California's
highest court ruled that country clubs must offer gay
members who are registered as domestic partners the same
discounts given to married members--a decision
that could apply to other businesses such as insurance
companies and mortgage lenders. The decision Monday by the
California supreme court dealt with a policy at the Bernardo
Heights Country Club in San Diego that allowed only
the children, grandchildren, and spouses of married
members to golf for free.
Birgit Koebke, 48, an avid golfer who pays about
$500 a month in membership fees, challenged the policy
after being told that her lesbian longtime
partner could use the course as a guest only six
times a year while paying up to $70 per round. The court
ruled that the policy constitutes "impermissible
marital status discrimination."
While businesses might once have claimed a
legitimate business interest in maintaining different
policies for married couples and gay couples, who
cannot legally wed, such distinctions are no longer
justified under a sweeping domestic-partnership law
that took effect in California on January 1, the court
said. "The legislature has made it abundantly clear
that an important goal of the Domestic Partner Act is to
create substantial legal equality between domestic
partners and spouses," Justice Carlos Moreno wrote for
a five-judge majority. "We interpret this language to
mean that there shall be no discrimination in the
treatment of registered domestic partners and spouses."
Koebke hailed the ruling, saying, "We aren't
activists, we aren't politically charged. We just
wanted to play golf together, and we just really felt
we had every human right to do that."
John Shiner, the lawyer representing Bernardo
Heights, said, "The club will take whatever action is
necessary to comply with the decision of the supreme
court." He would not elaborate on whether that means
the club will start giving spousal privileges to the
partners of gay or lesbian members.
Jon Davidson, legal director of the gay rights
group Lambda Legal, predicted that the ruling would
affect not just country clubs but also mortgage
lenders, insurance companies, and other businesses
that have separate policies or fees for married and
unmarried customers. "What the court said was that if
a business in California provides benefits to married
couples, it has to provide them equally to couples who
register as domestic partners," Davidson said.
Aside from Massachusetts, where same-sex
couples can legally wed, and Vermont, which
recognizes civil unions, California offers the
nation's strongest legal protections for same-sex couples.
Under the expanded domestic-partnership law,
approximately 29,000 couples have registered their
relationships with the state and receive nearly all
the same responsibilities and benefits as married
spouses, ranging from access to divorce court to
liability for a partner's debts. Elderly unmarried
heterosexual couples also are eligible to register as
domestic partners.
Most large employers in California already
provide insurance benefits for the same-sex partners
of their gay workers, while many insurers, hotels, and
rental car companies have voluntarily extended family-type
discounts to gay- and lesbian-headed households.
Beginning in 2007 all businesses with large state
contracts will be required to offer their employees'
domestic partners the same benefits that employees' spouses enjoy.
Gay rights activists want California to follow
Massachusetts's lead in making marriage an option for
gays and lesbians. The high court's embrace of the
notion that domestic partners form families that deserve to
be treated like any others may bode well for a lawsuit
seeking to overturn California's ban on same-sex
marriage that is now working its way toward the court,
according to Davidson.
Rejecting the country club's claim, for
instance, that it limited spousal benefits to married
members for the "legitimate goal of creating a
family-friendly environment," Moreno wrote that the
domestic-partnership law, like the state's marriage laws,
"seeks to promote and protect families as well as
reduce discrimination based on gender and sexual orientation."
The ruling, which included a partial dissent
from Associate Justice Kathryn Werdegar, reversed the
decisions of two lower courts that had sided with
the country club. But the court also said that Koebke
and Kendall French, 43, who have been together since 1993
and registered partners since 1998, were not entitled
to seek damages "for being subject to discriminatory
treatment" before the domestic-partnership law took
effect. (Lisa Leff, AP)
