There they go again: the “band of four,” the slim majority of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, the band that took it upon itself to remodel the laws of marriage in Massachusetts.

In November the court had proclaimed that there was no rational basis for the laws that, for centuries, have restricted marriage to a couple drawn from the two sexes. The majority on the court had been candid enough to admit that neither the constitution nor the laws of Massachusetts had ever contemplated the possibility that “marriage” could encompass two people of the same sex. In order to reach its result, the court had to invoke a federal case: one decided last year, in which the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a Texas sodomy statute. Strictly construed, the decision had overturned a law that attached criminal penalties to sodomy in private settings. But that decision has been taken to mean that it is wrong to cast any judgment, or draw any adverse inference, from private sexual acts. This sweeping rhetoric will come down to earth before long when a court has to decide whether the custody of a child may be awarded to a father who has shown, in private, a profound taste for sado-masochistic sex, or even alliances with animals. But the Supreme Judicial Court in Massachusetts was willing to soar for a while in the currents of sentiment and classify as irrational and unconstitutional the laws that have governed marriage in Massachusetts as long as memory has runneth.

There is a novelty, though, under the laws of Massachusetts: A house of the legislature may actually come before the state supreme court with the draft of a bill, and seek an advisory opinion on the constitutionality of the measure. That kind of arrangement may effectively constitute the court as a third chamber of the legislature — though the way things are going of late, the court may take that as a demotion. The supreme court had given the legislature 180 days to provide some plausible alternative to same-sex marriage, and the senate, eager to please, tried out a scheme of “civil unions”: Every benefit of marriage, in taxes or property, could be conferred, and the only thing held back was the name of “marriage” itself. The whole thing had the aspect of a contrived caper, concealed as a maneuver to avoid same-sex marriage. In point of fact, the aim of the bill seemed to be to “sap” or undermine the conviction that supported the traditional laws of marriage. If a legislature talked itself into conferring on couples of the same sex virtually every benefit and privilege associated with marriage, it would seem in time only a carping, curmudgeonly refusal to recognize, in name, what had been recognized fully in substance.

The majority on the Supreme Judicial Court picked up on that matter at once. But instead of using that offering as an artful device to impose, in steps, its own policy, the majority rejected the proffer with a certain contempt. “Segregating same-sex unions from opposite-sex unions,” said Chief Justice Marshall, “cannot possibly be held rationally to advance or ‘preserve’...the Commonwealth’s legitimate interests in procreation, child rearing, and the conservation of resources.” The majority apparently thought it could turn away from the finesse, the peace offering, and go for bigger stakes. In that move, the band of four might have overplayed its hand. But the judges also wrought better than even they knew, for they also delivered themselves here of the most searing criticism that has yet been made of the whole scheme for contriving “civil unions” as a surrogate for marriage. The argument might be condensed in this way: If the legislature is willing to grant every legal benefit and attribute of marriage to a couple, but simply holds back the name of “marriage” for couples of the same sex, the implication should be clear: There is something in that class of persons not exactly worthy of the name of marriage. Consider how the same legislation would have appeared if the substance of marriage were given to couples, but only “civil unions” given to dwarves. Or people with disabilities. Or Jews and blacks. In other words, it is precisely the scheme of creating the parallel substance of marriage, and withholding the title, that picks out classes of people in a demeaning way. And the truth that comes crashing through in this clumsy opinion is this: that the scheme of “civil unions” is simply geared to keep generating invidious distinctions, in the way that the traditional laws on marriage do not. Brothers and sisters, fathers and daughters were not demeaned when they were barred from marrying one another. Nor were two men, seeking to marry each other. The laws that prohibited these unions implied no vilification of men or fathers, brothers and sisters as individuals.

Justice Martha Sosman, in dissent again, and ever clear-headed, pointed out the serious barriers in the landscape to same-sex marriages created in Massachusetts. Thirty-eight states now refuse to honor those marriages; their courts will not be available to enforce the obligations of those unions, or deal with their dissolution. Several years ago some of us worked on the Defense of Marriage Act for the federal government, an act that simply refused to consider, as a marriage, anything but the union of a man and woman. As Sosman points out, that modest measure offers the most severe impediment: Same-sex couples will not be able to file joint tax returns, or claim any of the benefits that may flow to spouses through the mass of federal programs. She suggests that even a facsimile of marriage, in a civil union, might provide then a route for benefits that the claim of marriage would foreclose. And in that sense, the legislature may have a “rational” enough basis for justifying this marriage in camouflage.

In the meantime, it might be said that the court itself has offered a series of slogans searching for a principle; and yet that may impute too high a reach to Chief Justice Marshall and her colleagues. The judges in the majority were mainly making it clear that they were in charge, and would have nothing less than what they had “invited” the legislature to produce. Those folks seasoned in the legislature must retain some ordinary reflexes found among ordinary human beings, and if they retain at least some minimal self-respect, this gesture of contempt by the court should be enough to push them over the edge. It is not enough to put off for two years a constitutional amendment. There are things to be done even now. The governor seems to be studying again the lessons taught by Lincoln on the limits of the court and the constitutional responsibilities of the political branches. As Lincoln reminded us, the executive and the legislature could respect the disposition of any case in regard to the litigants, but they may not be obliged to accept the principle articulated by the court. The court might issue injunctions to registrars throughout the state, ordering them to give marriage licenses to people of the same sex.

But the constitution of the state is clear that the laws on marriage belong mainly in the domain of the legislature, and the legislature has the decisive authority to determine the terms on which courts may issue injunctions. Exercising that power in the past, the legislature had diminished the authority of the judges to intervene in labor disputes, and leap in with injunctions to break strikes. By any reckoning, the laws of marriage would be at least as fundamental as the laws on labor and servants. The powers are there to be used. The main question then is whether the legislature of Massachusetts, happily composed as it is of members drawn from both sexes, can summon either the testosterone or the simple nerve to take their responsibility, and to vindicate “the right of a people to govern itself.”

— Hadley Arkes is the Ney Professor of Jurisprudence at Amherst College (Kwing Hung: a very liberal college but apparently with at least one conservative professor).

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Gay-Marriage Movement Held Up in Calif., Mass. (FN, 040312)

SAN FRANCISCO — The California Supreme Court halted gay weddings in San Francisco, but only so it can take the time to decide whether they are legal.

Across the country in Massachusetts — where the state’s high court has already ruled that gays can marry — lawmakers returned to the Capitol to consider undoing the justices’ mandate with a constitutional amendment.

California’s high court now must decide in May or June whether San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom had the authority to issue same-sex marriage licenses. The city has responded by filing a lawsuit demanding a judge declare the marriages constitutionally permissible, a question that could take at least another year to decide.

“I’m pleased the process is working as well as it is,” Newsom said Thursday. “Now we will be getting to the Supreme Court and making our argument.”

Minutes after Thursday’s ruling, teary-eyed couples were turned away at San Francisco’s City Hall, where 4,161 gay weddings have been performed since Feb. 12.

“We were filling out the application and they told us to stop,” said Art Adams, who was the first to be denied along with partner Devin Baker. “It’s heartbreaking. I don’t understand why two people in love should be prevented from expressing it.”

The court did not void those marriages, leaving the gay newlyweds in legal limbo.

Newsom’s defiance of California law sparked a host of other municipalities across the nation to follow suit.

“They restored order to chaos in San Francisco,” said Joshua Carden, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund, one of two conservative groups that went to court to block the marriages.

Massachusetts lawmakers ended their impasse Thursday with a recess until March 29, stopping just short of final approval to a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage but make Massachusetts the second state to grant civil-union benefits.

The civil unions provision was little solace to gay-rights advocates, who want lawmakers to uphold the full marriage rights accorded by the Supreme Judicial Court in November.

“For many legislators, prejudice won out over equality,” Arline Isaacson, co-leader of the Massachusetts Gay and Lesbian Political Caucus, said after the current version of the amendment survived through three rounds of votes Thursday.

Massachusetts Senate President Robert Travaglini expressed optimism that after weeks of intense debate and failed compromises, lawmakers were headed toward consensus.

“I believe we’ve overcome significant hurdles to get to this point,” Travaglini said. “I would hope that the road gets somewhat smoother and that we have encountered all of the bumps along the way, as of today.”

If approved later this month, the constitutional amendment would then proceed to the next step in the convoluted process, which would take effect in 2006 at the earliest.

In the interim, the nation’s first gay marriages are scheduled to take place May 17, although some legislative leaders have said they would try to block them.

While the national landscape has shifted dramatically since lawmakers last convened, with gay marriages occurring across the country and President Bush endorsing a federal amendment, the spotlight remained on Massachusetts because of its unique status as the only state where the marriages are legal.

“No Hatred. Just loving biblical truth,” read posters held by some of the opponents of gay marriage who gathered on the Statehouse steps.

Lynn Tibbets, 50, of Boston, held a sign urging “No discrimination in the constitution.”

“It used to just make me mad — the people on the other side. Now it just makes me sad,” Tibbets, a financial management consultant, said as she choked back tears.

In other developments Thursday:

— In Wisconsin, the state Senate approved a constitutional amendment early Friday that was earlier passed by the Assembly. If lawmakers approve the legislation again during the January session, it will go before voters on the April 2005 ballot.

— In Kentucky, the state Senate passed a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriages and ignore civil unions. A similar amendment has been introduced in the House.

— New Paltz, N.Y. Mayor Jason West, who performed 25 same-sex marriages last month, met face-to-face with New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. West, now under a court order to temporarily stop the marriages, had hoped to win over Spitzer, who reiterated his position that state law prohibited gay weddings.

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Black Clergymen Come Out Against Gay Marriage (FN, 040323)

ATLANTA — More than two dozen black pastors added their voice to the critics of same-sex marriage, attempting to distance the civil rights struggle from the gay rights movement and defending marriage as a union between a man and a woman.

“When the homosexual compares himself to the black community, he doesn’t know what suffering is,” said the Rev. Clarence James, an African-American studies professor at Temple University.

Jones and 29 pastors rallied late Monday with their supporters at an Atlanta-area church where they signed a declaration outlining their beliefs on marriage and religion.

The declaration is meant to pressure state representatives to approve a constitutional ban on gay marriages, which will be considered again by the Georgia House as soon as this week.

The declaration, to be presented to state leaders Tuesday, says same-sex marriage is not a civil right, and marriage between a man and a woman is important because it’s necessary for the upbringing of children.

“To equate a lifestyle choice to racism demeans the work of the entire civil rights movement,” the statement said. “People are free in our nation to pursue relationships as they choose. To redefine marriage, however, to suit the preference of those choosing alternative lifestyles is wrong.”

Same-sex marriage is already illegal in Georgia, but supporters of the ban say the constitution needs to be changed to make sure a judge does not direct Georgia to recognize gay marriages performed in other states.

“It is a threat to who we are and what we stand for,” said Bishop William Shields of Hopewell Baptist Church. “If nothing else gets us out of the pews, this ought to.”

