by John Boyle
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Income tax returns were due yesterday. And at the last minute, hundreds of New Yorkers scrambled to the main Post Office on 34th St. to get their checks in the mail.
While on line they were a captive audience for many groups who protested against the system. One group was all decked out in furs and pearls and called themselves Billionaires for Bush
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Street ambience
"thanking you the hard working middle class … my corporation paid no income tax, legally.
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But one group was protesting to get into the system.
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Chanting: "If you want to tax us, let us marry, what's the fuss?"
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They are called Marriage Equality NY.
They are an organization of gay and lesbian couples who say they pay higher taxes than straight couples without any of the financial benefits of marriage. David Chase and his partner of 16 years were married legally in Toronto last year.
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we have a perfectly legal marriage license that the federal govt of the us does not recognize and therefore we pay higher taxes than a straight couple with exactly the same income and deductions as we have.
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David Thompson is the co-chair of Marriage Equality NY, an organization created to bring awareness to the issue of legalizing same sex marriage. He says that, on the state level alone, a civil marriage license activates over 700 laws that grant benefits and impose responsibilities.
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these govern things such as divorce, child custody and support taxation, common property, debt, and the List goes on. We're excluded from these legal structures right now because of what's apparently a moral decision and I would call it a questionable moral decision.
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For Bob Abrams, a lawyer, their protest struck the perfect note.
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It's absolutely right on the money. They have many of the rights that non-gay people have but they don't have the right to be married and they don't have the right to file income taxes as married filing jointly. I never thought of it until I saw this. It's wonderful. It's a great idea that they're here to protest and it gives another reason for allowing gay marriage.
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For Sylvie Johnson, it just didn't make sense
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Why should they have same sex marriage? I don't go for that.
I don't see why they're protesting.
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David Pace and his friends thought it was okay for gays and lesbians to marry but wondered why they'd want to.
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If homosexuals want to screw up their relationship and get married like the rest of us … more power to them. Let them join in the misery … pay alimony, child support, **** if you want to pay the marriage penalty, go for it , its hell, its hell, don't do it , be thankful that you not allowed.
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Thompson says that the marriage penalty is an issue that he is frequently asked about.
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That's really part of the argument. We're not just asking for a bunch of handouts. We want to be part of both benefits and the obligations and there are both.
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David Chase says that one of the possible solutions he hears often is giving same sex unions the same rights as married couples but calling it a civil union. He says that the problem with civil unions is that federal and state laws don't recognize them.
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only if the federal govt and all the state govts were to somehow miraculously create the thousands of lawss that deal w/ marriage and duplicate all of those for gay people in civil unions would it be equal and that's ridiculous
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Maureen Bobrovnicki explains why calling marriage anything else doesn't work for her.
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You're not a family. You're domestic partners. When you get married you are family. Your husband, your wife, that is your next of kin and you have rights and responsibilities as family and you're respected as such. We don't have that. That's why we're here.
Fade up on " We paid our taxes, now give us our rights!"
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The historic phrase, "Taxation without representation," seems to have been given a new lease on life.
For Columbia News Radio, I'm John Boyle