Marriage: Time to reconsider

"Why can't it be for everyone?"

That was an excellent question posed last week by a state senator. Only I'm not sure society is ready for the answer. It came during a legislative debate over whether to let certain unmarried couples sign up as domestic partners, giving them many of the same rights and benefits that come with marriage.

The bill, which probably will become law, allows only two groups in our state to form these unions — same-sex couples and seniors.

For same-sex couples, the rationale is fairness. They aren't allowed to get married. So they have no way to gain basic family rights, such as inheriting property or visiting in the hospital, other than through costly legal contracts.

As controversial as that is, it's the part about seniors that's most intriguing. The bill lets heterosexuals age 62 or older be domestic partners.

These people could get married. They just don't want to.

They have all sorts of good reasons, from personal beliefs to not wanting to lose a widower's pension. As a result, the state is on the verge of granting a select group of people a menu of family rights and benefits.

Don't want to get married? If you're part of an older heterosexual couple, no problem. You could pay a small fee and enjoy many of the legal benefits of marriage without actually getting betrothed.

One critic dubbed it "marriage lite." He meant it's a state-sanctioned family contract, just like marriage, only lacking the moral and religious traditions.

Which is why it's so provocative. And so overdue.

I have long thought the solution to the marriage fight is to get government out of the marriage business. Let churches marry — or refuse to marry — whomever they choose. Have the state support families through civil contracts. For the most part, families are what they define themselves to be.

This is already happening, without government. For the first time in more than a century, married households now are the minority in America. In Seattle, a whopping 67 percent of households are headed by unmarried adults.

A Washington Post story Tuesday said marriage now is "a luxury item" that "only the well educated and well paid are interested in."

That leaves a lot of families that don't fit the old stereotype. Most are heterosexual. If we're giving the oldest ones a new legal option for familydom, why not the rest? The middle-aged, the twentysomethings? Any couple that live together and care for one another?

So I agree: Why can't it be for everyone?

The answer is that because once it is for everyone, the rationale for keeping marriage laws as exclusive as they are evaporates. There'd be no reason for marriage laws at all.

Rick Bartholomew, a family attorney in Olympia who backs this bill, says the path to equality is to grant gay marriage. He said my idea of instead giving everyone the same options for domestic partnerships is nuts.

"If you think it's tough winning gays the right to marry, wait until you propose to end civil marriage," he said. "That's a complete non-starter."

Maybe it is, politically. It looks to me like the people, though, have already begun.

Danny Westneat's column appears Wednesday and Sunday. Reach him at 206-464-2086 or dwestneat@seattletimes.com.