But the Rev. Paul Turner, a gay pastor from Atlanta who helped organize a pro-gay marriage rally last month outside the Georgia Capitol, disagreed: “How do they figure that it’s not a civil rights issue?”

“This is just a way for those conservative leadership in the black community to say, ‘Look, this isn’t a matter of civil rights because we’re black and we didn’t have a choice in being black.’ And they think gays do, and that’s not true,” Turner said.

Elsewhere Monday:

— In Oregon, the county that was poised to become the state’s second to allow gay marriage backed off until courts intervene. Commissioners in Benton County, home to Oregon State University and the liberal city of Corvallis, decided to stop issuing all marriage licenses until there is a court ruling on whether gay marriage is legal in Oregon.

— In St. Paul, Minn., supporters of a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage gathered by the thousands in one of the largest Capitol rallies in memory, waving hundreds of signs on the Capitol steps and spilling over onto the lawn and parking lot. The House is expected to pass the bill Wednesday, with a Senate committee planning to take up the measure later in the week.

— In New York, two Unitarian Universalist ministers facing criminal counts for officiating at same-sex weddings pleaded innocent. Kay Greenleaf and Dawn Sangrey were charged after marrying 13 gay couples during a public ceremony in New Paltz, but the district attorney has said he does not expect to seek jail time.

— In North Carolina’s Durham County, a gay couple filed a lawsuit after being denied a marriage license. State law invalidates any claim of marriage between people of the same sex. Register of Deeds Willie Covington said the law gave him no choice.

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Justices Told to Comply With Gay Marriage Law (FN, 040426)

BOXBORO, Mass. — Gov. Mitt Romney’s top legal counsel told the state’s justices of the peace Sunday to resign if they are unwilling to preside over same-sex marriages beginning next month.

Daniel Winslow said Romney expects the justices to comply with the law, even though the Republican governor opposes gay marriage and has sought to delay its court-ordered legalization on May 17.

“Gov. Romney understands and respects that people have very strong personal views both for or against same-gender marriage,” Winslow told justices gathered to learn about the impending changes. “But on this point, the law is clear.”

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled in November the state must begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples by mid-May, which means changes for clerks and justices of the peace.

Refusing to marry gay couples could leave justices individually liable and raises the possibility of punitive damages in court, said David Fried, enforcement chief for the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination, who also addressed the gathering.

“To the extent that the justices of the peace have taken an oath to follow the law, it seems to me both appropriate and wise to do so,” Fried said.

Nelson Goldin, one of the state’s approximately 1,200 justices of the peace, said he believes marriage should be between a man and a woman only.

“But I took my oath of office and told them I will marry anyone who the commonwealth of Massachusetts says has the right to be wed,” he said.

Meanwhile, Romney said same-sex couples who live outside the state will not be allowed to marry in Massachusetts when the law takes effect. He cited a 1913 law barring unions that would not be legal in the couples’ home state.

“Massachusetts should not become the Las Vegas of same-sex marriage,” he told The New York Times for a story in Sunday’s editions. “We do not intend to export our marriage confusion to the entire nation.”

Supporters of gay marriage say the 1913 law is discriminatory and was never envisioned to block same-sex marriage. They criticize Romney for adopting the broadest interpretation possible for the law.

Romney ordered changes to the state’s marriage application, including now asking applicants for evidence of where a person resides and intends to reside. It warns out-of-state couples that if they do not intend to reside in Massachusetts, the marriage “shall be null and void.”

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Dems Look to Bank on Gay Marriage Issue (Foxnews, 040513)

WASHINGTON — Wanted: Gay Democrats.

Democratic parties in 15 states and Puerto Rico have set numerical goals for gays and lesbian delegates at the party’s national convention this summer, double the number that set a standard in 2000.

The effort comes as gay marriage has emerged as a divisive political issue, particularly in Massachusetts where Democrats will gather in July to choose their presidential nominee. Barring a last-minute ruling, gay marriages will be legal in the state beginning Monday.

Both President Bush and Democratic rival John Kerry oppose gay marriages, although the Republican incumbent has backed a constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex nuptials. Kerry supports civil unions.

Democrats are determined to ensure that gays and lesbians are part of their convention ranks. Delegates should “look like the nation as whole,” said Winnie Stachelberg, political director for the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights advocacy group.

According to the Democratic National Committee, 212 delegates, or roughly 5 percent, of the more than 4,300 at the party’s 2000 convention in Los Angeles were gay or lesbian. They came from seven states with numerical goals, as well as states without.

The increase in 2004 is in part “a signal of growing acceptance of gays and lesbians nationwide,” said Eric Stern, who directs the DNC’s outreach efforts to those groups.

Democrats have courted aggressively gay voters and their campaign dollars — with a significant amount of success. In 2000, exit polls showed Al Gore got 75 percent of the votes cast by self-identified gays and lesbians, compared to 25 percent for Bush.

National convention delegates formally choose a party’s presidential nominee. Among Democrats, a DNC panel signs off on a state delegate selection plan, including diversity goals that can range from the number of blacks and Hispanics to age breakdown.

In California, the target is 22 gays and 22 lesbians among the 440-member delegation. Rhode Island is seeking one gay or lesbian among its 32 delegates.

Officials are quick to point out that the goals aren’t quotas. Neither a state nor a presidential campaign is penalized if they do not reach these goals. However, state delegations are required to have equal numbers of men and women.

Party and Kerry campaign officials say they haven’t had problems filling goals. In many cases, parties coordinate with local chapters of gay advocacy groups such as the National Stonewall Democrats to recruit potential delegates.

Karen Hammer, chair of that organization’s Colorado chapter, will be part of her state’s 64-member delegation to Boston. The state party this year added the goal of three gay or lesbian delegates.

“We decided we should be getting some of those seats because of our status needing protection for equal rights ... should be on par with other groups,” said Hammer, who is pledged to support Kerry.

Rachel Morse, a social worker from Oklahoma City, is another Stonewall Democrat member and Kerry delegate. Oklahoma does not have a delegate goal for gays or lesbians.

Generally, application forms to become a delegate include questions about sexual orientation that help state parties and campaign officials determine if they fit a diversity need. Answering is optional, officials say, but people like Morse add that privacy isn’t an issue for many delegates who already are politically active and whose backgrounds are well known.

Rules for the Republican National Convention, to be held in August in New York City, state that participation in primaries and the delegate process “shall in no way be abridged for reasons of sex, race, religion, color, age or national origin,” while encouraging the “broadest possible participation” among all groups.

But, for the most part, numerical goals for delegations to the Republican convention do not exist.

Gay and lesbian delegates attended the party’s 2000 convention in Philadelphia, said Chris Barron, political director for the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay political group. He did not have precise numbers.

“We’re happy at the number we are going to have at (this year’s) convention,” Barron said. “We want the delegates there to be there because of who they are, and not an arbitrary status” like sexual orientation, race or religion.

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Gay Couples Begin to Wed in Massachusetts (FN, 040517)

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Gay couples began exchanging marriage vows in Massachusetts on Monday, marking the first time a state has granted gays and lesbians the right to marry and making the United States one of at least four countries where homosexuals can legally wed.

Tanya McCloskey, 52, and Marcia Kadish, 56, of Malden went at a breakneck pace to fill out paperwork, get a waiver from the three-day waiting period, then return to city hall — where they got their marriage license and exchanged vows.

At 9:15 a.m., Cambridge City Clerk Margaret Drury told the couple: “I now pronounce you married under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.”

It was among the first — if not the first — same-sex weddings taking place throughout the state on Monday, the day that same-sex couples could wed under a court order.

“It was really important to us to just be married. We want to be married as soon as we possibly can. Part of it is, we don’t know what the Legislature is going to do,” McCloskey said.

In Boston, David Wilson and Robert Compton became the first of the seven couples who sued the state to be married. At the Arlington Street Church, Wilson and Compton exchanged vows under a rainbow flag and to the strains of the Boston Gay Men’s Chorus singing “Marry Us.” An excerpt from the landmark Supreme Judicial Court decision that legalized gay marriage was read as an invocation at the Unitarian Universalist church.

They were pronounced “partners for life” at the end of the ceremony.

The six other plaintiff couples planned to marry later Monday.

There were scattered protests amid a largely festive atmosphere.

About 15 protesters, most from Topeka, Kan.-based Westboro Baptist Church, stood near Cambridge City Hall carrying signs with anti-gay slogans Sunday night. The group, led by the Rev. Fred Phelps Sr., travels around the country protesting homosexuality.

But Ray McNulty, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Family Institute, one of the leading organizers of opposition to same-sex marriage, criticized some of the protesters, saying there was no need for hateful speech.

“What’s going on down there is legal, and as far as I’m concerned, give those people their happiness for the day,” McNulty said.

Massachusetts was thrust into the center of a nationwide debate on gay marriage when the state’s Supreme Judicial Court ruled 4-3 in November that gays and lesbians had a right under the state constitution to wed.

In the days leading to Monday’s deadline for same-sex weddings to begin, opponents looked to the federal courts for help in overturning the ruling. On Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene.

The SJC’s ruling also galvanized opponents of gay marriage in Massachusetts, prompting lawmakers in this heavily Democratic, Roman Catholic state to adopt a state constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage but legalize Vermont-style civil unions. The earliest it could wind up on the ballot is 2006 — possibly casting a shadow on the legality of gay marriages taking place in the intervening years.

The city of Cambridge, a liberal bastion that’s home to Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, opened its doors to couples at midnight, and remained open until about 4:30 a.m. Monday.

The first couple to receive marriage paperwork was Marcia Hams, 56, and her partner, Susan Shepherd, 52, of Cambridge. After 27 years together, they sat at a table across from a city official shortly after midnight, filling out forms as their adult son looked on.

“I feel really overwhelmed,” Hams said. “I could collapse at this point.”

Out-of-state gay couples are likely to challenge Massachusetts’ 1913 marriage statute, which bars nonresident couples from marrying in Massachusetts if the union would be illegal in their home state. Republican Gov. Mitt Romney, who opposes gay marriage, has said that clerks who give licenses to nonresidents may face legal implications.

“All along, I have said an issue as fundamental to society as the definition of marriage should be decided by the people,” he said Monday. “Until then, I intend to follow the law and expect others to do the same.”

Still, officials in Provincetown, Worcester and Somerville, have said they will not enforce Romney’s order and will give licenses to any couples who ask, as long as they sign the customary affidavit attesting that they know of no impediment to their marriage.

Sure enough, Chris McCary, 43, and his partner of six years, John Sullivan, 37, of Anniston, Ala., were first in line outside town hall in Provincetown on Monday morning.

“This is the most important day of my life,” said McCary.

The SJC’s ruling touched off a frenzy of gay marriages across the country earlier this year. Even though courts ordered a halt to the wedding march, opponents pushed for a federal constitutional ban on gay marriage, which President Bush has endorsed.

