|
« AAUP Homepage
|
Changes Made to Domestic Partner Benefits
By Gwendolyn Bradley
Montana's Supreme Court ruled in December that the state's university system must offer health benefits to unmarried same-sex couples since it offers them to unmarried heterosexual couples who sign an affidavit of common-law marriage. A failure to do so, the court said, would violate the state constitution's equal-protection clause. The university had argued that its policy did not discriminate against gay couples because its benefits were offered or denied based on the marital status of employees and not on their sexual orientation, but the court found that the common-law marriage affidavit did not meet the requirements for determining whether a common-law marriage existed and that "marital status, as defined by Montana statutes and case law, plays little if any role in determining who is eligible for benefits." Rather, the ruling said, "unmarried opposite-sex couples are able to avail themselves of health benefits under the University System's policy while unmarried same-sex couples are denied the health benefits. . . . Once the illusory marital status is removed from the analysis, there is no legitimate governmental interest in treating the two groups differently." The decision explicitly excluded any consideration of whether Montana's marriage statutes discriminate against same-sex couples by denying them the right to marry.
The plaintiffs in the case included Carla Grayson, a former University of Montana psychology professor, and her partner, Adrianne Neff. The lesbian couple and their child were the victims of a still-unsolved arson attack in February 2002, shortly after the lawsuit was filed. For more information, see "Arson Follows Suit Over Domestic Partner Benefits" in the May-June 2002 issue of Academe.
In a separate development, several institutions in Massachusetts have changed their domestic-partner benefits as a result of a law allowing same-sex marriages in that state, the Chronicle of Higher Education reports. According to the newspaper, new policies at Emerson College and Northeastern University terminate benefits to same-sex domestic partners, who are now eligible to marry and receive spousal benefits. The newspaper also reports that the University of Massachusetts, which previously did not offer benefits to same-sex domestic partners, will now offer spousal benefits to those who marry.
|