Civil Unions officially passed the Colorado State House today, 39-26! It passed the Senate back in January and now Governor Hickenlooper will sign the bill as soon as it comes to his desk. We'll be able to start getting civilly unioned in May! You can read the entire SB-11 on the Colorado State legislature website and you can watch a replay of the bill being passed here.
House Speaker Mark Ferrandino and Rep. Sue Schafer co-sponsored Senate Bill 11.
via {The Denver Post}
If you watched the House discuss the bill yesterday and initially pass it, you probably laughed, cried, and screamed at your computer or television. You were probably outraged that mostly they talked about children ("thiiink of the chiiildren") and Catholic Charities, an adoption agency . Why? Because Catholic adoption agencies have threatened that they're going to stop adoption services in the state if civil unions are legalized. Rep. Lori Saine tried to make the case that same-sex couples already have like, a ton of equal rights, so why should we even bother with this, am I right? "What is in this bill that isn't already in the law?" she said. She urged a yes vote on the religious adoption discrimination amendment. Another representative said the bill was actually reverse discrimination to people who don't want gays to adopt kids.
All amendments to protect the rights of religious adoption agencies to discriminate against same-sex couples failed. Well, now we get to see what dramatics ensue.
Republicans in the house tried to cling onto the one last hope by trying to put it to a vote of the people. This failed as well.
Not all Republicans voted no for the bill, including Rep. Cheri Gerou, who said, "What I think this bill is really about is personal freedom and individual liberties. I think this is a good conservative bill."
This is a monumental move for Colorado, which was previously known as the "Hate State" for passing a law in 1992 making it legal to discriminate against LGBT people (the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the law in 1996). We've come a long way, haven't we? Civil unions will be available to Colorado residents beginning in May.
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