Both sides in the debate say the issue may figure prominently in the November elections across the country.

Candidates for Congress could face pressure to explain their position on the proposed federal constitutional ban, and voters in several states will consider similar amendments to their state constitutions.

In Massachusetts, married couples are entitled to hundreds of rights under state law. But federal rights are not available to gay married couples because federal law defines marriage as between a man and a woman.

The Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark and Canada’s three most populous provinces are among the only places in the world where gays can marry.

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Gay Marriage Likely to Be Election Issue (Foxnews, 040518)

BOSTON — With gays and lesbians now legally wed in Massachusetts, foes of gay marriage vowed Tuesday to campaign hard, in state and national elections, for candidates willing to reverse the tide.

“It’s very difficult, once a right has been claimed in law, to reverse that right, but we’re going to try,” said the Rev. Christopher Coyne, spokesman for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston.

The election battle will be waged on two main fronts: an effort nationally to elect congressional candidates supporting a constitutional ban on gay marriage, and an effort in Massachusetts to tilt the balance in the Legislature by ousting 10 to 20 lawmakers who opposed a state ban.

“We’re not going to let this issue go away,” said Kristian Mineau, president of the conservative Massachusetts Family Institute. “Our theme is ‘Remember in November.’”

More than 1,000 same-sex couples — including scores from other states — have obtained marriage licenses since Massachusetts on Monday became the first state to allow gays to wed.

Protests were few, and sparsely attended, but Mineau said that reflected a deliberate decision by his group and others to avoid confrontations and to focus their energy against politicians, not gay couples.

“Homosexual couples are not the enemy,” said Raymond Flynn, a former Boston mayor and foe of gay marriage. “The enemy is the legislators who ignored and betrayed the people of Massachusetts by not giving them an opportunity to express their point of view.”

Legislators wrangled for months after the state Supreme Judicial Court, in a 4-3 decision last November, ruled that gay couples were entitled to marry. Eventually, in a compromise that dismayed activists on each side, lawmakers took the first step toward letting voters decide in 2006 if they want to amend the constitution to ban gay marriages and allow gay couples enter civil unions.

“Without a change in the makeup of the Legislature, we don’t have an opportunity to get a real amendment passed,” said Michael Carl, president of a political action committee called the Heritage Alliance that wants both civil unions and gay marriage banned. Carl said the alliance has recruited more than 20 legislative candidates “willing to take a courageous stand.”

Coyne said Catholic Church leaders, though avoiding partisan politics, would make clear to Catholic voters that gay marriage is a factor they should consider when casting their votes this fall. However, he acknowledged the task of gay-marriage opponents is now more daunting.

“Obviously the issue has become so much more complex now with the reality of same-sex marriage,” he said. “When you talk about withdrawing that reality from these couples, you’re just opening a whole can of worms.”

Nationally, conservative leaders are working to build support for a proposed federal constitutional amendment — pending in Congress — that would prohibit gay marriages nationwide.

Tony Perkins, president of the Washington-based Family Research Council, said the amendment is the only sure defense against the expected wave of lawsuits by same-sex couples who marry in Massachusetts, then return home to other states and seek recognition of their unions there.

“This issue is boiling,” Perkins said. “It’s gone from an academic debate to a real public policy crisis.”

The federal amendment must first be supported by two-thirds of both the House and Senate, then be ratified by at least 38 legislatures, representing three-quarters of the states.

Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, said he was concerned because several members of Congress told him recently they were getting little pressure from their constituents to push for the amendment.

Another line of attack against same-sex marriage is pending in federal court. An appeals court in Boston is scheduled to hear arguments next month from lawyers contending that the Supreme Judicial Court had no authority to issue a ruling defining marriage in Massachusetts.

Mathew Staver of the Florida-based Liberty Counsel, one of the conservative lawyers handling the federal case, said such legal efforts should be complemented by a stronger push from the White House on behalf of the proposed constitutional ban.

“President Bush needs to do more than make a public statement,” Staver said. “He should appoint a pro-marriage advocate to his staff whose sole job is to push forward a constitutional amendment ... to educate, motivate and direct the strategy.”

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Gay Marriage Opponents Enlist Faithful (Foxnews, 040618)

BEAVERTON, Ohio — Ken Keeley spends his Sunday mornings at church — not just to worship, but to collect signatures for a ballot measure that would amend Oregon’s constitution to ban gay marriage.

Keeley, one of roughly 2,000 members at the evangelical Beaverton Christian Church, describes himself as “not that political.”

But he says the issue of same-sex marriage — and what it means to much of Oregon’s religious community — drove him to join the petiti to churches for support of their efforts to legally define marriage as between a man and a woman, a move that political analysts call savvy.

But some churches that support gay rights are worried the strategy will send the wrong message, while others have questioned the ethics and legality of bringing politics to the pulpit.

In Oregon, the Defense of Marriage Coalition has just two weeks left to collect the 100,840 valid signatures needed to place an amendment banning gay marriage on the November ballot. They’re counting on 1,500 Oregon churches for help.

Organizers won’t say how many they’ve collected so far, because the signature-validation process makes it difficult to get an accurate count.

“We’re optimistic and we’re hopeful,” said Tim Nashif, the group’s political director.

Chris Stewart, whose group, the Arkansas Marriage Amendment Committee, is leading efforts to ban gay marriage there, describes the petition drive as a “pre-emptive strike.”

“We have seen what has begun in our culture across the nation,” Stewart said. “And we realize it is coming to ‘a town near you.”‘

Volunteers based in Little Rock, Ark., have already collected 109,000 signatures — 28,250 more than is needed by the July 2 deadline for a ballot measure there. Two church-based groups have yet to turn in about 25,000 more signatures, Stewart said.

In Michigan, volunteers with the Lansing-based group Citizens for the Protection of Marriage had signed up 130,000 people by the end of May. They need 317,000 valid signatures.

And the Montana Family Foundation in Laurel, Mont., has collected more than half of the 41,029 signatures needed to get its constitutional amendment on the November ballot.

Recent polls in Michigan, Montana, and Ohio show voters support a marriage amendment. There has been no such poll in Arkansas, but Stewart says the Bible Belt state doesn’t need one.

Political analysts say visiting churches gives signature collectors access to a friendly, receptive audience.

“It’s a very, very politically astute move,” said Laura Olson, a political science professor at Clemson University in Clemson, S.C. She edited a 2001 book on the role of the clergy in U.S. politics. “You know you’re going to have a particular set of people who are going to be 95 percent in favor on this issue,” she said.

The gay marriage debate has forged connections among congregations as disparate as Southern Baptists and Roman Catholics, evangelical Protestants and members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

“Marriage is at the very core of who we are as people of faith,” said Phil Burress, whose Cincinnati-based group, Citizens for Community Values, is leading the petition drive in Ohio. Volunteers there have to turn in nearly 323,000 signatures by Aug. 4.

But Rev. Tara Wilkins, an independent Portland pastor, says the churches’ stance against gay marriage mistakenly gives the impression that no Christian congregations welcome gays.

“It sends the message that there is no room in organized religion for people who are gay, lesbian or transgendered. That’s the wrong message,” said Wilkins, director of the Community of Welcoming Congregations, who attends a local United Church of Christ. Her organization represents 44 congregations in the Portland metropolitan area, ranging from mainline Protestant churches to Jewish synagogues.

Wilkins and her partner, Carol Issacs, were among more than 3,000 same-sex couples who tied the knot in Portland in March and April, after Multnomah County commissioners decided to begin issuing marriage licenses to gays and lesbians.

Roey Thorpe, executive director of Basic Rights Oregon, a Portland-based gay rights group, said the church-based effort “raises questions for me about how appropriate it is for people to use the ballot measure process to advance their religious views.”

But Keeley, the volunteer at Beaverton Christian Church in Oregon, says he has no doubt that the gay marriage ban will reach the ballot.

“People are sincere about their beliefs,” he said. “They want to make a change.”

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Marriage & Stripping: Another split on the social Right (NRO, 040625)

In recent weeks, House Republicans have gotten behind a “two-vote strategy” on same-sex marriage. They want to vote on a bill before voting on a constitutional amendment. “Which bill?” has been the main subject of debate. Some Republicans want to vote on a bill that would block same-sex marriage in the District of Columbia. Others are seeking a vote on Indiana congressman John Hostettler’s bill to remove the federal courts’ jurisdiction over the Defense of Marriage Act. Majority leader Tom DeLay is said to fall in the latter camp. But the Family Research Council, one of the strongest social-conservative organizations, is opposed to DeLay’s apparent strategy.

Other social conservatives are behind the Hostettler bill — notably Concerned Women for America and Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum. (Concerned Women for America differs from DeLay, however, in one respect: It does not support the bill as a way of building momentum for the Federal Marriage Amendment. It opposes the amendment on the peculiar theory that it would enshrine civil unions in the Constitution.)

Tony Perkins, the president of the Family Research Council, has two objections to the Texan’s two-step. The first sounds like an objection to any two-vote strategy. “We’re not in favor of having two measures moving because we feel like it will give some people a way to take cover,” he tells me. “They can vote for one and say that they’ve done what they can do to protect marriage — and not do what needs to be done, an amendment.”

Second, Perkins says that the Hostettler court-stripping bill would accomplish very little. It would block the federal courts from striking down the Defense of Marriage Act. But it would not block state courts from imposing same-sex marriage, as in Massachusetts. Nor would it block federal courts from imposing same-sex marriage: Any federal court could find that current state marriage laws amount to unconstitutional discrimination without touching the federal Defense of Marriage Act. Nor would the Hostettler bill stop federal or state courts from unbundling the elements of marriage and providing them to same-sex couples one benefit at a time.

Perkins emphasizes that he is in favor of court-stripping as a general proposition, and that he does not question the motives of DeLay or like-minded conservatives: “This is a disagreement about strategy.”

There’s another strategic problem with the Hostettler strategy. Let’s assume that Perkins, DeLay, and Schlafly are right and that the political branches should assert their power to regulate the federal courts’ jurisdiction. (I certainly believe that they are right about this specific point.) The propriety of this kind of court-stripping is nonetheless very controversial. Building the respectability of the idea is a long-term project. It would make sense to start with an issue where the public is very strongly on conservatives’ side: Todd Akin’s bill to strip the lower federal courts of jurisdiction over challenges to the Pledge of Allegiance, for example. In the case of the Hostettler bill, on the other hand, both the controversy over marriage and the controversy over court-stripping would combine to sink the bill. Many conservatives who oppose same-sex marriage but are conventional in their view of the relationship between the courts and the legislature would vote against it. Conservatives whose main concern is to amend the Constitution to prohibit same-sex marriage would not have furthered their goal. Neither would those conservatives whose main concern is reining in the courts.

