Banning same sex marriage has already been confirmed a violation of the constitution in the state of Hawaii. The case began in 1991 when three same-sex couples, who had been denied marriage licenses, brought a lawsuit to the state

court against the director of the Hawaii department of Health. The laws in Hawaii require couples wishing to marry to obtain a marriage license. New York Times reporter David Dunlap said “while the marriage license did not explicitly prohibit same sex marriage at that time, it used terms of gender that clearly indicated that only heterosexual couples could marry” (New York Times). In 1993, the Supreme Court decided that denial of marriage licenses violated the state constitution (New York Times). Although the court established that the state of Hawaii’s constitution had discriminated against homosexuals, today there have been no same-sex marriage licenses that have been given anywhere in the United States.

There are many benefits that same-sex couples miss out on. A civil marriage is a union between a man and a woman. There are 1,049 federal rights that couples receive when they get married. Gay couples cannot receive joint parenting, adoption, foster care, custody rights or visitation rights. This would be a problem if a couple decided to separate. They also would not be able to get joint insurance policies for home, auto or family health care. In the case of their spouse dying, they would not be able to inherit their will automatically, choose a final resting place for the deceased partner, or obtain wrongful death benefits for the surviving partner and children. If their partner were sick, they would not be able to make a medical decision on the partner’s behalf (Marriage Equality of New York). A same-sex couple would not be able to have their non U.S. spouse become a citizen. Without these benefits, it would be extremely difficult to raise a family.

A man and a woman can get married in any state they want. A gay couple cannot get married anywhere in the United States. In fact there are only three countries in the world that allow same sex marriages. They are Canada, Belgium and the Netherlands (Marriage Equality of New York). In the United States there is something similar to a marriage called a civil union. The only st

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