Breaking News: New Jersey Supreme Court Says the Same Rights MUST Be Given To ALL Couples.

Bisexual Resource Center News Bulletin:

Much like the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, the Supreme Court of the State of New Jersey has just announced that the state Constitution mandates that same-sex couples should have the same rights as heterosexual couples.

From the decision (see the decision online at: )

denying rights and benefits to committed same-sex couples that are statutorily given to their heterosexual counterparts violates the equal protection guarantee of Article I, Paragraph 1. To comply with this constitutional mandate, the Legislature must either amend the marriage statutes to include same-sex couples or create a parallel statutory structure, which will provide for, on equal terms, the rights and benefits enjoyed and burdens and obligations borne by married couples. We will not presume that a separate statutory scheme, which uses a title other than marriage, contravenes equal protection principles, so long as the rights and benefits of civil marriage are made equally available to same-sex couples. The name to be given to the statutory scheme that provides full rights and benefits to same-sex couples, whether marriage or some other term, is a matter left to the democratic process.

The State of New Jersey is leaving it open to the State Legislature whether the means of having equal benefits is through legalizing same-sex marriage, or whether it is through a "separate-but-equal" status.

http://www.biresource.org/index.php?p=645