state’s nearly 650 spousal benefits and protections. Same-sex couples would be able to enter into a civil union by obtaining a license from the city clerk, having a ceremony witnessed by a secular or willing religious official, and then registering their unions.

Equality Illinois has been working with grassroots organizations such as the Advocacy Council to urge citizens to contact their elected officials and ask them to support SB 1716. Equality Illinois also has spearheaded a petition signed by more than 300 clergy members from 270 congregations and seminaries statewide asking the General Assembly to pass the bill.

Our central Illinois legislators are mostly opposed or uncommitted to the civil unions bill; only state Sen. Dave Koehler and state Rep. Naomi Jakobsson have officially voiced support for the legislation. Still, we must contact our legislators – regardless of their support – and remind them that we and many of their constituents support the bill and want it passed.

Support for the bill can be found by looking at a poll of 1,000 registered, likely voters in Illinois. The poll, initiated by the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute indicates 67.5 percent of poll respondents support either civil unions or full marriage equality for gay and lesbian couples. Only 26.5 percent are opposed to any legal recognition, and 6 percent didn’t know or had no opinion.

Local surveys conducted by Illinois Wesleyan’s political science department classes also reveal that a growing majority of citizens in the Bloomington area favor civil unions for gay and lesbian couples in Illinois.

Equality Illinois continues to monitor the situation in Springfield and will regularly post updates on its website www.equalityillinois.org.

The fall veto session is scheduled to end Dec. 2 so the window of opportunity is very small. Please contact your representative and senator today and ask them to support SB 1716! Contact information for state legislators can be found at www.ilga.gov.

Acorn Equality Fund provides opportunities for scholarships and grants to Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender (GLBT) persons, organizations and allies in Illinois’ downstate counties. Over $20,000 in scholarship money will be awarded at this year’s breakfast.

Tickets to the breakfast are $25. The Advocacy Council is putting together a table so if you are interested in sitting with us please e-mail Dave at davebent62@hotmail.com.

The poll, initiated by the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute, indicates 67.5 percent of poll respondents support either civil unions or full marriage equality for gay and lesbian couples. Only 26.5 percent are opposed to any legal recognition, and 6 percent didn’t know or had no opinion.

The same poll revealed that 72.6 percent of respondents favor allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military. Only 19.3 percent expressed opposition, with 8.1 percent having no opinion or not answering.

The poll was conducted Sept. 30 – Oct. 10 and has margin of error of 3 percent. For more information visit the institute’s web site at www.paulsimoninstitute.org.

Gay and lesbian couples that include an immigrant are facing unique challenges as the nation struggles to come up with a humane, fair immigration policy. Oftentimes these couples face a double negative in that they cannot get married PLUS the immigrant in the couple might be facing an uncertain future in this country.

Panelists include Michael Jarecki, an immigration lawyer from Chicago; Lawrence B. Solum, professor from the College of Law at the University of Illinois; and Aaron Smith, professor of English at ISU. Alison Bailey from the ISU department of philosophy will moderate the discussion.

The event is sponsored by the Global Review Student Association. For more information contact wgstudies@ilstu.edu.

Governor.  Republican challenger Bill Brady has made no qualms about his opposition to equal rights for LGBT people. He opposes civil unions legislation which means, were he to become governor, the legislation would be dead in the water for at least the next four years. Brady has also sponsored legislation that would roll back the state human rights act and allow employers to fire or refuse to hire LGBT people.

Incumbent Gov. Pat Quinn has consistently supported the civil unions bill and opposes a constitutional amendment that would define marriage as the union between a man and a woman. He has been a friend to the LGBT community and has won the endorsement of Equality Illinois, the state’s LGBT human rights organization.

U.S. Senate.  The other high-profile race in the state pits state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias against U.S. Rep. Mark Kirk. Giannoulias favors both civil unions and marriage equality for LGBT people and has been unflinching in his support. He supports the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, passage of the Employment Non Discrimination Act (ENDA), and the repeal of the draconian Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

Kirk is a social moderate and has supported inclusive hate crimes legislation and the passage of ENDA. However, compared to Giannoulias his support falls short in that he opposes repeal of DADT and on a recent questionnaire refused to support the repeal of DOMA. Many also are troubled by his recent more-conservative swing as the election nears.

11^th Congressional District.  Democratic incumbent Debbie Halvorson is facing stiff opposition from challenger Adam Kinzinger. Kinzinger is a far-right conservative who opposes all LGBT-supportive legislation and has received the endorsement of the anti-gay Illinois Family Action, the political action committee of the Illinois Family Institute.

Since taking office two years ago Halvorson has increased her support for LGBT legislation. She is a co-sponsor of the Employment Non Discrimination Act, voted for inclusive hate crimes legislation, and has earned the endorsement from the Human Rights Campaign.

15^th Congressional District.  Incumbent Tim Johnson faces Democratic challenger Dr. David Gill. Johnson, who has been in office since 2000, has been among the most anti-gay elected officials in Washington and has opposed every piece of LGBT legislation brought before Congress. He is no friend to the LGBT community.

Gill offers a refreshing contrast in that he is fully supportive of LGBT issues including civil unions; marriage equality; employment non discrimination; and gays in the military. He is running a low-key campaign that one hopes will resonate with voters at a time when the “throw the rascals out” sentiment seems to be running high.

There are a number of other offices up for grabs and thankfully an LGBT-supportive candidate is running in each one. We encourage you to check out the voter guide for more information about those races.

This election could either continue the trend toward equal rights for LGBT people or halt the momentum dead in its tracks. We urge you to think carefully about the choices and exercise your right to vote.

Free appetizers and a cash bar will be available at the event. There is no suggested donation but since it is a fundraiser his campaign hopes this event will raise some good money to help David in his effort to unseat Congressman Tim Johnson.

Gill is running for the 15th congressional seat held by Johnson since 2001. The district encompasses parts of Bloomington/Normal and stretches east beyond Champaign/Urbana.

Johnson has a clear history of opposing equal rights for LGBT people; in fact, he has consistently scored “0″ on the Human Rights Campaign congressional scorecards. Gill, in contrast, has declared his support for a variety of LGBT issues including the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, overturning the “Defense of Marriage” Act, and granting equal marriage rights to same-sex couples.

Please consider joining us in helping elect an LGBT-friendly candidate to represent us in Washington! And please, PLEASE pass along this information to other listserves and individuals!