In a 65-35 vote Washington State’s legislature passed a domestic partnership bill that will provide same-sex couples some of the rights that come with marriage. Lambda Legal provided technical assistance in the creation of this bill, which offers a domestic partnership registry with the state, hospital visitation rights, the ability to authorize autopsies and organ donations and inheritance rights when there is no will. The passage of this bill comes nearly a year after the Washington State Supreme Court upheld a ban on marriage for same-sex couples in the case Andersen v. King County — a lawsuit seeking the right to marry for same-sex couples brought by Lambda Legal and the Northwest Women’s Law Center. Though we ultimately did not prevail in court, our marriage case helped show the people of Washington the daily struggles same-sex couples face because they cannot marry and laid the groundwork for the passage of the state’s domestic partnership bill.
