Indiana is not only interested in curbing gay and lesbian citizens’ future rights, Indiana is looking to strip citizens of rights they already have. See subsection (b):
(b) This Constitution or any other Indiana law may not be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents of marriage be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.
The man responsible for this state amendment, Brandt Hershman, denies this is the case and that this is merely a reaffirmation of the law that already exists in the state banning same-sex marriage. But as Masson says:
I don’t know how proponents of the measure get around the interpretation that, if the General Assembly passes a law that conveys a right which is an incident of marriage to an unmarried couple, a court cannot enforce that law. That’s not only a change. That’s a big change.
Or in other words, that the court could not enforce domestic partnership benefits that are offered by employers to employees. Or in other-other words, that all domestic partnership benefits currently received would be ended upon passage of this amendment.
And for extra pleasure, we find that the language used was cribbed from the Federal Marriage Amendment that failed in the Senate last year. Go Hershman.
If what you say is so, I’d be hitting places like Columbus and Huntington and Evansville and Kokomo with this tidbit.
It would kill the bill deader than dead, or at least until it’s next incarnation came along.