KENTUCKY AMENDMENT Q & A: From the Lexington Herald Leader

Here's a primer on what Amendment No. 1 would or would not do, based on conversations with lawyers who specialize in family or constitutional law. In some cases, the lawyers disagree. If the amendment is passed, its meaning will ultimately be decided by judges. ...

If the amendment is passed, would the legal agreements that some same-sex couples use to define their relationship still be valid?

Legal documents such as wills, power-of-attorney documents and health care proxies would not be affected.

However, more complicated agreements could be vulnerable, especially if written in terms traditionally associated with marriage, said Sam Marcosson, who teaches constitutional law at the University of Louisville and has spoken publicly against the amendment.

For example, a same-sex couple could draft an agreement saying that one partner would pay the other a set amount if their relationship ended. The partner required to make the payment could challenge the contract based on the amendment, Marcosson said, arguing that the contract was essentially setting up alimony, a benefit of marriage.

Paul Salamanca, who teaches constitutional law at the University of Kentucky, contends that such challenges would fail. "Otherwise it would just make chaos out of the law of contracts," Salamanca said.

At a minimum, unmarried couples would have to be careful to avoid using marital language when writing legal agreements, Marcosson said.

If the amendment is passed, will employers be able to offer benefits to same-sex couples?

A private employer could still extend benefits to same-sex couples. However, the amendment could prevent public employers -- state agencies, public universities and local governments -- from extending benefits to same-sex couples. ...

If the amendment is passed, will members of unmarried couples still be able to seek protection under the state's domestic violence laws?

In 1992, state law was rewritten to allow members of unmarried couples to obtain a protective order against an abusive partner. Five years later, the Court of Appeals ruled that the rewritten law included same-sex couples.

Someone could argue that, by giving to members of unmarried couples a right reserved by tradition to married couples, the legislature gave status to unmarried relationships -- an act forbidden by the amendment.

Salamanca doubts that such an argument would succeed: He contends that the more specific language of the statute and the Court of Appeals ruling would govern the more general-language of the amendment.

Marcosson disagrees. The amendment doesn't specify whether protective orders are part of a status similar to marriage, he said.

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