c. 2007 Religion News Service

NEWARK, N.J. _ The Commonwealth of Massachusetts considers Stacey and Jessie Harris married. But every April, the Harrises get a reminder the legal recognition goes only so far. Although they can file joint state tax returns, they must file their federal income taxes separately.

“It makes me more conscious that the federal government doesn’t recognize my marriage,” said Jessie, who moved with Stacey from New Jersey back to their native Massachusetts in 2005.

Thousands of same-sex couples in New Jersey will soon learn what the Harrises already know. Although a new law promises same-sex couples who form civil unions “all of the same benefits, protections and responsibilities” that flow from marriage, it comes with a giant asterisk.

It really means all of the state’s benefits of marriage. Like Massachusetts, New Jersey is powerless to grant same-sex couples the benefits that federal law bestows on married heterosexuals. Federal law does not recognize same-sex partnerships, regardless of whether they are labeled “marriages” or “civil unions.”

“There are a plethora of federal rights that are significant that remain denied,” said Elizabeth Cooper, a professor at Fordham Law School.

Thomas Prol, who co-chairs the New Jersey State Bar Association’s committee on gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender rights, said Congress’ Government Accountability Office has tallied 1,138 sections of federal law in which benefits depend on whether a couple meets the federal definition of a marriage: one man and one woman. The most important affect taxes, immigration, bankruptcy, Social Security, veteran’s benefits and federal workplace protections for pensions and family leave.

Stephen Hyland, a lawyer with offices in Princeton and Westmont, N.J., said same-sex couples who form civil unions will have “significantly less rights in total than heterosexual married couples.”

Even so, Cooper said New Jersey’s civil union law _ the third in the nation after Vermont’s and Connecticut’s _ represents “a major step forward for lesbian and gay couples in New Jersey.”

David Buckel, an attorney with the gay rights organization Lambda Legal, said state rights associated with marriage actually matter more than the federal benefits because state law addresses “very basic, elemental protections that can really make a family secure.”

They include the ability to visit a hospitalized partner, to stay in a shared home after one partner dies and to obtain health insurance for the whole family through one partner’s coverage. They also include the ability to sign prenuptial agreements and, should the relationship end, to have a judge determine who gets custody of the children and whether either partner is entitled to collect alimony or child support.

In all of those areas and more, the law promises same-sex couples who form civil unions “equality” with married heterosexuals.

For its part, the Internal Revenue Service treats couples in civil unions differently than married heterosexuals.

“April 15 is going to be a nightmare for civil union couples in New Jersey,” said Steven Goldstein, chairman of the gay rights group Garden State Equality. He said he plans to form a New Jersey civil union with his partner of 14 years, Daniel Gross, and wonders how they will file their taxes.

Just deciding which filing box to check will be a challenge. The choices on federal form 1040 are: single, married filing jointly, married filing separately, head of household or qualifying widow or widower.

“Are we going to take a pencil and draw our own box on federal tax forms to say `civil unions’? To say we’re single when under New Jersey law we are not would be a lie,” Goldstein said. He added that for the first time, he and his partner plan to hire an accountant because “we have no idea what to do.”

In 1996, Congress passed the Defense of Marriage Act, which defined marriage _ at least for federal purposes _ as “a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife.” It also said no state is required to recognize a same-sex marriage performed by another state.

Goldstein said true marriage equality for same-sex couples will have to be achieved in two steps: first by winning the right to marry in New Jersey and then by changing federal law so those marriages will be recognized.

“You’re talking about a whole lot of changes at the federal level that may well take a generation,” Goldstein said. “In New Jersey, it will take two years. At the federal level, it will take 20.”

(Robert Schwaneberg writes for The Star-Ledger in Newark, N.J.)

KRE/RB END SCHWANEBERG