Pawlenty's Anti-family Stripes Are Showing

On Tuesday, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty vetoed the omnibus state departments appropriations bill, one of many vetoes over the course of the week. His reasons were numerous, but his veto message was clear on one issue: He would not sign a bill with "any legislation concerning domestic partners benefits."

He said he opposed allowing local governments to decide whom they could provide benefits to because it would "permit the unlimited expansion of employment benefits to domestic partners and others by local units of government." Truthfully, that expansion would be limited by the local governments themselves. If the cities of Minneapolis or Duluth wanted to provide their workers with benefits for same-sex couples, they could under this bill. If New Ulm or Virginia decided that domestic partner benefits aren't for them, so be it.

Minneapolis had been offering domestic partner benefits until a Republican operative sued the city in 1995, and a court threw the benefits out for Minneapolis and every local government unit. (Some might call that an activist court.)

Pawlenty's veto this week sparked outcry from supporters of the bill who decried Pawlenty's abandonment of the Republican ideal of local control. That would be fair if Pawlenty subscribed to that ideal. History says he doesn't. He didn't support the power of township government in deciding about factory farming. A smoking ban certainly doesn't smack of 'local control.' Even on the education front he's faced criticism for abandoning the principle.

But this veto isn't about Pawlenty abandoning local control, it's about pleasing the Minnesota Family Council and Minnesota Majority (formerly Minnesota Citizens in Defense of Marriage), the anti-homosexual, anti-family "pro-family" groups that call themselves Christians. Pawlenty, for some reason, wants desperately to keep their votes. He fulfilled the promise he made to them at the Minnesota Family Council Legislative Luncheon in February that no domestic partner legislation would get through. And it's probably true what an audience member asked him at the luncheon. "Do you think you would have won without the faith-based vote?" to which Pawlenty replied "No" followed by laughter and applause.

The sparse turnout at the anti-family, "pro-family" rally a few weeks ago was far less than the margin by which Pawlenty won, so his answer is debatable.

Three days after the veto, another branch of Minnesota government was wrestling with the same issue. A lesbian couple of 22 years from Minneapolis were dealing with a "divorce" and the Minnesota Supreme Court had to sort out the details of who gets custody of the couple's children in part because there is no legal way to determine if one partner is more the parent than the other, if they are equal, or who should get custody. The court said "the record indicates that [they] co-parented the children, recognized themselves as a family unit with two mothers, and represented themselves to others as such."

Pawlenty's veto is meant to please the anti-family "pro-family" groups, but it does nothing to help those families who could really use a break. Thirty-five percent of lesbians and 18 percent of gay men have children either biologically through previous relationships, through a fertility clinic, through adoption or as foster care parents. And it's not like gay men and lesbians are bad parents. A great deal of research shows the opposite despite claims from the anti-family "pro-family" groups.

A 2003 study commissioned by the Canadian government (and suppressed for four years until a freedom of information request was filed) analyzed the bulk of family research: "A few studies suggest that children with two lesbian mothers may have marginally better social competence than children in 'traditional nuclear' families, even fewer studies show the opposite, and most studies fail to find any differences."

Obviously, it's hard to be a stay-at-home mom or dad when your partner can't provide you with health benefits.

It would seem that gay and lesbian families are as capable as any in rearing children. So why the anti-family veto? Why shouldn't communities be able to decide? Does Pawlenty think that only some children should benefit from the stability provided by a domestic partnership? Or did he let the anti-family, "pro-family" groups make the decision for him?