Voyage They’re Taking Together’ (May 17, 2004)
Like extending to women the right to vote, the right for gay couples to marry in Massachusetts was a landmark worth exploring in depth. What did it mean for couples in love yet historically denied the right to celebrate their commitment to one another — and denied the legal rights that committed heterosexual couples have historically taken for granted — to finally be recognized? In addition to covering a legislative debate on allowing same-sex couples to marry, I wrote four profiles of couples who planned to marry and in some cases renew civil-union vows they’d already taken on the first day they were legally able to do so in this country, and attended a wedding ceremony in Greenfield on that first day. This article is about one couple who planned to renew their vows.
Theirs is a home like that of any other newly married couple, with photos of parents and other relatives on the walls, and pictures above the hearth from their own wedding last summer.
But for Jeannette and Ali Wicks-Lim, shown in various affectionate poses with family and friends, their ceremony wasn’t legally recognized as a wedding, even though the young couple considers themselves married.
“We definitely wanted it to be honored and respected as a wedding,” said Ali Wicks-Lim, who proudly thumbs through their album showing photos of herself wearing an ivory suit and her partner in a white dress at the Old Deerfield ceremony. “We wanted to do everything possible to make it hard for people not to acknowledge our commitment. I feel we’ve exhausted all options until the state makes it a recognized union.”
Like other same-sex couples — who represent 1.2 percent of all Franklin County households, the third-largest proportion of any county in the state (although the Census numbers only reflect couples living under one roof and under-represent even that population, some researchers believe) — the Wicks-Lims are eagerly awaiting a Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruling that could make this the first state in the nation to sanction gay marriage.
For many gay couples, the inability to legally marry adds up to real expenses, such as having to pay federal income tax on a partner’s health insurance benefit — if it is offered at all. There are more than 1,000 such denied benefits.
“For heterosexual people arguing against gay marriage, it’s a very philosophical, religious debate,” said Ali Wicks-Lim, who at first wavered with her partner on whether they should wait for the law to be changed, then decided that could be a long wait. “For us, it’s very practical: What if tomorrow something happens to me and Jeannette can’t get into the hospital to see me? What happens if we have a child and she has to legally adopt it and there’s a problem?
The lawsuit, which is expected to be decided soon, was filed on behalf of seven same-sex couples, including Gina Smith and Heidi Norton of Northampton, charging that current marriage laws violate the state constitution.
Already, groups opposing same-gender marriages as “bad for society” have called for a constitutional amendment defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman. In Massachusetts, that process would require two votes by successive legislatures and approval by voters — which would come in November 2006 at the earliest.
On the national level, President George W. Bush, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, the Rev. Jerry Falwell and others have called for bans on same-sex marriages, and even Pope John Paul II has urged legislators against adopting legislation that would legalize them.
But for many, the need to provide the same legal protections to gay couples as to heterosexual couples, and to loosen the definition of marriage, is clear.
“It’s just not fair,” said the Rev. Jonathan Rehmus of All Souls Church, Unitarian-Universalist, who performed the Wicks-Lim ceremony.
Rehmus, who has filed a “friend of the court” brief in support of the couples challenging the law, lamented Bush’s recent attack on same-sex marriage: “There’s such duplicity in our willingness to accept people as they are while what we’re really saying in not giving them rights is that they’re lesser people; they’re more sinful people. To me, that’s an egregious attack on others.”
It’s difficult to avoid reacting personally to arguments made against homosexuals, say Ali Wicks-Lim, a 28-year-old former police officer who grew up in Amherst and Montague and attended Northfield Mount Hermon School, Hampshire and Holyoke Community colleges, as well as her 32-year-old partner, who is completing her doctorate in economics at the University of Massachusetts and will soon begin teaching at Marlboro College.
Both admit that that their proposed solution to the debate is a radical one: Let the government, which bestows legal rights and protections, recognize all civil unions, and allow religion to sanctify marriages, to further distinguish the separation between church and state. Others point out that there already are civil marriages that don’t involve religious services.
Neither likes the Vermont-style solution of “separate but equal” civil unions, in which Social Security and other federally derived benefits are not included.
Confusion and misinterpretation
Smith and Norton, who have been together for 13 years, first decided they needed the marital protections they are seeking in their lawsuit when their first son was born 7 years ago.
“There were more documents that we had to have to protect ourselves and our children than straight couples would have to have — durable powers of attorney and emergency guardianship proxies — and we saw very quickly that there were lots of gaps, and that the remedy that would give us what we really needed was full marriage,” said Norton.
“I know what it means when somebody tells me they’re married,” she said. “It’s even hard to figure out the adjective related to civil union: We are civil united?’ It’s open to a lot of confusion and misinterpretation.”
The most painful part of the debate over same-gender marriage, both women say, is the suggestion, “which comes from personal ignorance,” questioning the ability of gay people to be good parents.
She and Smith, both 38, plan to legally marry as soon as the court allows them to, even though they’ve considered themselves married since their commitment ceremony 10 years ago.
“This time, the boys get to be part of it,” said Smith. “They love to get dressed up.”
M.V. Lee Badgett, research director at the Amherst-based Institute for Gay and Lesbian Strategic Studies, estimated that if Massachusetts recognizes same-sex marriage, there could be a flood of as many as 15,000 gay and lesbian couples from around the country — who would then seek to have their own states recognize their legal status, even though that would mean trying to overturn explicit bans in 37 states. But the effect would be greatest for the couples themselves, not for the economy.
In their Greenfield home, the Wicks-Lims’ album glows with cards of congratulations from parents and other family members, notes of support from many of the 100 people who attended, “clearness” essays the couple wrote for Rehmus.
There are photos of the entire event, which included a traditional Korean pebek ceremony, in full costume, bowing in appreciation for the support of their families — including Jeanette Wicks-Lim’s parents, who immigrated here in the late 1960s.
Included in the album, also, is Ali Wicks-Lim’s written testimony to the state Legislature against proposed legislation that would have defined marriage as the union of a man and woman. She wrote that Massachusetts could not afford to lose intentional, responsible families like theirs, who are actively involved in community outreach and volunteer work.
Jeanette Wicks-Lim says including the testimony, along with the well wishes and joyous memorabilia, documents the political realities for their future children.
“I really anticipate the political climate will change enough that we’ll be legally married before we die,” she said.
But Ali Wicks-Lim added that while she’s hopeful, “I don’t feel that much optimism. I don’t have any sense of security that this is going to come through the way I want it to. And that’s very scary, because everything we care about is on the line. You’re always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Is it going to be good or bad?”
Still, she said, gesturing toward her partner, “The biggest piece to me is the commitment I made to her,” said. “There were all the people who witnessed and were a part of that, and it was a powerful ceremony. … With every possible step we could take to be married, we’ve taken it. The state just hasn’t caught up yet.”
– RICHIE DAVIS