Arizona is back in court today, this time to defend the Legislature's decision to deny health benefits to the gay partners of state employees.

Lawmakers and Gov. Jan Brewer intended to cut benefits to all domestic partners when they reversed a rule change under then-Gov. Janet Napolitano as part of a budget-balancing bill.

But a lawsuit filed on behalf of 10 state employees in November 2009 argued that the law discriminates against gay and lesbians. In July, U.S. District Judge John Sedwick agreed and temporarily prevented the benefit cut for same-sex couples, saying the law violated the U.S. Constitution's equal-protection clause by making it impossible for homosexuals to get health coverage for their partners.

More than 600 state workers lost health-care coverage for their heterosexual partners on Jan. 1. The law also cut benefits for adult children, but federal health-care reform required the state to offer insurance to dependent children up to age 26.

Benefits to 480 same-sex partners and about 60 children would be cut off if the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals lifts the injunction. A three-judge panel in San Francisco hears oral arguments today. Arizona spends $625 million a year on employee benefits, of which roughly $5 million went to benefits for all domestic partners.

The state can't require employees to be married in order to qualify for family benefits when Arizona offers no legal unions for same-sex couples, said Tara Borelli, an attorney with Lambda Legal, a New York-based advocacy group that filed the lawsuit.

"The state has set up a legal impossibility for gay couples," said Borelli, who will argue the case today.

In addition, the state can't discriminate against a group of people to save money, she said. But the state argues that there's no requirement to offer benefits to domestic partners. More than half the states and the federal government do not.

And attorneys, in their appeals-court brief, said Sedwick erred in granting the stay. Among other things, they said, he placed the burden of proof on the state rather than the plaintiffs and reached "illogical" and "implausible" conclusions.

"The state had no obligation to provide any optional employee health-insurance coverage to domestic partners," Assistant Attorney General Charles A. Grube wrote. Under Sedwick's reasoning, Grube said, there should be a special benefit for gay employees.

"In order to comply with the preliminary injunction, the state must require state employee applicants to prove they are lesbian or gay as a condition of receiving benefit of employment," he wrote.

But Borelli said that homosexual employees are seeking to have the same benefits as their married co-workers, nothing more. Napolitano extended benefits to domestic partners through a rule change in late 2007. That put Arizona in line with 20 states and several Arizona cities, including Phoenix, Tempe, Tucson and Scottsdale. Brewer and lawmakers axed the benefits as part of budget-balancing bills, amending the definition of "dependent" to mean a child or a "spouse under the laws of this state."

Deanna Pfleger, a wildlife manager with Arizona Game and Fish and a plaintiff in the case, said she put her partner on her health plan after the rule change. The couple, who have two children, will celebrate 21 years together today.

"We are a family just like any other family," said Pfleger, who will attend today's hearing in San Francisco. "We've just wanted the same thing everybody around us has."