Posted on 07/01/2003 3:49:34 PM PDT by unspun
By The Leader-Chicago Bureau (chicago@illinoisleader.com) - Opposite sex domestic partnerships not to be included, clerk's office says
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| Rev Bob VandenBosch, lobbyist for Concerned Christian Americans said today is a "sad day for Cook County and the state of Illinois." |
The certificates will be available to Cook County residents in 90 days, but only to couples who are of the same sex. No heterosexual domestic partnerships will be authorized to receive the certificate according to the Cook County Clerk's office.
Cook County Clerk David Orr's office has been preparing for this development. Scott Burnham, spokesman for the Clerk, said today that those who are applying will need to pay $30 and both of the partners will need to come in personally to obtain the domestic partnership certificate.
"When the couple comes in, they will need to fulfill some requirements before obtaining the certificate," Burnham said. "They will need to swear that they are not legally married to someone of the opposite sex, that they are living together in a committed relationship, and they are both over eighteen years of age."
Burnham said that the certificate will provide private sector employers with proof that their employees are in a relationship, opening the way for health care insurance for the other person in the relationship.
“The only purpose that I can see is to incrementally create a new form of marriage in Cook County and then work to expand it to the entire state. It’s a step toward giving rights and benefits to couples who do not qualify for marriage,” Kathy Valente, state director of Concerned Women for America of Illinois said.
The ordinance, which was sponsored by Commissioners Mike Quigley, John Stroger and Mayor Richard M. Daley's brother, John Daley, easily passed the board with one "present" vote. Commissioner Carl Hansen spoke out against the ordinance.
"This is a sad day for Cook County, and for the state of Illinois," Rev. Bob VandenBosch of Villa Park said today. VandenBosch has lobbied against preferential rights for homosexuals at the state capitol for over ten years.
"This ordinance today only muddies up the waters on the issue of marriage," VandenBosch, on the staff of the Quentin Road Baptist Church, said today. "How will these couples register, how will they un-register their partnerships?"
Burnham said that the couples will un-register in a similar way that they register -- likely to be simply filing paperwork, "nothing as complicated as getting a divorce."'
Will bi-sexuals be allowed to register with more than one person in their relationships?
"You need to call Quigley's office for that answer," Burnham said. "I am assuming that only two persons will be allowed to be included in a domestic partnership, just as it is with marriage certificates."
Questions about inheritance provisions, medical care authorization and asset disbursement in case of partnership termination has not been clearly outlined either, the clerk's office said.
"The homosexual movement has always wanted preferential treatment, and now they have it in Cook County," VandenBosch said. "The only hope for marriage to be protected in Illinois is for the church to begin an outcry against this. With the Supreme Court's decision last week, and this decision today, maybe onlookers will finally get involved in protecting our children's future."
_______________ What are your thoughts concerning the issues raised in this story? Write us at letters@illinoisleader.com.
If it starts over this, I'll fight them and turn them in.
This is patently ridiculous. And I'm certainly not going to live in a Government formed if these yahoo take over.
No one I know would.
You know what the problem is?
We've got a group of people here who live in the middle of Iowa. They get up, go outside to the cornfield and look around and think : "Yep. This is how it is everywhere"
They have absolutely NO CLUE that 95% of the population can't stand them. (Even if they don't say it to their faces.)
Some lunatic here yesterday tried to tell me the Religious Right was 80% of the Republican vote.....
With our immigration policy, we're liable to be bringing in radical homophilliacs from across the globe. (Seems that's how AIDS got here in the first place.)
Please "enlighten" me. Describe in exacting language, just what a Fundy (Fundie?) is.
I sure do, LH. Real, living people, adults and children, live in those cities. That's what makes them cities, afterall. ;-)
In any case, I don't think anybody in his right mind would relish a second civil war.
With a fairly extreme, but historically realistic scenario according to the states rights theme you postulate, bb, it's feasible. (If I'm there, and it most likely wouldn't be in Iowa, I'd be interested in seeing if DAnconia55 comes to the front.)
Because your lifestyle is a choice. There is nothing natural about a man ramming another man. There is nothing natural about two women enjoying clam dips.
Same sex anything has begot us nothing but more STD. Sick lifestyle, sick mindset, abnormal thought.
I will fall for it no more. These people have a problem, not a lifestyle. No adoption for gays. No marrige for gays. No special laws for gays. They can practice their ways in the privacy of their own homes, but I will not "tolerate" it when they wish to pull their "were here, were queer" bullshit.
Thankfully, I won't see any of them in the afterlife..
Yeah bad choice on my part. I forget those idiots keep electing Harkin.
Well, I guess you're one, considering you are talking about taking up arms because gays now have the right to have sex with each other without being arrested for it.
And some of them owned slaves and they refused to give women the right to vote.
You need to study both biology and history. For 6000 plus years mankind has known that the union of one man to a woman is the natural and correct order
As a matter of public policy, it restricts the best breading partners and thus hurts public health.
As a matter of public policy it creates the strongest and best environment for producing and raising children, the future of any society. By reining in the natural promiscuity and irresponsibility of men and encouraging them to become fathers and providers for their children marriage promotes and increases public health and the health of the public. (Also it really doesn't matter whether the two are the best bakers or not. Breading vs breeding :^) )
This is why marriage should have nothing to do wih state interests, and have everything to do with personal convictions.
Marriage has everything to do with state interests. The state is built upon a healthy citizenry. The only way to get healthy citizens is to raise them in two parent households formed of one man and one woman where the parents are married to and committed to each other. The only reason the state recognizes marriage at all is to provide incentive for people to raise healthy children. If the union has no chance of producing children (as in a 'gay' union) then it doesn't deserve public encouragement as it is contrary to the interests of the public.
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