It began as a discreet Socialist campaign promise, brought up in public only in response to questions, outlined in letters to gay rights groups such as ActUp. The Prime Minister, Mr Lionel Jospin, prides himself on keeping his word, so over the summer Socialist parliamentarians drew up a proposed law establishing the Civil Solidarity Pact (PACS).
But the initiative degenerated into a confused and acrimonious dispute between left and right, secular France and religious France, Parisian and rural society. Last Friday, it resulted in the first major set-back for the ruling pink-red-green coalition. And it's not over.
A legacy of pre-revolution values, French inheritance law gives absolute priority to blood relatives - even over spouses. Property willed to anyone outside the family is taxed at a rate of 60 per cent. By recognising unmarried union, the PACS was to have provided legal protection for heterosexual couples and homosexuals. The AIDS epidemic provided many tragic examples of men who, after the death of their companion, came home to find a bailiff's seal on the door.
The measure was denounced by the opposition right as de facto "gay marriage" that would lead inevitably to the adoption of children by homosexuals and in vitro conception to enable gays to have biological offspring. Even leftwing deputies took fright.
Liberation headlined one article with a constituent's remark overheard in the countryside: "Alors, comme ca, tu votes pour le mariage des pedes?" (So you're voting for homo marriage?) Opinion polls showed that 49 per cent of French people supported the PACS for homosexuals, but that figure fell to 45 per cent in rural areas, strengthening the impression that the text was invented by Parisians under the influence of the "gay lobby".
The debate reopened the rift between secularists and practising Catholics that runs through French history, from the 1789 revolution through Jules Ferry's late 19th century battle to wrest control of education from the Church to the 1905 Law on the Separation of Church and State.
The ecologist deputy Noel Mamere denounced PACS opponents as "wearers of crucifixes" and grenouilles de benitier. The latter expression means literally "font frogs" and was last heard during the 1905 battle.
"We've received letters from constituents who were a bit shocked," Mr Mamere's assistant, Patrick Farbiaz, admitted with a laugh. "Maybe we overdid it."
On the religious side, the centre-right deputy Christine Boutin pulled a Bible from her handbag and shook it at the Socialist Minister for Justice, Elisabeth Guigou, during the parliamentary debate on October 9th. In the Journal du Dimanche, the writer Dominique Fernandez said he and Mrs Boutin had not read the same Bible. "In the Gospel, not only is there not a single word against gays, Christ defends sexual dissidents against the obtuseness of the Pharisees and right-thinking people," Mr Fernandez wrote. "In the Old Testament, we discover that David had feelings for Jonathan that no woman could inspire in him."
This interpretation was disputed by Father Tony Anatrella, a priest and psychoanalyst who has campaigned against the PACS.
The debate was further confused when Roselyne Bachelot, the only right-wing deputy who supported the PACS, introduced an amendment - one of 900 - extending the bill to brothers and sisters. In her rural Maine-etLoire district, Mrs Bachelot said, it was not uncommon to find elderly siblings living together. Shouldn't they enjoy the same inheritance and tax advantages as other couples? The amendment was mockingly dubbed "brothers, calves, cows and pigs", and it divided the Socialists between those who were relieved to see sexuality excised from the law and those who said it defeated the purpose of recognising homosexual relationships. Mrs Guigou said she feared it could encourage incest.
To the fury of Mr Jospin, only 39 of 251 Socialist deputies showed up in the National Assembly last Friday, and the opposition right staged a procedural vote pronouncing the law "inadmissible". When the Socialists filed a slightly re-jigged PACS law yesterday, to be voted on November 10th, party leaders took the precaution of asking all present to sign a pledge promising to show up for the ballot.
The PACS debacle could signal the end of Mr Jospin's 16-month honeymoon in office. President Chirac is growing more combative, transport workers were on strike all last week in Paris, and a protest movement by secondary school students is gathering momentum. The methode Jospin has always stressed balance, but it is starting to look like a balancing act.