This objection would not apply to a vote on same-sex marriage in D.C. A bill against that might very well pass, and perhaps build momentum for a constitutional amendment. (Of course, the D.C. vote would bring up the issue of home rule; although that objection probably should carry more weight than the objection to court-stripping, it clearly doesn’t as a matter of practical politics.)

Stuart Roy, a spokesman for DeLay, says that House Republicans have not settled on the strategy. “It’s still very fluid,” he says. “What we don’t want is to throw a constitutional amendment on the floor that fails and takes all the wind out of the sails of the effort to protect marriage. And DeLay believes that there’s a way to build momentum so that we can actually win rather than simply lose and complain about it.”

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Record Number of Signatures for Gay Marriage Ban in Oregon (Foxnews, 040701)

SALEM, Ore. — Opponents of same-sex marriage submitted a record-high number of signatures Wednesday to place a proposed constitutional amendment banning gay nuptials on the ballot.

The 244,587 signatures amassed by the Defense of Marriage Coalition — more than twice the necessary amount — was the highest number of signatures ever submitted for an initiative measure in Oregon’s history.

The signatures still need to be verified by state elections officials by Aug. 1. Only 100,840 signatures need to be valid for the proposed constitutional amendment to be placed on the November ballot.

A gay marriage measure could affect other political races — especially the presidential contest in this battleground state.

Oregon Republican Party Chairman Kevin Mannix has said he believes the hot-button social issue will bring out conservative voters, which could boost President Bush’s chances of defeating presumed Democratic candidate John Kerry in Oregon.

In March, commissioners in Multnomah County, Oregon’s largest and most liberal enclave, directed employees to issue marriage licenses to gay couples. More than 3,000 were issued before a judge halted the process to give state lawmakers and the state’s highest court a chance to weigh in.

Five weeks ago, backers of a law banning gay marriage — similar versions of which already exist in 39 states — launched their drive to place a proposed constitutional amendment on November’s ballot.

Legislatures in five states — Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Utah — have placed similar amendments on this November’s ballot, while voters in Missouri will consider the issue in August. In Arkansas, Michigan, Ohio and Montana, citizen drives like the one in Oregon are under way.

Basic Rights Oregon, the state’s leading gay rights group, said it will launch a statewide campaign to defeat the measure.

Both sides said they plan to spend at least $1.5 million each to get their message to voters.

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Stay Denied on Same-Sex Marriage Registration in Oregon (FN, 040709)

SALEM, Ore. — Oregon may soon be forced to officially recognize the more than 3,000 same-sex marriage licenses issued this spring in Multnomah County, after the Oregon Court of Appeals on Friday refused to order a hold on registering the licenses.

State recognition of the licenses would presumably entitle gay couples to the same state benefits accorded to heterosexual married couples, from taxes to legal protections.

Kevin Neely, a spokesman for Attorney General Hardy Myers, said that the state might try to avert that though, by quickly appealing the appeals court decision to the state Supreme Court.

A Multnomah County judge had halted any future marriages in April while a lawsuit challenging their constitutionality is pending.

But in the same ruling, Circuit Judge Frank Bearden did direct the state to officially register the licenses from ceremonies already performed, making him the first judge in the nation to recognize the legal validity of gay marriage.

The state had asked the appeals court to halt that decision, but the appeals court turned them down Friday.

Basic Rights Oregon, the state’s leading gay rights group, applauded the appeals court’s action.

“These couples have already done what any other couple seeking to marry has already done to marry in the state of Oregon. It’s only fair that the state register those marriages — and that they are afforded the same protections and responsibilities of marriage that any other Oregon couple is afforded,” said Rebekah Kassell, spokeswoman for Basic Rights Oregon.

But Tim Nashif, a spokesman for the Defense of Marriage Coalition, the group that has led the fight against gay marriage, said that the appeals court decision doesn’t necessarily mean immediate state recognition of the gay marriage licenses.

““We don’t want to comment on this until we know what it all means. It may not necessarily mean that the licenses will be registered tomorrow,” Nashif said.

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Gay Marriage a Thorny Political Issue in 2004 (Foxnews, 040716)

WASHINGTON — To hear President Bush and many Republicans say it, they’re not opposed to gay marriage so much as eager to prevent judges — routinely described as unelected and activist — from weakening one of civilization’s most enduring institutions.

It’s a political straddle in the making, designed to maximize election-year support among conservatives without offending moderate voters wary of any taint of intolerance.

“Gay bashing, plain and simple,” was how Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., this week described a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, unwilling to let the measure’s supporters define it in their own terms.

“Activist judges and local officials in some parts of the country are not letting up in their efforts to redefine marriage for the rest of America,” Bush countered. “And neither should defenders of traditional marriage flag in their efforts.”

While the early legislative returns are in — the amendment went down to a decisive defeat in the Senate — Republican strategists hope they have laid the foundation for success in November.

“Four million religious conservative voters sat out the last election, so the president’s visible stance on protecting marriage is essential to turning out all of those conservative voters who pulled the lever for him in 2000 and getting those other 4 million to come out for him this year,” said Keith Appell, a conservative strategist in Washington.

Other Republicans say they hope the issue helps Bush with low- and middle-income social conservatives, with Catholics and others, particularly in battleground states such as Ohio and Michigan.

Republicans also note that some black ministers are among the amendment’s supporters.

“I think it’s being used as a wedge issue,” said Alexis Herman, a black former labor secretary who is now an adviser to Bush’s Democratic presidential opponent, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts.

Kerry and other Democrats also call the issue a political distraction, an attempt to divert attention from the economy and the war in Iraq.

“The unfortunate result is that the important work of the American people funding our homeland security needs, creating new and better jobs and raising the minimum wage is not getting done,” said the Democratic presidential nominee-in-waiting.

Whatever it is, the gay marriage issue has surfaced in a handful of congressional races, in South Dakota, Florida and elsewhere, and may emerge elsewhere.

Beyond that, opponents of gay marriage are working to force votes in more than a dozen states this November on proposed state constitutional amendments. The list includes Michigan, Ohio and Oregon, all presidential swing states.

The debate is occurring within the context of a broader campaign conflict over social issues.

But abortion and gun control have been campaign perennials.

Gay marriage emerged as a political issue over the winter after San Francisco began issuing licenses to same-sex couples and the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled the state constitution mandates full, equal marriage rights for gay couples.

Kerry, has worked hard to reassure voters who disagree with him on social issues. An advocate of gun control, he’s been photographed with a hunting rifle in hand.

A career-long supporter of abortion rights, he’s said he might appoint judges to the bench who don’t share his view on the subject.

Like Bush, he’s doing something of a straddle on gay marriage.

He opposes the gay marriage amendment but says he’s against gay marriage itself.

A campaign spokeswoman, Stephanie Cutter, says that if Kerry’s home state comes up with a constitutional provision that outlaws gay marriage but protects equal rights and benefits for same-sex couples, he would support that.

To the disappointment of GOP strategists who had hoped to force him to cast a vote, Kerry was absent in the Senate this week for what his campaign aides described as a procedural roll call.

Instead, he issued a statement that criticized Republicans for bringing the issue to a vote. He added, “When I am president, I will work to bring the nation together and build a stronger America.”

That was a charge that the Republicans were attempting to divide the country.

If Republicans are nervous about that, it’s out of concern that they can be depicted as intolerant.

“What they do in the privacy of their house, consenting adults should be able to do,” Bush said earlier this week.

The same concern is evident in South Dakota, where Republican senatorial candidate John Thune has been airing radio commercials supporting the amendment that his opponent, Sen. Tom Daschle, voted against.

“This constitutional amendment won’t take away anyone’s rights,” Thune says reassuringly in the ad. “Not a single one.”

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House Considers Gay-Marriage Bill (FN, 040722)

WASHINGTON — No federal court has ruled on state bans on gay marriage, and House Republicans want to make sure none does.

The House was considering legislation Thursday to keep the Supreme Court and other federal courts from ordering states to recognize same-sex unions sanctioned elsewhere.

Continuing their election-year focus on gay marriage, Republican leaders expect the measure to pass easily. Last week, the Senate dealt gay marriage opponents a setback by failing to advance a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex unions.

Supporters said Wednesday the House legislation is needed to protect state bans on gay marriage from federal judges who might rule that a gay marriage that took place in Massachusetts, the only state where it is legal, must be recognized by other states.

“This bill is really a reaffirmation of states’ rights,” said Rep. David Dreier, R-Calif., chairman of the House Rules Committee.

The Marriage Protection Act would strip federal courts of their jurisdiction to rule on challenges to state bans on gay marriages under a provision of a 1996 federal law that defines marriage as between a man and a woman.

Democratic opponents said the GOP is pushing ahead with an unconstitutional bill to appeal to socially conservative voters who are a key Republican constituency.

“That’s what this is really all about, working their base to a frenzy for the election,” said Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill.

Adding to Democrats’ sense that the House legislation is motivated by politics is that no federal court has yet to rule on the 1996 law, the Defense of Marriage Act. “The legislation is premature,” Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., told the Rules Committee.

Nadler said he believes the legislation is unconstitutional, but legal scholars said the constitutional question of stripping jurisdiction from federal courts is unresolved.

“My sense is that Congress has explicit authority in the Constitution ... but it is a largely unexercised power,” said Douglas Kmiec, a Pepperdine University constitutional law professor and former legal adviser to Republican presidents.

While Republicans defended states’ rights, Democrats said the phrase recalled Southern opposition to desegregation, which was propelled by a series of federal court rulings.

“Today, it’s gay marriage. Tomorrow, it could be something else. It’s very dangerous for any Congress to move down this road,” said Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., a civil rights leader.

Some Republicans also cited their desire to avoid setting a precedent that could used by a Congress controlled by Democrats to satisfy their allies or by lawmakers who wanted to shield future unconstitutional legislation from federal court review.

However, Rep. John Hostettler, R-Ind., author of the bill, said the issue is too important to ignore. “Simply put, if federal courts don’t have jurisdiction over marriage issues, they can’t hear them. And if they can’t hear cases regarding marriage policy, they can’t redefine this sacred institution,” Hostettler said when he introduced the legislation in May.

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Gays More Anti-Bush Than Pro-Kerry (Foxnews, 040727)

Senate Rejects Bid for Marriage Amendment

BOSTON — “Si se puede!” former presidential candidate Al Sharpton screamed as he energized the Latinos for Kerry Caucus Monday in the Constitution Ballroom of the Sheraton Boston Hotel. The delegates responded by chanting the Spanish words meaning “Yes, we can.”

Later, in a nearby room, the Service Employees International Union members chanted the Democratic presidential candidate’s name so loudly that the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered Caucus that had followed the Latino caucus meeting could hear their enthusiasm through the wall.

But inside the GLBT meeting, the mood was more subdued as delegates decried the actions of President Bush, but also expressed skepticism about the commitment of John Kerry to the issues important to them. Both Kerry and John Edwards opposed Bush’s proposed constitutional amendment barring gay marriage, but, to the dismay of homosexuals, they have said little more than that it is a decision for the states. Homosexuals would like much more. Although they are energized to throw out Bush, a man they see as deeply opposed to gay rights, they wish Kerry would give them more to be excited about.

