Politics

Same-Sex Marriages Likely A Long Way Off In Ill.

CHICAGO (CBS) ― A day after a California Supreme Court ruling legalized same-sex marriage, the question now is what might happen in Illinois.

But as CBS 2 Political Editor Mike Flannery reports, even those who support gay marriage in Illinois don't think it's going to happen any time soon. 


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 Read What Others Had To Say: Part 1 | Part 2


About 24,000 couples a year get their marriage licenses from the Cook County Clerk's Office. To be eligible, they have to include one man and one woman, like Matthew Morrison and Samantha Tolgyesi, although they are in support of gay couples having the right to marry, too.

"If you love somebody, it doesn't matter," the couple said.

State Rep. Greg Harris is sponsor of a bill to legalize gay marriage, but says he probably won't call it in Springfield because it doesn't have the votes to pass.

On the other hand, he said he might call his House Bill 1826, legalizing civil unions, which would grant same-sex couples certain, what he called, limited, rights.

"Illinois is not ready for same-sex marriage yet. Certainly the legislature was not when I did my roll call there. But people are willing to talk about extending certain basic concepts [like] fairness," Harris said.

Ralph Rivera's one of the leading foes of gay marriage, opposition that he says is based in part on the Bible, especially the books of Genesis, Leviticus and a letter from St. Paul to the Corinthians.

"It's a bad idea," Rivera said. "It's something that the legislators in the general assembly do not support; they are very much in the majority being opposed to this."

Harris said he would prefer to have the political process legalize gay marriage if it ever comes to that.

The gay-oriented Lambda Legal Foundation does not rule out eventually asking Illinois courts to legalize same-sex marriage here. But for now there are no plans to do that.

In Cook County, the domestic partnership registry, open to same-sex couples, has registered 1,200 couples in the last five years.

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