Cambridge's domestic partnerships benefits ordinance is significantly different from Boston's, a fact which may preserve the ordinance against litigation, according to former City Councilor Katherine Triantafillou, who participated in the drafting of the ordinance and who has a long-term female partner.

Forty domestic partners recognized under the current statute have been receiving city health insurance, Triantafillou said. She said the law is less likely to be discarded when doing so would deprive people of longstanding benefits.

The Cambridge ordinance gives partners broader benefits than the Boston plan did.

In Massachusetts, the two sides of the domestic partnership debate are facing off both in local suits, like those in Boston and Cambridge, and state legislation.

The SJC said their decision will leave "some household members of some of Boston's employees ...without a critical social necessity, health insurance. That is a reality that must be addressed by the Legislature."

Last November, the Massachusetts senate passed the Domestic Partnership Bill, which would extend health insurance benefits to same-sex partners of state employees and allow municipalities act similarly. The House has yet to put the bill up for public debate.

"These little mean-spirited attacks could be stopped dead by a simple state domestic partnership benefit law," Buseck said of the suits filed against Cambridge and Boston. "If the House passed it and the governor signed it, the case in Cambridge would be moot."