Connecticut Supreme Court Rules that Civil Unions Unconstitutional, Same-Sex Marriage will be Allowed

In Kerrigan v. Commisioner, the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled that same sex couples have a constitutional right to marry.

The court announced that sexual orientation is a quasi-suspect class under the Equal Protection clause of the state constitution, and therefore it is entitled to a heightened level of scrutiny. The court said that same sex couples suffer a constitutional harm, and that a separate but equal scheme of civil unions did not pass constitutional muster. In its decision, the court emphasized that civil unions are not equal to marriage even though they share all of the same rights. The name itself was enough to offend Equal Protection. Marriage has a long history in our culture, but civil unions are a recent construct. Therefore, the civil union scheme created in fact not an equal institution, but an inferior one.