Rhode Island is now the only state in New England that doesn't allow same-sex couples to marry and we shouldn't expect a marriage equality bill in that state anytime soon. But Rhode Island state senate did approve a domestic partnership bill yesterday. So what rights might same-sex couples in Rhode Island soon enjoy? Just one.

[The] Senate on Tuesday approved a bill giving “domestic partners” the right to claim the bodies of—and make funeral arrangements for—their loved ones.

And that's it. To get the state of Rhode Island to treat a same-sex couple equally one the partners has to die first. Isn't it romantic? And why did the Rhode Island senate decide to bestow this right—and only this right—on same-sex couples?

At a hearing earlier this year on one of the stalled bills to allow same-sex marriage, Mark S. Goldberg told a Senate committee about his months-long battle last fall to persuade state authorities to release to him the body of his partner of 17 years, Ron Hanby, so he could grant Hanby’s wish for cremation — only to have that request rejected too because “we were not legally married or blood relatives.”

Goldberg was in possession of the documents that opponents of marriage equality insist are all we queers really need. He and his partner had wills, living wills, powers of attorney, and a marriage certificate from Connecticut. But the police and the medical examiner's office wouldn't even look at these documents. Instead they held on to Hanby's body and conducted a weeks-long search for Hanby's "next of kin." It took a month for the state to release Hanby's body to Goldberg and even then Goldberg couldn't get his partner's remains cremated in Rhode Island—he had to have Hanby's body taken to Massachusetts—because Goldberg wasn't Hanby's "next of kin."

Goldberg and Hanby were together for 17 years.