I think I was wrong; I think it's worse than I thought.

[solarbird]

Hm. I'm reading this again:

Neither this Constitution or the constitution of any State, nor state or federal law, shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.

Let's take out the constitutional and federal parts, and leave in the part that applies specifically to the possible actions of states:

[No]... state... law... shall be shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.

I think I'm wrong. I think it'll be used to ban civil unions, too, because any state law that conferred legal incidents of marriage could fall under this clause. So only a state civil unions law that provided none of the benefits of marriage would be allowable under this reading.

That message will be difficult to communicate.