New Jersey adopted civil unions at the behest of its judiciary in 2007. By the numbers, the threshold of factual proof is very high to demonstrate that civil unions do not meet the equality criterion that the state’s Supreme Court posited in its decision of October 26, 2006. The breakdown:

8,600,000 – The total number of residents living in New Jersey
1,600,000 – The total number of married couples living in New Jersey
3,200,000 – The number of married individuals in NJ
37.2 % – The percentage of married persons in NJ to the total population
245,100 – The estimated number of homosexual persons living in NJ
2.8 % – The percentage of homosexual persons in NJ to the total population
5,447 – The number of homosexual couples who formed civil unions in New Jersey; only 2.2% of homosexuals*
0.06% – The percentage of NJ homosexual couples in civil unions compared to the total population.
13 – The number of homosexual couples who have formed civil unions in New Jersey who have filed complaints with the NJ Civil Rights Commission claiming that civil unions are not working
0.00015% – The percentage of NJ homosexuals in civil union filing formal complaints to the total population
1 – The number of complaints where the Civil Rights Commission found that there may have been probable cause. The other 12 were dismissed.
*As of July 10, 2011 per NJDHSS

So for two people in all of New Jersey, we would change the meaning of marriage? At yesterday’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, a handful of homosexual couples testified that medical personnel did not know and/or would not comply with the civil union law in a time of extreme need. Len Deo, Founder and President of NJFPC, said, “It is inappropriate that medical and administrative personnel not acknowledge relationships specifically recognized by law, especially in medical emergencies. However, this is a bureaucratic failure. Changing the name of civil unions to ‘marriages’ would not fix the problem of uneducated or misguided personnel. The solution is to update the forms and train the staff in medical centers and state agencies—not to overturn thousands of years of societal and legal custom.”
In a poll fielded for New Jersey Family Policy Council in 2010, 61% of New Jerseyans supported the traditional institution of marriage. Just recently, participants in an online poll by the Star-Ledger stood 60%-39% against redefining marriage.