Democratic National Committee officials, Kerry campaign representatives and others tried to downplay the division within Democratic ranks and stress how bad Bush is on gay issues.

“George Bush has decided that this year you are the scapegoat, and I’m here to tell you that nobody is going to make you a scapegoat,” said Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., who received a standing ovation from the caucus and repeatedly drew loud applause by expressing her opposition to Bush. “The choices of this administration are hurtful choices. No one should be rewarded for hurting people.”

Sticking to safe territory, Steve Elmendorf, the Kerry-Edwards deputy campaign manager, focused on slamming Bush rather than touting Kerry’s initiatives. “I don’t think there has ever been a president nearly as bad as this one,” Elmendorf said. “The contrast between John Kerry and George Bush could not be deeper.”

Although both statements received loud applause, the excitement waned when the conversation turned away from Bush and toward Kerry.

As members of the Platform Drafting Committee representing the GLBT community gave presentations to their caucus, delegates became visibly upset.

“It’s not good enough,” yelled out one delegate as Jeff Soref, chair of the DNC’s GLBT Caucus acknowledged that “there are differences between many of us in the room on the platform.”

In fact, the majority of Democratic delegates believe gays should be allowed to marry. A Boston Globe survey of 400 delegates from July 16-21 found that 62 percent favor gay marriage, while 19 percent oppose it and 18 percent said they did not know.

Some Democratic Party operatives acknowledged that the party is not worried about getting these votes, but rather swaying swing voters who may be skeptical of the Democratic Party’s traditional affinity to liberal social issues.

“We didn’t get everything, but we believe we made a very vigorous effort, and they made a good-faith response,” said Roberta Achtenberg, a member of the Platform Drafting Committee and a former San Francisco supervisor who worked for the Clinton administration.

The Platform Committee, which authored the Democratic platform, heard several presentations from gay and lesbian groups, but gay marriage is not mentioned in the platform.

The only mention of gays in the platform is a recognition of their equality.

“We support full inclusion of gay and lesbian families in the life of our nation and seek equal responsibilities, benefits and protections for these families,” the platform reads.

In a press conference Monday morning, Alice Germond, secretary of the Democratic National Committee, said the gay marriage issue, prominent in Massachusetts, the first state to legalize gay marriage, “did not even come up.”

Achtenberg confirmed this.

“I think that it’s a pretty strong statement that affirms equality,” Achtenberg said of language in the platform. “Beyond that, that’s not the role of a nationwide consensus-based document.”

Some gay delegates said they understood the political necessity for Kerry not to push the gay marriage issue too far, while praising him for the efforts that he had made.

“The election is so close. Kerry has to appeal to the independent voters. This is not an issue that is necessarily going to appeal to them,” said Troy Liggett, a delegate from Indiana.

Liggett said that he is not at all disappointed in Kerry, in part because “anyone would be better than George Bush on gay issues. I’m so angry at George Bush. … He didn’t need to be at the forefront of stopping progress.”

But other gay delegates said they were feeling marginalized because they believed that their part of the Democratic message was being stifled in favor of this national message.

When Chris DiGiorgio, a delegate from New York, asked convention organizers if they would be able to bring signs supporting gay marriage into the FleetCenter, Soref responded that the convention would be trying to “stay on message,” a statement that met grumbling in the room.

Singer Carole King, who has been campaigning for Kerry, also addressed the audience and acknowledged problems with Kerry’s platform on gay issues.

“I know John Kerry, and I agree with him a lot. I do not agree with him on gay marriage,” she said, as the room erupted in cheers. However, she cautioned the audience that while Kerry may not be perfect, “this is a good man who has been your advocate for many, many years.”

Although not a delegate, David Loper, a homosexual from Alabama, traveled up to the convention and described the DNC-organized activities as “so welcoming.” He praised Kerry for his work opposing the constitutional amendment against gay marriage that failed in the Senate earlier this month. Loper added that gay marriage is only one of many issues that interest gays, while other issues include the concerns of all Americans: the economy and the War on Terror, for example.

Fellow Alabaman, delegate Patricia Todd, said that the DNC has really reached out to the gay community during the convention lead-up. Two hundred thirty-six gay delegates are attending this year, more than any other convention.

“I would like [Kerry] to be stronger on gay marriage, but I understand that this is politics,” Todd said.

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French nullifies country’s first gay marriage (National Post, 040727)

BORDEAUX, France (AP) -- A French court nullified the country’s first homosexual marriage on Tuesday, a ceremony that led the government to try to suspend the high-profile Green Party mayor who conducted it.

The couple, Stephane Chapin and Bertrand Charpentier, exchanged vows last month in the Bordeaux suburb of Begles. Their lawyer said the ruling would not take effect pending an appeal.

The court in Bordeaux said in a statement it had “declared the marriage conducted null.”

The couple expressed optimism that the move would be overturned, promising to take their case to the European Court of Human Rights if necessary.

“We are sure that we will win because we’ll take this as far as possible,” Charpentier told reporters after the decision.

Begles mayor Noel Mamere, a leading Green Party lawmaker, officiated the June 5 marriage, defying the government and saying he wanted to take a step toward ending discrimination of all kinds.

In France, mayors carry out civil marriages.

Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin stripped Mamere of his official duties for a month on June 15, basing his decision on a law allowing the suspension of mayors who “gravely misunderstand the duties of their office.”

The exchange of vows between Chapin and Charpentier was recorded by television cameras and journalists. Mamere wore the blue, white and red sash of the French Republic when he married the couple.

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Mo. Voters Approve Ban on Gay Marriage (Foxnews, 040804)

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Missouri voters solidly endorsed a state constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, a decision that was closely watched by national groups on both sides of the battle.

With nearly all precincts reporting, the amendment had garnered 71 percent of the vote, according to unofficial results for Tuesday’s vote. It was the first such vote since the historic ruling in Massachusetts last year that legalized same-sex weddings there.

Although the ban was widely expected to pass in conservative Missouri, experts said the campaign served as a key barometer for which strategies work as at least nine other states, and perhaps as many as 12, vote on similar amendments this year.

Missouri and 37 other states already have laws defining marriage as only between a man and a woman. But amendment supporters fear a court could toss aside the state law, and they believe the state would be on firmer legal ground if an outright ban is part of the Constitution.

“I’m very gratified and encouraged and thankful that the people of this state understand our current policy’s a wise public policy and they want to see it protected from a legal challenge,” said Vicky Hartzler, a spokeswoman for the Coalition to Protect Marriage in Missouri.

Opponents said the amendment was unnecessary and discriminatory, but knew they faced an uphill battle in Missouri.

“We’re already reaching out to these other states, sharing with them what we learned, what worked, what didn’t work, and we’ll move on,” said Doug Gray, campaign manager for the Constitution Defense League. “Ultimately we’re right and they’re simply wrong.”

Supporters and opponents of the amendment have used grassroots campaigns, knocking on doors and making phone calls to tell people about the issue. The group fighting the amendment, the Constitution Defense League, raised more than $360,000, largely from national gay-rights groups, and ran a television ad in the final days before the vote.

The group favoring the amendment, the Coalition to Protect Marriage in Missouri, spread the word through churches and community events, raising just a few thousand dollars but saying public sentiment in Missouri was on their side.

Louisiana residents are to vote on a marriage amendment Sept. 18. Then Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Montana, Oklahoma, Oregon and Utah are to vote on the issue Nov. 2. Initiatives are pending in Michigan, North Dakota and Ohio.

Four states — Alaska, Hawaii, Nebraska and Nevada — already have similar amendments in their constitutions.

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Manitoba legalizes same-sex marriage (CTV News, 040916)

Manitoba has become the fifth jurisdiction in Canada to legalize same-sex marriage.

Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Douglas Yard ruled Thursday morning that the current definition of marriage in provincial law is unconstitutional.

“The traditional definition of marriage in Manitoba is reformulated to mean a voluntary union for life of two persons at the exclusion of all others,” Justice Yard said in his decision.

Gay rights groups say they expect the first same-sex wedding to be performed in the province by the end of the week.

The case was brought forward by three same-sex couples who argued for the right to marry.

The couples sued the provincial and federal governments asking that the definition of marriage as a union of a man and a woman be declared contrary to the equality provision in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Lawyers for the federal government, which has jurisdiction over the definition of marriage, did not oppose the motion. It’s the first time that federal lawyers did not try to fight or adjourn a court battle over same-sex marriage.

Lawyers for the Manitoba government also offered no opposition.

Gay marriages are already legal in Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia and Yukon, after judges in those provinces declared the definition of marriage unconstitutional.

Same-sex couples were legally given the right to marry in the Yukon at the end of July.

Justice Yard said those precedents weighed heavily in his decision Thursday.

“The cumulative effect and the overwhelming effect of that judicial authority is to the effect that the traditional definition of marriage is no longer constitutionally valid in view of the provisions of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms,” he said.

The Supreme Court of Canada will begin holding hearings on the federal government’s draft legislation to legalize same-sex marriage across the country.

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Gay Marriages Issue Motivates Christian Voters (Foxnews, 040926)

WASHINGTON — Christian conservatives are casting a wider net this year in their search for likely voters — especially conservative ones — by asking people on the phone how they feel about same-sex marriage as well as their views on abortion, a standard question in previous election cycles.

“The federal marriage amendment will be an important issue in the states it’s on the ballot,” Roberta Combs, president of the Christian Coalition of America, said Saturday during an election training conference for activist members. “It will have an impact on us getting out the vote.”

Proposals on amendments on gay marriage are expected to be on the ballot in 11 states, including the swing states of Arkansas, Oregon, Michigan and probably Ohio. Those people who say they are likely to vote and who oppose abortion and favor traditional marriage will be heavily recruited by the coalition on Election Day.

The coalition hopes to help re-elect President Bush and add a handful of conservative U.S. senators who will support its agenda. The ultimate goal is loftier: changing the U.S. Supreme Court and the federal judiciary.

The coalition is finishing interviews of lawmakers for its voter guides, which national field coordinator Bill Thomson called the “B-2 bomber” in its arsenal. Combs wasn’t ready to say exactly how many coalition voter guides will be printed. The group handed out 70 million in 2000.

Politicians are being asked a number of questions, including whether they support a constitutional amendment that effectively bans gay marriage. Their views on abortion, late-term abortions and measures to protect children from online pornography are being sought as well.

Voter guides don’t advise people how to vote but provide opposing candidates’ positions on issues important to conservative voters.

A more conservative Senate, backed by a second Bush term, could allow the appointment of two or three conservative justices to the Supreme Court to join Justices William Rehnquist, Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia.

“If you asked people in this group their top priority, the first thing they would say is changing the U.S. Supreme Court,” said Jim Backlin, a legislative lobbyist for the coalition.

