Six states have “everything but marriage” laws, which grant same sex couples the same rights the states give to married opposite sex couples. The idea is to give gay couples everything marriage includes except for the actual name.

It doesn’t work.

The Lewiston Sun-Journal reported the findings of a New Jersey commission that the state’s civil union law creates second class citizens:

The commission held three public hearings last year at which the majority of the testimony came from people who were in civil unions and said they were still not being treated the way married couples are by government agencies, employers and others. . . [It found] that gay couples in Massachusetts, the only state that now allows same-sex marriage, do not experience some of the legal complications that those in New Jersey do.

The second class status has real effects. Insurance companies governed by federal laws will sometimes deny joint coverage to gay couples in a civil union, but will grant that coverage to couples married in states like Massachusetts.

The commission also found that everything but marriage laws hurt children, making it difficult to grow up with gay parents or accept their own sexuality.

Joanna Grossman, law professor at Hofstra Law School, explains the two major disadvantages to the second class status that everything but marriage brings:

The creation of a “separate but equal” status often visits stigma and insult on those who partake in it, and civil unions are no exception. . . Second, couples who entered into civil unions encountered practical difficulties stemming from the newness and the scattered out-of-state recognition of the status.

I’ve written before about the out of state recognition difficulties that couples in domestic partnerships and civil unions face.

The combination of problems shows that everything but marriage laws lack more than just the marriage label.