Judge OKs New Calif. Domestic Partner Law

[Khephra]

SAN FRANCISCO -- A Superior Court judge in Sacramento upheld a new state law Wednesday that is poised to give gay couples who register as domestic partners nearly all the legal benefits and responsibilities of married spouses.

Dismissing arguments of two groups that sued to have the law struck down before it takes effect Jan. 1, Judge Loren E. McMaster ruled that assigning privileges such as alimony and parental status to same-sex couples does not violate a voter-approved measure that holds California can recognize only marriages between a man and a woman.

"The parties' obvious fundamental dispute is whether a domestic partnership under the new statute constitutes a marriage. The court concludes that it does not," McMaster wrote. "In the end, although the two relationships now share many, if not most, of the same functional attributes they are inherently distinct."

Former Gov. Gray Davis signed the California Defense of Marriage Act last year.

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-domestic-partners,0,5597605.story?coll=sns-ap-nation-headlines