“These people want Roe v. Wade overturned and that authority returned to the states,” Backlin said. The case of Roe v. Wade resulted in a landmark ruling in 1973 guaranteeing women the right to abortion.

While many in the Christian Coalition expressed confidence that Bush will win re-election, they’re taking nothing for granted. Those supporting Democratic candidate John Kerry are highly motivated, said Spencer Banks, an Atlanta businessman, so it’s dangerous to assume Bush will win.

Jody Anderson, a nurse from Fort Worth, Texas, said she’s concerned some Christian conservatives may stay home on Election Day because they have been disappointed that Bush hasn’t taken a public stand on some conservative issues like the dispute over displaying the Ten Commandments at an Alabama courthouse.

Thomson, a former Marine, used military imagery to fire up the Christian Coalition activists to get out the vote.

“Never allow the enemy to block you,” Thomson urged them. “Get around them, run over the top of them, destroy them — whatever you need to do so that God’s word is the word that is being practiced in Congress, town halls and state legislatures.”

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House Defeats Anti-Gay Marriage Amendment (Foxnews, 040930)

WASHINGTON — The House emphatically rejected a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage Thursday, the latest in a string of conservative pet causes advanced by Republican leaders in the run-up to Election Day.

The vote was 227-186, 49 votes shy of the two-thirds needed for approval of an amendment that President Bush backed but the Senate had previously scuttled.

“God created Adam and Eve, He didn’t create Adam and Steve,” said Rep. Roscoe Bartlett, R-Md., on behalf of a measure that supporters said accused GOP leaders of “raw political cynicism” and said they hoped to “create the fodder for a demagogic political ad.”

Bush issued a statement expressing disappointment with the vote’s outcome.

“Because activist judges and local officials in some parts of the country are seeking to redefine marriage for the rest of the country, we must remain vigilant in defending traditional marriage,” the president said.

The measure drew the support of 191 Republicans and 36 Democrats. Voting against it were 158 Democrats, 27 Republicans and one independent.

The debate on the gay marriage amendment came a day after the House voted 250-171 to overturn a 28-year municipal ban on handgun ownership in the District of Columbia. And last week, Republicans forced a vote on legislation to protect the words “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance from court challenge. It passed, 247-173.

While both of those measures face uncertain prospects in the Senate, they -- along with the gay marriage proposal -- appeal to voting groups whose support Republicans are counting on in the Nov. 2 elections. Recent surveys in battleground states in the presidential race indicate roughly one-quarter of Bush’s supporters say moral or family values are uppermost in their minds.

The gay marriage amendment said marriage in the United States “shall consist only of a man and a woman.” It also would have required that neither the U.S. Constitution nor any state constitution “shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman.”

Even among majority Republicans, the issue generated dissent.

Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, was the principal speaker on behalf of the measure, taking a role that is almost always reserved for the chairman of the committee with jurisdiction. In this case, though, the leadership bypassed the Judiciary Committee, and GOP officials said the panel’s chairman, Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., made clear he wanted no part of the debate. His spokesman did not immediately return a call for comment.

DeLay said the need for congressional action was “forced upon us by activist judges trying to legislate from the bench.” He noted that under 1996 legislation passed by Congress and signed by President Clinton, marriage is defined as between a man of a woman.

“One would think this would be the end of the story. But it is not,” DeLay said. The law is “under an incessant and coordinated attack in the federal courts,” where he said judges feel a greater “responsibility to their own political ideology than the Constitution.”

“The limitations of traditional marriage rest not on an intent to discriminate, but on what is most beneficial for society and children as evidenced by volumes of social science research,” added Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, R-Colo.

“Traditional marriage is worth preserving, because the nuclear family is far and away the best environment in which to raise children. Every child deserves both a father and a mother,” said Musgrave, whose persistent advocacy for the measure has gained her national notice unusual for a first-term lawmaker.

Critics saw it differently.

“We feel love and we feel it in a way different than you,” said Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., who is openly gay. “We feel it with someone of the same sex, male or female, and we look at your institution of marriage and we see the joy it brings. How do we hurt you when we share it?”

Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass. quoted Vice President Dick Cheney -- who has a gay daughter -- as saying, “The fact of the matter is that we live in a free society and freedom means freedom for everybody.”

Public polls show strong opposition to gay marriage, but opinion is about evenly divided regarding a federal constitutional amendment to ban it.

At the same time, voters in 11 states will decide the fate of proposed amendments to their state constitutions this fall, and opponents of bans on gay marriage concede they will be difficult to stop.

The issue has gained prominence this year. Massachusetts residents have had first-in-the-nation rights to same sex marriages since May, the result of a ruling by the state’s highest court. A judge in Washington recently struck down that state’s ban on same-sex marriage.

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‘Marriage’ issue works its way through courts (Washington Times, 041129)

December will be a busy month for homosexual “marriage” issues as courts in Oregon and California consider the fate of about 7,000 same-sex “marriages” and a Louisiana court considers the legality of a newly passed marriage amendment.

The Louisiana case is up first, with a hearing scheduled for Wednesday before the state Supreme Court.

In October, Louisiana District Court Judge William Morvant ruled that the marriage amendment, which passed Sept. 18, was unconstitutional because it defined marriage as the union of a man and a woman and prohibited recognition of “any union of unmarried individuals.”

Judge Morvant agreed with homosexual rights lawyers that the amendment illegally contained more than one subject. Louisiana lawmakers who wrote the amendment say it was legal and have appealed the case.

The case is being watched closely because similar anti-amendment lawsuits have been filed in Georgia, Kentucky and Oklahoma.

Oregon’s case, scheduled for Dec. 15 before the Oregon Supreme Court, also tests a new marriage amendment.

In the spring, Multnomah County officials, citing constitutional equal-rights protections, began marrying couples regardless of their sex. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) quickly filed a lawsuit seeking full “marriage” rights for homosexual couples, and traditional values groups countersued to stop the county clerks from issuing such licenses.

In April, Multnomah County Circuit Court Judge Frank Bearden stopped the issuance of same-sex “marriage” licenses. But he also ruled that the 3,000 same-sex licenses already issued must be registered by the state and that the legislature should resolve the bigger issue of marital rights for same-sex couples.

The Bearden decision was appealed to the Oregon Supreme Court. In the meantime, Oregon residents voted Nov. 2 to add a sentence to their constitution saying, “Only a marriage between one man and one woman shall be valid or legally recognized as a marriage.”

The high court asked for updates on the ACLU lawsuit, and on Nov. 17, ACLU lawyers said they would ask the high court to legalize some form of civil union — not “marriage” — for same-sex couples.

The state, they added, “is still obligated to fully recognize” the 3,000 Multnomah “marriages,” as the new amendment “cannot retroactively undo these valid marriages.”

Leaders of the conservative Defense of Marriage Coalition want the high court to reverse Judge Bearden’s recognition of the 3,000 “marriages,” because the licenses were issued in violation of state law.

The rest of the ACLU lawsuit should be dismissed, the conservative lawyers said, because the ACLU argued against allowing civil unions in its earlier briefs.

“You can’t change your request two-thirds of a way through a lawsuit,” coalition lawyer Kelly Clark told the Oregonian newspaper.

Finally, in California, on Dec. 22, a lawsuit seeking marriage rights for same-sex couples has a hearing before San Francisco Superior Court Judge Richard Kramer.

This case is expected to reach the California Supreme Court, perhaps within a year. This summer, the high court voided about 4,000 same-sex “marriages” conducted in San Francisco this spring. However, if the high court eventually ruled in favor of legalizing same-sex “marriage,” those couples could reapply for legal licenses.

California doesn’t define marriage in its constitution, but in 2000, its voters passed a law that cannot be overturned by legislators that says that only marriage between a man and a woman can be valid or recognized.

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Protestant Church in Netherlands to Grant “Blessings” to Gay Couples (Christian Post, 041127)

Six months after its formation, the Protestant Church in the Netherlands announced that it would grant “blessings” to gay couples and permit female pastors.

Dutch Protestant church leaders have tilted to more liberal views in recent decades in an attempt to keep pace with society, according to a recent report by the Associated Press. Six months after the Netherlands Reformed Church, the distinct Reformed Churches in the Netherlands, and the nation’s small Lutheran Church merged to form the Protestant Church in the Netherlands, the new church announced that it would grant “blessings” to gay couples and permit female pastors.

Though the Protestant Church in the Netherlands said that it would not force local congregations to accept gay couples blessed by the church, the new decision did not sit well with conservative factions in the three churches, according to AP. At least 15,000 members refused to join the new church and have formed a breakaway group.

It is a scenario that is all but unfamiliar in recent years, and an issue that has surfaced across many congregations in many places.

Most recently, the Episcopal bishop of Los Angeles, Jon Bruno, announced that he would stop blessing same sex unions, in an attempt to win back three conservative breakaway churches that broke ties with the Episcopal Church USA (ECUSA) because of vast theological differences on issues such as homosexuality.

In June, the Southern Baptist Convention—the largest U.S. Protestant body with 16.3 million members—voted to quit the Baptist World Alliance to protest a perceived liberal shift that included support of female pastors and “gay-friendly congregations.”

And even in nations such as New Zealand, where the Presbyterian Church voted to ban the ordination of active homosexuals in all its leadership positions during the Church’s general assembly on Sept. 24, the issue of gay clergy has divided the Church for decades. Similar to its counterpart in the U.S., the Presbyterian Church USA, the New Zealand church suffered membership losses because of its “midway” stance on the issue.

In January 2005, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, whose policy states that ordained ministers are to refrain from engaging in homosexual sexual relationships, will release a four-year study that primarily deals with “the blessing of same-gender unions and the rostering of persons in committed gay or lesbian relationships.”

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The Future Is Uncertain (National Review Online, 041201)

On the future of gay marriage, your guess is as good as ours.

Last spring, Jason West, the mayor of New Paltz, New York, made what became the single most important and powerful argument for gay marriage: It’s inevitable. “It’s inevitable that we’ll have same-sex marriage in this country, because it’s a generational question.... Give it ten or 20 years when we’re holding state legislatures and Congress. It will just be a non-issue.” Jonathan Rauch agrees: “Young voters are pro-gay marriage.” Just last month at the Federalist Society’s National Lawyers Convention Anthony Romero of the ACLU argued that those opposing gay marriage are “on the wrong side of history.”

Are they right? Is the gay-marriage debate over because the omnipotent young have made up their more flexible minds? Many intellectual elites think so, primarily because (we suspect) their own kids are so pro-gay-marriage. A majority of college students now favor gay marriage, and elite student opinion is pretty one-sided on this question, in part because elite opinion generally has been so lopsidedly and unreflectively pro-gay-marriage. But a detailed look at recent polls suggests a different picture for the next generation as a whole.

