Case Study:
Alaska Civil Liberties Union v. State of Alaska 122 P.3d 781 (Alaska 2005)
The state of Alaska offered benefits to its employees’ spouses, but these benefits did not extend to gay and lesbian domestic partners. The excluded employees sued the state, alleging this exclusion of them from the benefits extended to other state employees was a denial of equal protection. The Alaska Supreme Court agreed and ordered that the benefits be extended to domestic partners of state employees.
Eastaugh, J.
The State of Alaska and the Municipality of Anchorage offer health insurance and other employment benefits to the spouses of their employees. These benefits are financially valuable to employees and their spouses. Only couples who are married are eligible to receive these benefits; unmarried couples are not eligible. The Alaska Civil Liberties Union and eighteen individuals who alleged that they comprised nine lesbian or gay couples (collectively, the “employees”) filed suit against the state and the municipality complaining that these benefits programs violated their right to equal protection under the Alaska Constitution. They alleged that at least one member of each same-sex couple was an employee or retiree of the state or the municipality, that the eighteen individual employees were involved in “intimate, committed, loving” long-term relationships with same-sex domestic partners, and that, as gay and lesbian couples, they are excluded by state law from the institution of marriage. Members of eight of the couples asserted in affidavits that they are in “committed relationships.” Their complaint alleged that because they are prohibited from marrying each other by Alaska Constitution article I, section 25, they are ineligible for the employment benefits the defendants provide to married couples, resulting in a denial of the individual employees’ right to equal protection. Article I, section 25 was adopted by Alaska voters in 1998. Commonly known as the Marriage Amendment, it provides: “To be valid or recognized in this State, a marriage may exist only between one man and one woman.” Case8 It effectively prohibits marriage in Alaska between persons of the same sex. The employees consequently cannot enter into the formal relationship—marriage—that the benefits programs require if the employees are to confer these benefits on their domestic partners. Put another way, the employees and their same-sex partners are absolutely precluded from becoming eligible for these benefits. Although all opposite-sex couples who are unmarried are also ineligible for these employment benefits, by marrying they can change the status that makes them ineligible. The employees did not challenge the Marriage Amendment. Instead, their complaint asked the superior court to declare that denying employment benefits to same-sex domestic partners violates, among other things, article I, section 1 of the Alaska Constitution, which states in part: “This constitution is dedicated to the principle . . . that all persons are equal and entitled to equal rights, opportunities, and protection under the law.” The court determined that the only right at issue was a right to employee benefits, which it ruled was not a fundamental right. The court ruled that the employer had a legitimate interest in reducing costs, increasing administrative efficiency, and promoting marriage. It then ruled that granting benefits only to spouses of married employees bore a fair and substantial relationship to those interests. The employees, in challenging the spousal limitations in the benefits programs, rely on article I, section 1 of the Alaska Constitution, which guarantees the right to equal treatment. It states that “all persons are equal and entitled to equal rights, opportunities, and protection under the law.” Often referred to as the “equal protection clause,” this clause actually guarantees not only equal “protection,” but also equal “rights” and “opportunities” under the law. We must decide as a threshold matter whether the Marriage Amendment precludes challenges by samesex couples to government policies that discriminate between married and unmarried couples. The Alaska Constitution’s equal protection clause and Marriage Amendment can be harmonized in this case because it concerns a dispute about employment benefits. The Marriage Amendment effectively precludes samesex couples from marrying in Alaska, but it does not explicitly or implicitly prohibit public employers from offering to their employees’ same-sex domestic partners all benefits that they offer to their employees’ spouses. It does not address the topic of employment benefits at all. Article I, section 1 of the Alaska Constitution “mandates ‘equal treatment of those similarly situated’; it protects Alaskans’ right to non-discriminatory treatment more robustly than does the federal equal protection clause.” A person or group asserting an equal protection violation must demonstrate that the challenged law treats similarly situated persons differently. We first consider whether, as the municipality contends, there is no evidence of differential treatment. The employees assert that the government treats same-sex and opposite-sex couples differently. The government employer argues that their programs differentiate on the basis of marital status, not sexual orientation or gender and all married employees can confer benefits on their spouses, and no unmarried employees can confer benefits on their partners. It therefore argues that it treats same-sex couples no differently than any other unmarried couples, and that there is consequently no basis for an equal protection claim. We agree with the employees that the proper comparison is between same-sex couples and opposite-sex couples, whether or not they are married. The municipality correctly observes that no unmarried employees, whether they are members of same-sex or opposite-sex couples, can obtain the disputed benefits for their domestic