LANSING, Mich. — The Michigan Supreme Court ruled 5–2 Wednesday that the state’s constitutional amendment protecting marriage does not allow for the extension of taxpayer-funded benefits to the unmarried “domestic partners” of state and municipal employees. ADF attorneys filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the case, arguing that the state can extend benefits to whomever it wishes so long as it doesn’t do so on the basis or a marriage-like status prohibited by the Michigan Constitution.
“The government should promote and encourage strong families. Michigan’s marriage amendment does that; benefits for unmarried ‘domestic partners’ at taxpayer expense do not,” said ADF Legal Counsel Dale Schowengerdt. “Marriage is under attack because certain special interest groups are trying to reduce it to little more than a benefits system for emotionally attached couples. The court followed the law and prevented the ACLU from bypassing the will of the people as expressed in the Michigan Constitution.”
More than two years ago, the American Civil Liberties Union filed suit against the state, demanding that it offer benefits to the unmarried “domestic partners” of state employees. In 2007, the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled that the state’s constitutional amendment defining marriage as a union between one woman and one man prohibits public institutions from offering benefits based on a union similar to marriage (
www.telladf.org/news/story.aspx?cid=4000).
In its opinion, the Michigan Supreme Court found that “the marriage amendment specifically prohibits recognizing ‘for any purpose’ a union that is similar to marriage but is not a marriage. ‘Any’ means ‘every; all.’ Therefore, if there were any residual doubt regarding whether the marriage amendment prohibits the recognition of a domestic partnership for the purpose at issue here, this language makes it clear that such a recognition is indeed prohibited ‘for any purpose,’ which obviously includes for the purpose of providing health-insurance benefits.... The people of this state could hardly have made their intentions clearer.”
The full text of the Michigan Supreme Court’s opinion in
National Pride at Work v. Governor of Michigan is available at
www.telladf.org/UserDocs/GovMIruling.pdf. The amicus brief submitted to the court by ADF attorneys on behalf of the Michigan Family Forum is available at
www.telladf.org/UserDocs/GovMIamicus.pdf.
ADF is a legal alliance defending the right to hear and speak the Truth through strategy, training, funding, and litigation. ADF President Alan Sears is co-author with Craig Osten of the book
The ACLU vs. America (
www.acluvsamerica.com).
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