Do a majority of young adults favor gay marriage? It depends on how the question is asked. Over the past year, polls by reputable polling companies have found the proportion of adults ages 18-29 who favor gay marriage ranging from 40 percent to 63 percent. Conversely, the proportion of young adults opposed to gay marriage has ranged from 36 percent to 54 percent.

For example, separate polls conducted just two weeks apart last spring found radically different results: A March 2004 ABC News poll found 63 percent of young adults agreeing that “it should be legal...for homosexual couples to get married” (36 percent thought such marriages should be “illegal”). Meanwhile, the Annenberg Public Policy Center found young adults opposed to gay marriage (“a law...that would allow two men [or two women] to marry each other”) by a margin of 52 to 41 percent.

Why? Respondents may be uncertain about what making gay marriage “illegal” would mean, especially compared to the status quo. Does “banning gay marriage” or making it “illegal” entail criminalizing gay people who live together as married, or who go through private or religious wedding ceremonies? If so, the greater support for gay marriage shown in these polls may reflect younger Americans’ opposition to criminalizing gay unions, rather than their support for a new legal definition of marriage that includes same-sex couples.

Nor does young-adult opinion appear particularly fixed. After the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruling in Goodridge, opposition to gay marriage among adults skyrocketed. In June 2003, according to Gallup, young adults favored gay marriage 61 to 36 percent. By December 2003, opposition among young adults had jumped 17 percentage points (more than twice the 8 percentage-point shift among all adults), resulting in 53 to 44 percent opposition to gay marriage.

Perhaps most surprising (and completely unreported), is that the next “next generation” is growing increasingly opposed to gay marriage. Since 2001, Gallup has asked teenagers (ages 13-17) whether they “approve or disapprove of marriages between homosexuals.” Between 2003 and 2004, teens’ approval of same-sex marriage dropped 6 percentage points, while the proportion that disapproved rose 8 percentage points. In the most recent poll (August 2004) American teens opposed gay marriage by a 27-point margin, 63 percent to 36 percent. Teens’ disapproval of gay marriage has now risen to about the same level as adults’.

What explains teens’ increasing disapproval of gay marriage? Most likely, as more adults voice firm objections to gay marriage, they appear to be having an impact on their children’s attitudes and values.

Will young adults who currently favor gay marriage continue to do so, even as opposition to gay marriage continues to be voiced and as they move through the lifecycle, marrying and becoming parents themselves? Will teenagers’ current high levels of opposition survive the college experience? The answer to both questions is: We don’t know. And that’s the point.

Don’t let them fool you. The future of gay marriage is undiscovered territory. Or as Peter O’Toole put it in Lawrence of Arabia, “Nothing is written.” Together, we are making up the future.

— Joshua Baker is policy director and Maggie Gallagher is president of the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy. For a roundup of next-generation opinion polls, e-mail info@imapp.org.

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Canadian High Court Approves Gay Marriage (Foxnews, 041209)

[Kwing Hung: a day of shame for Canada, anyone should be shameful as a Canadian.]

TORONTO — Canada’s highest court said Thursday the government can redefine marriage to include same-sex couples, but it added that religious officials cannot be forced to perform unions against their beliefs.

The ruling by the court in Ottawa brings to the final stages a long, bitter fight over whether gays and lesbians should be allowed to marry in Canada.

Judges in six provinces and one territory have already overturned the traditional definition, allowing thousands of same-sex weddings.

Canada would join Belgium and the Netherlands in allowing gay marriage if the government acts to make it legal nationwide. To pass in the House of Commons, the legislation needs the approval of about 44 of the 95 Liberal backbench members of Parliament to obtain a 155-vote majority.

One top Liberal predicted the legislation should pass easily after its introduction, likely early next year. It already has the support of the 38-member Liberal cabinet and virtually all the 54 Bloc Quebecois and 19 New Democrat MPs.

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Supreme Court okays same-sex marriage (National Post, 041209)

OTTAWA (CP) -- Canada’s top court says Ottawa has the authority to redefine marriage to include same-sex couples, but religious officials cannot be forced to perform unions against their beliefs.

The Supreme Court of Canada refused to say whether the traditional definition of marriage -- between one man and one woman -- violates equality rights.

It noted the federal government has already accepted lower-court judgments that excluding gays from marrying is discriminatory.

“The government has clearly accepted the ruling of lower courts on this question and has adopted their position as its own.

“The parties to previous litigation have now relied upon the finality of the judgments they obtained through the court process.”

The court says times have changed and the legal definition of marriage should change with them.

“Several centuries ago, it would have been understood that marriage be available only to opposite-sex couples.

“The recognition of same-sex marriage in several Canadian jurisdictions as well as two European countries belies the assertion that the same is true today.”

Still, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms clearly protects religious freedom, says the court.

The court’s landmark advisory opinion signals the final stage of a long, bitter fight over whether gays and lesbians should be allowed to marry.

Justice Minister Irwin Cotler predicted Wednesday that the court would give the Liberals a green light to move ahead with a bill to legalize same-sex unions as early as this month.

Same-sex marriage could become legal across the country next year if the minority Liberals win enough support in the divided House of Commons.

It’s expected a vote on legalizing gay weddings would narrowly pass even without the support of several Liberals and the Conservatives.

Judges in six provinces and one territory have already struck down the traditional marriage definition, saying it violates equality rights. Thousands of same-sex couples have already tied the knot.

Should the legislation pass, Canada would join Belgium and the Netherlands in allowing gays to wed.

The high court opinion on same-sex unions is strictly advisory.

Still, its political aftershocks will reverberate among pro- and anti-gay marriage factions across Canada.

The high court reference comes 18 months after former prime minister Jean Chretien abandoned his government’s fight against same-sex marriage by refusing to appeal provincial court rulings in Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec that declared traditional marriage laws unconstitutional.

His government then drafted legislation that would allow gay and lesbian weddings in city halls, courthouses and in religious institutions that choose to perform them.

To ensure the bill is legally bullet-proof, the Liberal government asked the high court three questions:

-- Does the federal government have exclusive authority to define marriage? The question was a pre-emptive strike at any provincial attempt to thwart the new law. Alberta Premier Ralph Klein has said he would use the Constitution’s notwithstanding clause to cancel the legislation in his province.

-- Does the charter protect religious groups from having to perform gay weddings against their beliefs?

-- Is the proposed same-sex marriage law constitutional?

Prime Minister Paul Martin expanded the reference after he was sworn in last December, adding a fourth question: Is the traditional definition of marriage -- between one man and one woman -- also constitutional? This was aimed at clarifying once and for all whether the century-old definition of marriage is flawed.

The federal Conservatives and several Liberal MPs are expected to wage a bitter final battle to preserve marriage for heterosexuals.

Chronology of events leading to the Supreme Court of Canada’s advisory opinion on same-sex marriage Thursday:

1969: Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau passes Criminal Code amendment decriminalizing homosexuality.

June 1999: House of Commons votes 216-55 in favour of preserving definition of “marriage” as union of a man and a woman.

April 11, 2000: Parliament passes Bill C-23, giving same-sex couples same social and tax benefits as heterosexuals in common-law relationships.

May 1, 2003: B.C. Court of Appeal unanimously declares that limiting marriage to heterosexuals violates equality rights; gives Ottawa two years to legally recognize same-sex marriage before judgment takes effect.

June 10, 2003: Ontario Court of Appeal upholds lower court ruling allowing same-sex marriage.

July 16, 2003: Prime Minister Jean Chretien refers three questions to Supreme Court of Canada: Is a draft bill to allow same-sex marriage within Ottawa’s authority? Does it respect Charter of Rights and Freedoms? Does it protect churches from having to perform marriages against their beliefs?

Jan. 26, 2004: Liberals under Prime Minister Paul Martin add fourth question asking high court if limiting marriage to heterosexuals violates charter.

Dec. 9, 2004: Supreme Court says Ottawa has the authority to redefine marriage to include same-sex couples; says religious officials cannot be forced to perform unions against their beliefs.

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Court Ruling in Canada: Judicial audacity scales new height (Washington Times, 041214)

The Supreme Court of Canada scaled a new peak in hallucinatory constitutional interpretation on Dec. 9, 2004. In an advisory opinion sustaining the Canadian Parliament’s power to recognize same-sex “marriages,” the best and the brightest of Canada’s jurists insisted the nation’s constitution was an organic “living tree,” not a petrified forest incapable of new limbs and climbing treetops. The “living tree” standard of interpretation, the justices say, gives birth to “progressive” laws and policies addressing “the realities of modern life.”

But like the emperor’s new clothes, a “living tree” legal doctrine is naked of substance. It empowers the Canadian Supreme Court to weave its own progressive finery into the Canadian constitution without restraints on personal whims or prejudices. Such judicial abuse and arrogance is what the Democrat Party in the United States champions and hopes to foist on the American people. It speaks volumes that liberal Democrats have not denounced the Canadian judicial frolic, a silence that echoes their unspoken joy over the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court’s invention of a state constitutional right to same-sex “marriage” in 2003.

Living trees, simpliciter, are not sinister things. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow versified in “The Village Blacksmith,” “Under the spreading chestnut tree the village smithy stands.” The no less “gifted” Barbara Walters pointedly asked honorifics to disclose their arboreal ambitions. But even U.S. Chief Justice Earl Warren, during a rare earthbound moment in Reynolds vs. Sims (1964) recognized that unlike people, trees have no representation in legislative bodies. Trees likewise command no role in constitutional thinking, whether weeping willows, giant redwoods or sweet magnolias.

The Canadian Supreme Court did not discover the “living tree” vitality of the constitution in the document itself. Instead, it summoned an encyclical by Lord Sankay speaking for the Privy Council in 1930 that frowned on “narrow and technical” constructions in favor of “large and liberal” interpretations, but within “certain fixed limits.” The “living tree” principle, the justices merrily chorused, enables the constitution to pioneer new vistas of rights and powers unanticipated by the framers without the bother of amending the charter with the people’s consent. The principle, however, is a one-way ideological street. As the justices admonished, a living constitution’s tree trunk sports only “large, liberal, or progressive” branches unblemished by a single conservative limb or twig. The court thus decreed: “In determining whether legislation falls within a particular head of power, a progressive interpretation of the head of power must be adopted.” The justices, of course, make decisions based on their political biases whether a law is a progressive reflection of new thinking or a retrograde endorsement of social Darwinism, i.e., whether it advances the welfare state or rewards individual talent or industry.

Lord Sankay had spoken of latitudinarian interpretations within certain fixed or natural limits. But the Canadian Supreme Court crippled that hedge against judicial creativity by confining the meaning of “natural” to what is universally accepted. With regard to marriage, views differ as to whether same-sex partners are natural. Accordingly, the court reasoned, the constitution must embrace the most ecumenical concept to escape the reproach of liberal historians. Since no idea worth discussing is universally acclaimed, Lord Sankay’s dictum leaves Canada’s Supreme Court omnipotent over the meaning of Canada’s constitution.

