Back in January, the Hawaii State House of Representatives killed a pro-LGBT civil union bill from coming to the floor. Numerous theories abound, including that House Speaker Say had the votes but didn't want to deal with the issue in an election year, Senate President and Congressional candidate Colleen Hanabusa (as kolea noted in the comments at the time) sprung this on the House to repair relationships with the LGBT community, the House didn't have the votes to override a potential Gov. Lingle veto threat that she never made, etc.
Equality Hawaii and its allies were finally able to push it through, as the House passed the bill on the very last day of the session, 31-20. The bill would also extend civil unions to unmarried opposite-sex partners. The passage also came under threat of a lawsuit from Lambda Legal and the ACLU of Hawaii, which issued such a threat following the the House move back in January. The bill had already been passed by the Senate and Gov. Lingle has 45 days to announce whether she will sign it, veto it, or allow it to become law without her signature. She has not announced a decision yet, but I am told she has allowed other LGBT bills to become law without her signature, and promised to sign such a bill when she ran for governor in 2002.
Hawaii was actually the original battleground on marriage equality back in 1993 when the state Supreme Court ruled that the statute limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples was unconstitutional unless the state could prove it justified a compelling state interest and did not abridge rights, before a 1998 voter referendum gave the legislature the power to restrict marriage to opposite-sex couples, which it did. Same-sex couples have gone without these benefits since then, and it is good to see additional protections added. Kudos to all who pushed this through.
