Same-Sex Marriage and Reciprocal Benefits

By Senator Avery B. Chumbley

As a legislator, I took an oath to uphold the Constitution of the State of Hawaii, a document which I hold dear as a lawmaker and as a citizen. The preamble to our Constitution states, "We reaffirm our belief in a government of the people, by the people and for the people, and with an understanding and compassionate heart toward all the peoples of the earth, do hereby ordain and establish this Constitution of the State of Hawaii." Guided by these words, I feel reaffirmed in my belief that as legislators, we must represent all of the people.

Apart from the Constitution itself, I believe that America's commitment to fairness and equality is best captured in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King: "I have a dream," he said, "that some day my children will be judged not by the color of their skin but rather by the content of their character." As legislators, we face a daily challenge to make real this dream of ensuring that distinctions imposed by the law are based on genuine and substantial governmental interests and not based on fear, ignorance, or prejudice.

Over the past five years that I have served as a member of the Hawaii legislature, and most recently as Co-Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I have spent countless hours of soul searching regarding the issue of same-sex marriage. On Wednesday, I agreed to support a constitutional amendment which would reserve marriage to opposite sex couples. I also agreed to support establishing reciprocal beneficiary relationships with certain governmental rights and benefits. I would like to take this opportunity to explain why I supported these measures.

First, I believe that as a society, we can only gain by supporting committed relationships between people who love each other and want to provide mutual support for each other. Our governmental structure extends hundreds of benefits to married couples because we believe that our society and our State benefit from relationships based on mutual care and the pooling of resources. Therefore, I was encouraged by the Supreme Court's ruling that as a State we should extend government recognition of rights and benefits to all persons equally.

A second key belief that I hold is tolerance for differences, something that is a part of our daily life in Hawaii. Because we live in multi-cultural communities, our people appreciate the fact that everyone in our State is a member of a minority group. We understand that we must respect our differences because our strength is rooted in our diversity; this common understanding supports rather than divides us. I must admit that because I have been guided by a more tolerant personal philosophy, perhaps I underestimated the adverse response to our proposal to provide similar governmental rights and benefits to committed relationships between persons who are not lawfully allowed to marry.

Most of the opposition to same-sex marriage and reciprocal benefits came from persons who stated that they were so motivated by strong religious beliefs. I understand that religious beliefs compel some people to oppose same-sex marriage because these relationships involve what some consider aberrant and deviant sexual behavior. I struggled in talking with these persons who were sometimes ill-informed and, unfortunately, responding from fear rather than from a position of tolerance and understanding. I was especially disturbed by the negative reaction from persons living outside of Hawaii who are obviously not very tolerant nor appreciative of differences between people. What upset me the most was their view of people who were different as less than human and less deserving than the "majority." I wonder if they realize that most of Hawaii's citizens are different from the mainland "majority"?

In the end, I am willing to acknowledge that political pressure was brought and bought by persons both within and outside of Hawaii, which allowed for the "majority" to be able to overrule the minority. However, I am also painfully aware that my Senate colleagues and I agreed to a compromise that will forever change the course of history in Hawaii. Ultimately, it is my hope that the opportunity to vote on this issue will allow the people of Hawaii to reaffirm their belief in our Constitution and our government "with an understanding and compassionate heart" and recognize that all of Hawaii's people should be treated with dignity, respect, and fairness.