“The Legislature or the governing body of a political subdivision or local governmental unit is not precluded from authorizing or requiring that a right or benefit traditionally associated with marriage be extended to two or more unmarried individuals; for example, family health insurance benefits, certain probate rights, or the ability to file joint tax returns.” […]
Appling: “If the state Legislature wants to take up adoption and inheritance rights, it can do that” if the amendment becomes law, Appling said. “Nothing in the second sentence prohibits that.” [Associated Press, 12/8/05] Appling: “Contrary to the message being given by opponents of the amendment, the second phrase does not ‘ban civil unions.’” [Daily […]
What if your partner was in the hospital and you legally couldn’t visit him or her? Or if you got seriously ill, and your partner couldn’t take time off from work to help care for you? Thousands of our family members, friends and neighbors in committed and caring same-sex relationships don’t have basic legal protections […]
You may have seen this story last week in the Wisconsin State Journal about a four-way jabfest between One Wisconsin Now, Mark Pocan, Nass, and the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance (Leah Vukmir took a swing too, but her press release was so ridiculous nobody really took it serious). The rundown is basically as follows: OWN called […]
Sen. Scott Fitzgerald and his right wing allies like Julaine Appling said over and over the ban wasn’t about domestic partners. Now they have done a complete 180.
The Courage Campaign, a California organization with a similar mission as One Wisconsin Now, has produced a powerful video about efforts to overturn more than 18,000 previously-legal same sex marriages in the Golden State. http://www.couragecampaign.org/page/s/divorce Despite some great gains for progressives in the last two years, one of the most distressing setbacks has been the […]
Yesterday, OWN launched a campaign asking citizens from across Wisconsin to call on Wisconsin law firm Whyte, Hirschboeck and Dudek to drop a case involving one of their attorneys working on behalf of the ultra-conservative (and James Dobson financed) Alliance Defense Fund. Amy Salberg, a lawyer with Whyte, Hirschboek and Dudek, has been working with […]
With each passing week, food and gas prices climb higher and higher, while thousands of Americans are losing their jobs and their homes. Seniors are still forced to choose between buying food or their prescription drugs. Gas prices across Wisconsin are topping $4 a gallon. After eight years of a Bush agenda that has been […]
Although Wisconsinites passed the ‘marriage amendment’ in 2006, polls at the time showed that they were supportive of domestic partnerships and civil unions. Advocates warned that the amendment would endanger both. Supporters of the amendment disingenuously claimed that it was only an effort to legally define marriage and not one to kill domestic partnership benefits […]
‘Studies show that no society that has totally embraced homosexuality has lasted more than, you know, a few decades. So it’s the death knell of this country.’ ‘I honestly think it’s the biggest threat our nation has, even more so than terrorism or Islam ‘ which I think is a big threat, OK?’ When Oklahoma […]