The IL House approved it yesterday, the IL Senate approved it today, and the governor has pledged to sign it. The law will go into effect in January.
Congratulations to my state’s lawmakers on a step towards equal rights (and legal responsibilities) for our gay and lesbian citizens.
gasp! I had no idea.
Now if only that weed bill would go through.
This is a great step in the road to equality. If the patern holds Illinois should have full civil marriage equality in 5-10 yrs.
Bumping this - in the wake of the news frenzy leading up to the blizzard last week, many barely noticed the Illinois civil unions bill being signed into law by our governor. Awesome! I’m pleased that this state finally acknowledges that at least a civil union is a basic right of gay and lesbian couples. Sadly, there is a statute in place banning same-sex marriage in Illinois, but this is a major step forward toward proper acknowledgement of civil rights.
Talk about a sleeper bit of news. Congrats Illinois!
As a gay male, I find this insulting.
Would you tell Rosa Parks, sit down in the back of the bus, after all it gets there at the same time as the front.
You’re offering gay people a lesser version of a right they should have.
Would Illinois dare to say to straight people, no more marriage, only civil unions? No they’d never get away with it.
Once again, it’s treating a subgroup like second class citizens and passing it off as something good.
I don’t mean to go on a rant, that’s not my point. The point is Illinois shouldn’t be trying to pass something off as a good thing, when it’s really just a way to marginalize a group and keep their mouths shut.
To a me a civil union is the same as saying sit on the back of the bus 
It’s better than walking.
No, it’s saying, come up here to the middle, I’ll sit with you here while we fight together to get us *both *seats in the front.
Or something. 
Civil unions are open to opposite gender couples as well, and my SO and I are in talks right now about whether we’ll apply for that, instead of a marriage license.
I agree with you that this is not “winning”, and nothing short of removing all trace of gender from marriage license applications will do that. But at least now when I’m working in the hospital, I can tell an uptight family member to shove it while I escort this patient’s husband into his room.
Exactly, WhyNot. Getting the anti-same-sex-marriage statute repealed and getting a statute put in place that allowed for full and fair rights to marriage regardless of gender would be a whole lot harder. I did note in my follow-up post that this was just a stepping stone to what is deserved. Maybe when some of the closed-minded folks don’t see the sky caving in over those who love each other being allowed to have important rights, they’ll start changing their minds.
And frankly, it’s a hell of a lot better here than in those states that have statutes forbidding same-sex marriage and civil unions - scroll down to the map and check out the deep red-colored states.
Sure, I’d love it if we had same-sex marriage like, say, Iowa does. Then again, a number of Iowans seem to be working really hard to eliminate it again, so who knows how long that’s going to stand.
And as a health care worker myself, I applaud the ability to legally stand up for patients’ rights rather than having to make a judgment call that might get me disciplined, fired, etc.
Hell no, it’s not enough. But it’s a little bit better here, and that’s something at least. Better to light a candle than curse the darkness, or to gripe that the candle isn’t the sun.
And in a way I agree - it’s terrible that this is considered good news or progress, and that this country has such laws forbidding marriage to so many people just because their partner is the same gender.
I’m with Markxxx on this. Why any self-respecting gay person would be happy about this is beyond me. If it is better than nothing, and I’m not at all convinced it is, then I would take the nothing and continue to fight for the equality that is due me as an American.
That in 2011 one has to fight to not be treated as a second class citizen is disgusting enough. It is significantly worse to voluntarily partake in a practice that promotes and perpetuates a system of institutionalized discrimination because state legislators either (a) are too lily-livered to stand up to homophobes and bigots to do what they know is right, or (b) are homophobes and bigots themselves, but know the winds of change are blowing, and are trying to maintain the status quo for as long as possible, believing that although they would prefer not to confer any legal status or recognition to gays, Civil Union status still prevents gays from achieving the sacred status of marriage which, in effect, persists the notion that gays are different and need to remain separate for the sake of non gays, who are the real Americans after all.
At the very least this legislation, if passed, kicks the issue of equal rights for gays down the road a few more years, during which period other arguments for the retention of legalized discrimination can mounted.
No, there’s no reason to be happy about this at all.