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Profound issues in Seattle lawsuit State high court set to rule on gay rights

^{- Wyatt Buchanan, Chronicle Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 3, 2006}


When San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom ordered city officials to marry same-sex couples -- a defiant act two years ago that soon was emulated in Portland, Ore., and New Paltz, N.Y. -- gay rights supporters in Seattle demanded that their elected officials do the same.

Instead, King County Executive Ron Sims placed an unusual phone call.

"He said, 'I don't want to break the law. Will you please sue me to strike down the law?' " said Lisa M. Stone, executive director of the Northwest Women's Law Center. "That's not a call we get very often."

The Washington State Supreme Court is expected to rule any day in the case that resulted and a second, related lawsuit. Not since the state Supreme Court in Massachusetts in 2003 ordered that state's legislature to legalize same-sex marriage has a gay marriage case drawn as much attention. Legal experts say the rulings may serve as a gauge of the national mood and could prompt another battle in Congress over a federal marriage amendment.

"We're watching this case very closely," said Tom McClusky, director of government affairs for the Family Research Council, the conservative Washington, D.C., lobbying organization leading the effort for a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage.

"We've been pushing Congress even before the Washington state ruling just in anticipation because we see this as a matter of utmost importance," he said.

The two Washington state cases explore two major issues being debated across the nation: whether marriage is a right and how the government can allow straight people to marry but not gays or lesbians.

"The cases present constitutional issues that judges haven't thought about a great deal yet," said Matt Coles, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Lesbian and Gay Rights Project. "It's not just the narrow issue of marriage but how you think about laws that discriminate against gay people under the equal protection clause, how you think about what a fundamental right is.

"Whenever there's a situation like that," Coles added, "I think it's very hard to be sure how (judges) are going to go."

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