partners. But this does not mean that these programs treat same-sex and opposite-sex couples the same. Unmarried public employees in opposite-sex domestic relationships have the opportunity to obtain these benefits, because employees are not prevented by law from marrying their opposite-sex domestic partners. In comparison, public employees in committed same-sex relationships are absolutely denied any opportunity to obtain these benefits, because these employees are barred by law from marrying their same-sex partners in Alaska or having any marriage performed elsewhere recognized in Alaska. Same-sex unmarried couples therefore have no way of obtaining these benefits, whereas opposite-sex unmarried couples may become eligible for them by marrying. The programs consequently treat same-sex couples differently from opposite-sex couples. The state argues that an intent to discriminate is, or should be, an essential element of a state equal protection claim in Alaska. Employers contend that there was no discriminatory intent, or evidence of animus against gays and lesbians. Employees respond that Alaska’s equal protection clause does not require a showing of discriminatory intent. We need not resolve this dispute here because we conclude that the benefits programs are facially discriminatory. When a “law by its own terms classifies persons for different treatment,” this is known as a facial classification. And when a law is discriminatory on its face, “the question of discriminatory intent is subsumed by the determination that the classification established by the terms of the challenged law or policy is, itself, discriminatory.” The state also asserts that the legislature “wanted to limit participation to that small group in a truly close relationship with the employee.” The municipality asserts that it decided “to limit employee benefits to a small, readily ascertainable group of individuals closely connected to the employee.” If the governments were interested in simply saving money, the companion goal of promoting marriage would seem to do the opposite. As the benefits programs succeed in convincing couples to marry or to stay married, the governments have to provide benefits to more people. This apparent tension between cost control and promotion of marriage can be harmonized by more appropriately describing the governments’ interest in cost control as an interest in controlling costs by limiting benefits to those people in “truly close relationships” with or “closely connected” to the employee. We assume that limiting benefit programs to those in truly close relationships with the employee is a legitimate governmental goal. But we do not see how an absolute exclusion of same-sex domestic partners from being eligible for benefits is substantially related to this interest. Many same-sex couples are no doubt just as “truly closely related” and “closely connected” as any married couple, in the sense of providing the same level of love, commitment, and mutual economic and emotional support, as between married couples, and would choose to get married if they were not prohibited by law from doing so. Although limiting benefits to “spouses,” and thereby excluding all same-sex domestic partners, does technically reduce costs, such a restriction fails to advance the expressed governmental goal of limiting benefits to those in “truly close relationships” with and “closely connected” to the employee. It is significant that other agencies, political subdivisions, and states provide, or have provided, employment benefits to their employees’ same-sex domestic partners. The state does not dispute the employees’ contention that the University of Alaska does or did so and that it adopted qualifying criteria. Likewise, other states and municipalities, including the City and Borough of Juneau, offer the same health benefits to domestic partners, per their eligibility standards, that they offer to married couples. The governmental interests of cost control, administrative efficiency, and promotion of marriage are legitimate, but the absolute denial of benefits to public employees with same-sex domestic partners is not substantially related to these governmental interests. When the state or a political subdivision acts in this capacity, it is subject to the overarching principles set out in article I, section 1, and article XII, section 6, of the Alaska Constitution. Those sections guarantee all Alaskans “the rewards of their own industry” and require public employment to be based on merit. Programs allowing the governments to give married workers substantially greater compensation than they give, for identical work, to workers with same-sex partners cut against these constitutional principles yet further no legitimate goal of the governments as public employers. However legitimate these programs’ broader policy goals may be, then, the means they employ would not be fairly and substantially related to furthering those goals. We therefore conclude that the challenged programs violate the individual employees’ right to equal protection of the law and the public employers’ spousal limitations violate the Alaska Constitution’s equal protection clause. VACATE and REMAND.
Q1. Does the court’s reasoning make sense to you? Explain.
Q2. As an employer, would you have known that if the Alaska constitution prohibited a denial of equal protection and rights that this meant you could not extend benefits to gay and lesbian couples? Explain.
Q3. From an employer’s point of view, did it make sense to you for the state to argue that not extending benefits to gay and lesbian couples would save money, if, at the same time, the ability by heterosexuals to be married in order to be able to qualify for benefits could mean, theoretically, that all heterosexual state employees would marry so they could have benefits? Explain.
Your answer must be typed, double-spaced, Times New Roman font (size 12), one-inch margins on all sides, APA format.