As we move into October, you cannot help but notice the campaign signs multiplying along the roadsides and in front of homes, blinding drivers in a see of color. Television and radio advertisements have been ramped up, flooding the airwaves stronger than a Category 5 hurricane. And the e-mails… oh, the e-mails have once again resurfaced, venturing into the ridiculous to the extent that even the 24-hour news stations, The National Enquirer, and Weekly World News won’t even touch them. Obama or McCain, Purdue or McCrory, Candidate A or Candidate B, it seems that politics is in the air and can’t be avoided.

While the individual elections in our area of the country are important and deserve careful, thoughtful consideration, some of the most meaningful votes affecting the LGBT community and its identity will not be for candidates, nor will they necessarily be local. There are four ballot initiatives in different states that are sure to shape the debate, reinforce negative stereotypes, and shuffle political positions for the next four years and beyond. Three ballot initiatives deal with state constitutional amendments to ban gay marriage, and one initiative deals with creating a law relating to the adoption and foster care of children by unmarried couples.

As I have mentioned before in previous articles, the affect of gay marriage on life and estate planning for LGBT couples is largely irrelevant—with the exception of a few tax breaks, all of the rights couples usually associate with marriage can be obtained even more effectively through proper life and estate planning. (For more information on an effective estate planning solution for domestic partners, please download the free report at www.partnerabsecuretrust.com). While certainly more impactful on LGBT families, the adoption and foster care of children debates are also shaping up around the most vicious of stereotypes. In the long run, these issues affect the LGBT community and the ability of its members to plan ahead more than the individual candidate elections, and they greatly affect the image of the community and deserve careful attention.

Here are the four states with ballot initiatives directly affecting the LGBT community:

Arizona: In 2006, the State of Arizona had the distinction of being the first state to reject Proposition 107, a ban on gay marriage and civil unions. But once again, the initiative has arisen in the form of Proposition 102 for a vote in November’s 2008 general election. However, it is not the same proposed amendment we saw two years ago. This time, the ban on civil unions has been cut from the initiative in the hopes that it will overcome some of the reservations Arizona voters had who would vote for a ban on gay marriage but who would not vote for a ban on civil unions.

While it would be nice to think that the people of Arizona rejected the whole of the amendment in 2006 out of principle, the voter statistics and exit polls show different. In 2006, 51.2% of the voters rejected the ban and 48.2% approved it (the remaining voters not voting on the issue).

Exit polls in other states that approved state constitutional amendments to ban gay marriage showed a good proportion of the voters being agreeable to equal rights, civil unions, and even some agreeable to legislation making attacks on LGBT members a hate crime. In short, the 2006 voters in Arizona were not buying the hateful stereotypes put forth by the proponents of the initiative and therefore the initiative in 2008 had to be narrowed.

The one thing that some of these voters clung to was a denial of full marriage rights, saying that was the one area that had to remain for heterosexual couples only. Whether their motive was personal or religious, there were several 2006 constitutional bans on gay marriage in other states that left open the possibility of civil unions, and those amendments passed more decidedly than Arizona’s ban failed.

The big question will be whether or not two more years of progressive thinking, denial of hurtful stereotypes, and overall acceptance of the LGBT community will overcome the number of voters who will vote for a ban on gay marriage provided Arizona leaves open the future possibility of civil unions.

Florida: While Arizona is backing away from a constitutional ban on civil unions, the Florida Marriage Protection Amendment (called “Amendment 2”) puts a ban on civil unions front and center. The actual text of the amendment reads: “Inasmuch as marriage is the legal union of only one man and one woman as husband and wife, no other legal union that is treated as marriage or the substantial equivalent thereof shall be valid or recognized.”

The Florida amendment makes it extremely clear that no union other than marriage between a man and a woman will exist or be recognized in Florida. This completely closes the door to civil unions or any other marriage or tax benefits available to married couples. Even more troubling, this amendment may even close the door to partner benefits at all levels of government. On the positive side, it takes sixty percent (60%) of the voters to approve an amendment to the constitution, and polling by the Orlando-Sentinel in late August showed only fifty-seven percent (57%) support.

While there are currently 27 states that have state constitutional bans on gay marriage and 41 that have state laws against gay marriage, some of these state bans allow for municipalities to provide domestic partner benefits to their employees. (In addition, all of the states allow businesses to provide domestic partner benefits for their employees.) The most troubling part of this ban is that it seems to be specifically designed to not only protect the heterosexual monopoly on state-sanctioned marriage but also to do everything it can to even prevent anything resembling a marriage right from being allowed in the State of Florida.

