“I do.”

With those simple pithy little words, a lifetime commitment begins. Once married, couples also stand to gain an array of legal benefits. These range from hospital visitation rights to certain tax benefits. In 2004, Massachusetts became the first state to recognize that every loving couple, straight and gay, deserves the opportunity to have their union recognized and certified in the eyes of the law.

As of this writing, four states have legalized marriage equality. The other three are Connecticut, Vermont, and Iowa. When will New Jersey join their ranks? For how much longer will our ostensibly liberal and true-blue state be “out-progressed” by a bunch of corn-huskers in Iowa, of all places? The Garden State is smack-dab in the middle of NYC and Philadelphia, for goodness’ sake. We’re supposed to be cosmopolitan! Iowa, on the other hand, is the midpoint between nowhere and a flock of sheep, if that.

In all seriousness, it is maddening that New Jersey has yet to extend the rights of marriage to all its residents. Instead, we have something called “civil unions”. Garden State same-sex couples have been allowed to join in civil unions before the law. This classification was to guarantee gays and lesbians all the same legal rights and benefits that married heterosexual couples enjoy, without the supposedly insurmountable hurdle of using the word “marriage”. Presently, this has resulted in equal rights on paper, but varying results in practice. As any student of American history could have guessed, a “separate but equal” policy has turned out to be inherently unequal.

Recently, our fair state established the New Jersey Civil Union Review Commission to evaluate the program’s success. Their report, however, concluded civil unions to be “a failed experiment”.

Governor Corzine, as reported in The Star-Ledger, has “pledged to sign a gay marriage bill if it reaches his desk”. Assemblyman Reed Gusciora (D-Princeton) introduced just such a bill, but it has yet to pass. The state senate, meanwhile, seems to be really dragging its heels. Both Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts (D-Camden) and Senate President Richard Codey (D-Essex) have expressed their support in the past for legalizing same-sex marriage. Now they must double their efforts to round up the necessary votes and send a bill to the governor.

Senator Loretta Weinberg, a Bergen county Democrat, explains the stakes:

“As public opinion continues to evolve from the dark days when homosexuals were forced to hide their sexual orientation from a fearful and intolerant public, we stand on the precipice of a rebirth of true civil rights for all people. As more and more states take a stand in defense of marriage – and I truly believe that expanding the definition strengthens the institution of marriage, as opposed to weakening it – we’re gaining momentum to true, nationwide marriage equality that does not judge the value of love between two people, be they heterosexual or homosexual.”

We need to throw away our two-tiered “separate but equal” system and stop assigning second-class status to gay and lesbian relationships in the eyes of the law.

You can help bring about this change in New Jersey. Just take a minute to call one or more of the following leaders in Trenton and ask them to legalize marriage equality.