Same-sex couples still lack federal rights

Bonnie Hope has to adopt her own daughter.

Last year, she donated an egg to be fertilized and placed in her partner, Laresya Anderson-Hope. In May, the Ronkonkoma couple celebrated daughter Cassidy's birth.

But even though Hope is the biological mother, she must adopt the girl to ensure she has the same parental rights as her partner, who was the one who gave birth.

The complication is just one of many legal hurdles legally married same-sex couples face and may continue to face.

"My partner has to adopt her own child, which is biologically hers," Anderson-Hope said. "We find it the craziest thing."

New York's law allowing same-sex marriages takes effect next Sunday, giving couples the same state benefits enjoyed by married heterosexual couples. But they still will be barred by the federal Defense of Marriage Act -- which defines marriage as solely between a man and a woman -- from federal rights and obligations afforded heterosexual married couples.

"It treats valid married heterosexual couples completely differently from valid married same-sex couples," said Melissa Goodman, senior counsel for LGBT rights at New York Civil Liberties Union.

In February, the Obama administration said it would stop defending DOMA cases in court, and legislation to repeal the law is in both houses of Congress. But until the law is struck down or repealed, its provisions stand.

DOMA, said Jericho accountant Harvey Susnick, hangs over same-sex marriage like a fog.

"It limits equality," Susnick said when he met with more than 200 people earlier this month at a marriage preparation meeting held in Bay Shore by the Long Island GLBT Services Network.

That makes for a confusing new world.

After the New York Marriage Equality Act takes effect, any state law that uses gender-specific terms to define rights and responsibilities to spouses will get a gender-neutral interpretation. Same-sex couples will be able to file joint tax returns, get spousal insurance benefits, be entitled to family medical leave, receive workers' compensation benefits if a spouse dies in the workplace, assert spousal privilege in court and receive inheritance protections in probate court.

But the law does not apply to federal tax returns, immigration status, Social Security benefits and federal pensions.

"Federally, we're nowhere," said Huntington Station resident Emily-Sue Sloane, who married her partner of 29 years, Linda Sussman, in Provincetown, Mass., in 2004.

They can take advantage of state inheritance rights, but not federal retirement rules. "The Defense of Marriage Act keeps us from being equal in the eyes of the law," she said.

While same-sex couples will be able to file joint tax returns in New York, they won't be able to file federal returns jointly.

They will be allowed to get spousal health benefits through an employer, but will be federally taxed on those benefits.

If one partner is an immigrant, the marriage will not impact a person's legal status.

And if one spouse dies, they will not be eligible for Social Security death benefits.

"It's really like a Rubik's cube," said David Kilmnick, chief executive of Long Island GLBT Services Network. "How can you get all the pieces to line up?"

Hope and Anderson-Hope plan to marry in New York. Had the pair, who have a domestic partnership, given birth after they were married, both women would be considered parents and not required to adopt.

Lawyers such as Goodman say the couple should proceed with the adoption, but Hope has resisted. "I'm angry that I have to do it. We don't want to be in anyone's faces," she said. "We just want to be treated like everybody else."

New York will be the sixth and, so far, the most populous state to do so when the Marriage Equality Act takes effect.

"We should all be celebrating," Kilmnick said, "but our work is not done."

NYS Marriage Equality Act

WHAT IT DOES: Legalizes same-sex marriages, associated state benefits

APPROVED: By Legislature and signed by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in June; effective next Sunday

FIRST CEREMONIES: Brookhaven and North Hempstead town clerks, and clerks in New York City, will open to issue marriage licenses.