In terms of life and estate planning, this will probably not affect anything that can already be done through trusts, powers of attorney or other legal documents. However, if passed this legislation could prevent a variety of state statutes from even being presented in the legislature, such as a law that allowed registered domestic partners to have priority visitation and medical decision-making power if their partner is in the hospital, or to provide for automatic inheritance for registered domestic partners. If passed, Florida couples will have to give even more attention to putting their plans in writing.

California: The most recent court victory in California had the mainstream media gushing about gay marriage being right around the corner. The California Supreme Court had overturned a portion of a state law that gave the same rights married couples had to LGBT couples and specifically calling that relationship a domestic partnership rather than a marriage. The court stated clearly and specifically that the relationship had to be called marriage to comply with California’s state constitution. As soon as the court decision was released, various political and religious groups vowed to amend the California constitution to overturn the court’s decision.

Welcome to the California Marriage Protection Act in the form of Proposition 8. While not technically an “Act,” this constitutional amendment would add a new Article I, Section 7.5 to read “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.”

While this amendment does prevent LGBT couples from becoming “married,” it would still leave in place all of the domestic partnership laws that gave all of the same state-level rights of marriage to same-gender couples. In other words, the only thing affected by this amendment is the right for LGBT couples to say that they are married under state law. All of the substantive rights are still in place, just as they were even before the California Supreme Court decision.

According to the Public Policy Institute of California, the good polling news here is that as of late August only forty percent (40%) of voters polled said they were in favor of the amendment and fifty four percent (54%) were against with the rest undecided. With the overall positive image of LGBT couple rights in California, it appears that the hurtful stereotypes prevalent in other states are not working on the West Coast.

Arkansas: While gay marriage tends to be at the top of the media’s attention on LGBT issues, there is actually a significant ballot initiative that would have much farther reaching effects on LGBT families in Arkansas than a denial of gay marriage and is based on extremely negative and false stereotypes of domestic partners. The Arkansas state law that would be enacted is known officially as “An Act Providing That an Individual Who is Cohabitating Outside of a Valid Marriage May Not Adopt or Be a Foster Parent of a Child Less Than Eighteen Years Old.” The short title is the “Arkansas Unmarried Adoption Ban.”

While far less popular in the media than the gay marriage bans, the Arkansas Unmarried Adoption Ban would have huge implications on LGBT couples who want to adopt children, deliver a body blow to the foster care system, and have a disastrous affect on the progress being made that shows LGBT couples have the same parenting skills and goals as heterosexual married couples.

Unfortunately, when you ask the question, “what are they trying to protect children from?” the obvious answer comes in the form of the horrible stereotype whispered in words of prejudice that say being gay means being a child molester.

Under the guise of “protecting children,” the ban would prevent the state from placing foster children into otherwise good and loving homes simply because the couple is not able to marry under state law or chooses not to marry under state law. Further, there is very little that LGBT couples would be able to do to become parents without one member of the couple actually being a biological parent.

It is also odd that while the text of the ban states that it is state public policy to favor marriage, this ban does nothing to affect the guardianship of minors from divorced couples. In practical terms, this means that if a couple marries and has children, then they can divorce and then cohabitate with whomever they want without the ban affecting their “guardianship rights” as a parent.

While the candidates will continue to flood the airwaves with ads and the streets with yard signs, keep in mind some of the ballot initiatives being decided across the country. And as you do, perhaps you may come up with some initiatives of your own to present in a few years. Perhaps if people are really concerned about preserving “the sanctity of marriage,” someone will propose a ballot initiative to amend the state constitution making it illegal to divorce within the state and that the state will not recognize divorces from other states. Hmm, something to think about for 2010.

Jeffrey G. Marsocci is a Raleigh-based life and estate planning attorney who frequently lectures and works in Asheville. He is also the author of Estate Planning for Domestic Partners, and focuses on helping domestic partners achieve many of the same rights married couples have (available at www.estateplanningfordomesticpartners.com). He can be reached through his main Raleigh office at 919-844-7993, and his book providing valuable information on revocable living trusts for LGBT couples can purchased at www.estateplanningfordomesticpartners.com. For more information on domestic partner estate planning issues, please check out the Podcasts at www.rainbowlegaltalk.com.