The court’s outlandish “living tree” standard of interpretation is twice-cursed. As a judicial doctrine, it is intellectually vacuous and irreconcilable with the rule of law. Constitutional principles aim to dispel doubts and to provide guideposts for the future. The “living tree” standard, in contrast, leaves the Canadian Parliament and subordinate tribunals clueless in assessing the constitutionality of legislation, other than guessing the political prejudices of the justices. Indeed, the “living tree” standard implicates neither judging nor specialized legal knowledge. It entails only a forceful articulation of a political faith.

The standard also enervates democracy. It arrogates to the Canadian Supreme Court power to decide vexing or troublesome policy questions that are the responsibility of the people and their elected representatives.

Responsibility begets maturity and enlightened compromises. It fosters wisdom and a mastery of complexities. It is the alpha and omega of an active citizenry that collectively and individually lives democracy by word and deed in its professional and private spheres.

Without popular responsibility, self-government becomes a shadow of the genuine article. The common citizen becomes inert, passive and aloof from national destiny. The fighting issues of the day are left to judges and lawyers, and government by the consent of the governed becomes more myth than reality.

The Canadian Supreme Court’s domination of Canada under the aegis of “living tree” judicial power will destroy Canada’s democracy and pluckiness on the installment plan. The U.S. Supreme Court should learn by that example.

Bruce Fein is a constitutional lawyer and international consultant with Bruce Fein & Associates and the Lichfield Group.

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National Vote on Gay Marriage in Canada Rejected (Christian Post, 041213)

The federal government of Canada rejected Sunday the idea of holding a national referendum on same-sex marriage after the Canadian Supreme Court said the federal government had the authority to legalize same-sex marriage across the nation.

Both Prime Minister Paul Martin and conservative leader Stephen Harper has said the issue should be decided by the Parliament.

“I think that this is an issue that parliamentarians ought to decide,” Martin said. “The courts have now given their direction. I think it’s one for Parliament and I think that Parliament ought to accept their responsibility.”

Justice Minister Irwin Cotler said last Wednesday that a legislation to legalize gay marriages could be introduced as early as next month.

Liberal sources have said that straw polls of MPs have indicated opponents of the bill would only be able to muster 141 or 142 votes, leaving 25 or more votes over the 154-vote minimum needed to pass the legislation.

Alberta Premier Ralph Klein said he and other Albertans are opposed to gay marriage. Klein is pushing for a national referendum on the issue. Last week, Alberta Justice Minister Ron Stevens said “the government of Alberta has continually defended the traditional definition of marriage, believing that marriage is deeply rooted in history, culture and religion and is a special bond between a man and a woman.”

Canadian Family Action Coalition, a pro-family group opposed to same-sex marriage, is also collecting signatures for petitions in support of a national referendum.

“Let the real debate begin and Canadians’ opinions be heard on this issue,” said Brian Rushfeldt, CFAC Executive Director, in a press release.

According to the group, when the Supreme Court did not answer the fourth question posed by the Liberal government - Is the traditional definition of marriage between a man and woman constitutional? – it sent a clear message that it is the responsibility of Parliament to legislate on the matter. Therefore, the Parliament cannot say, “The Courts made us to do it,” said CFAC.

“The institution of marriage as man and woman is so fundamental to all major religions that the state should not be allowed to alter it,” said Dr Charles McVety, President of CFAC. “You do not have to desecrate the sacred institution of marriage to protect the rights of others.” He added, “Common law relations already exists for others.”

In response to Martin’s statements saying there will be free vote only for MPs and not cabinet ministers, Rushfeldt said, “Martin is ordering them to vote the party line. That is a corruption of democracy.”

Lower courts in Canada have legalized same-sex marriage in six of the nation’s ten provinces including one territory.

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Homosexual ‘marriage’ debacle (Washington Times, 041231)

With much still to be decided, the homosexual “marriage” debate reached new heights in 2004, starting with President Bush’s State of the Union Address. “Activist judges ... have begun redefining marriage by court order, without regard for the will he people and their eqqqlected representatives,” he said. “On an issue of such great consequence, the people’s voice must be heard.” A few weeks later, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled that homosexuals have a state constitutional right to “marry.” Shortly thereafter, the mayor of San Francisco, in a particularly disturbing display of civil disobedience, began “marrying” homosexuals, an act a mayor in upstate New York quickly copied. As Mr. Bush forewarned, the public backlash against such reckless disregard for the legal process has been swift and politically brutal.

At this stage, it is worth asking what antagonizes the American people more: Is it the notion that homosexuals can get “married,” or the way in which public officials have allowed them to do so? Advocates of homosexual “marriage” would prefer the debate to focus on the former. If it’s simply a matter of old-fashioned thinking, then public officials have a “moral” duty to act as righteously as they please. Clearly, this helps explain why they chose to run roughshod over any legal impediments, believing their cause to reside on the same pedestal as the abolitionists’ and civil-rights activists’ of America’s past. It has proven to be a tactical blunder and a conceit, to say nothing of a moral misjudgment.

The fact is that a majority of Americans, red- and blue-staters alike, disapprove of homosexual “marriage.” Yet Mr. Bush’s call for a Federal Marriage Amendment in February was in response to the activists’ illegal tactics, as were the 11 state constitutional amendments banning homosexual “marriage” that passed in the election. Advocates of homosexual “marriage” underestimated public support for traditional marriage. Perhaps they will learn the right lessons from it.

It also could be too late. With the institution of marriage under threat, the people’s voice has been heard. Heading into the new year, we urge policy-makers to continue seeking practical policy solutions to preserve and protect marriage as the union between a man and a woman.

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Canada Churches Oppose, Support Gay Marriage Bill (Christian Post, 050126)

The government plan to legalize gay marriage is revealing more clearly the growing theological gap between the ultra liberal and traditional churches in Canada.

The United Church of Canada, known for its liberal stance on homosexuality, supported the government bill that would amend the nation’s marriage law to refer to a union of “two persons” rather than of “a man and a woman.”

In a letter to all members of the parliament, the UCC’s moderator, Rev. Peter Short, said, “The General Council of the United Church of Canada believes that equal marriage is a step on the path to justice, peace, and the common good.”

The UCC, the largest protestant denomination in Canada and one of the most highly criticized by evangelicals, has long since accepted active homosexuals as clergy and blessed same-sex “unions” within its pews.

However, Christians on the more traditional rung of the theological spectrum encouraged the parliament to protect marriage for the sake of family and society.

Same sex marriage could “bring in its wake bitter and unpredictable demographic, social, cultural and religious consequences,” said Cardinal Marc Ouellet, the highest ranking Roman Catholic clergyman in Canada.

Ouellet added that the institution of marriage was for “the procreation and education of children, within the context of the love of a man and a woman,” and he said it provided a guarantee “for the future of society.”

“It is parliament that must decide about this matter of such great importance for the future of our society and of its fundamental values,” he said.

The Canadian Supreme Court last month gave the government the green light to legalize gay marriage across Canada, but stopped short of saying that this was required by the constitution. Currently, gay marriage is “legal” in seven Canadian provinces and one territory. Parliament members will vote on the bill after they return from Christmas break, January 31.

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Canada Lawmakers Unveil Highly Disputed Same-Sex “Marriage” Bill (Christian Post, 050201)

The Canadian government introduced today in Parliament a three-paragraph bill that, if passed into law as expected, will make Canada just the third country in the world to allow same-sex “marriage.” The highly disputed bill, which seeks to legalize same-sex marriage nationwide, has received strong objection from the Roman Catholic Church and other conservative clergy.

Justice Minister Irwin Cotler, who confirmed yesterday he would be tabling the controversial legislation at 10 a.m. today, said the legislation reflected the spirit of Canadian rights and freedoms protected under the constitution, according to the Associated Press. Cotler noted that seven of Canada’s 13 provinces and territories already allow marriage between gays and lesbians, and he said it was time to make the law uniform nationwide.

However, the country is deeply divided on the issue, and the bill’s passage is not assured.

According to AP, the opposition Conservative Party has said it would fight the legislation, which defines marriage as a civil union between two people, as opposed to the current definition of marriage between a man and a woman.

Meanwhile, Roman Catholic Church groups have joined forces with other religious groups to defeat the legislation, with Quebec Archbishop Marc Cardinal Quellet saying the bill “threatens to unleash nothing less than cultural upheaval whose negative consequences are still impossible to predict.”

Cotler, who stressed that polygamy, bigamy and incest would remain illegal, told a news conference, “I appreciate the concern, sometimes even the anguish, that some Canadians feel.”

“Given that thousands of gay couples have already married ... we have a responsibility to enact this legislation,” he said, adding that Canada was built on “a tradition of tolerance and respect”.

But Bruce Clemenger, head of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, said Ottawa was hurrying down an unknown path.

“It is a sad day when the language of ‘husband and wife’ is removed from federal legislation. Is this what Canadians want? It is a distorted notion of tolerance and respect that eclipses distinctive relationships,” he said, according to Reuters.

Sources say for the bill to pass, it needs approval from 154 members of the 308-seat House of Commons. If approved, Canada would join Belgium and the Netherlands as the only other countries to embrace same-sex marriage nationwide.

AP reports that the legislation will have to go to committee for study and it could take weeks, or even months, for a final vote.

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Canadian Christians Stand Against Gay Marriage Bill (Christian Post, 050202)

A protestor against same-sex marriage demonstrates in front of the Canadian Parliamentary buildings in Ottawa, February 1, 2005. The federal government tabled draft legislation that would grant gays and lesbians the right to full civil marriages while making clear that religious officials would not be forced to marry same-sex couples. AP Photo by Jim Young

Hundreds of thousands of pro-family and Christian Canadians are expected to join a rally to protest the proposed plan to legalize gay “marriage” in the nation.

“We’re printing half a million brochures so we’re going to help the various organizations with literature... they will be distributed by various entities that are fighting this and that will (include) churches,” said Charles McVety, president of the Canada Family Action Coalition to Reuters.

Tuesday’s same-sex marriage bill, introduced by the Prime Minister Paul Martin, would change the nation’s law from defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman to a union between two “persons”.

According to McVety, the Canada Family Action Coalition is only one of many groups opposing the bill. McVety also leads the Defend Marriage Coalition, which is an organization that is raising money to support several other proponents of traditional marriage such as Concerned Christian Canada. CCC meanwhile has planned a rally in the city of Calgary to protect traditional marriage this Saturday.

The National Post newspaper also revealed statistics on Wednesday, which showed that two thirds of Canadians want a national referendum on the issue, according to the Associated Press.

A similar percentage said they wanted to preserve the definition of marriage, making the Canadian population head-to-head with the American population on the issue.

And although Martin emphasized that the bill will not force clergy to recognize or bless same sex unions, Canada’s 2.5 million evangelicals disagreed.

“With more than 75 percent of marriages in Canada solemnized by clergy, it is clearly a deeply religious institution. It is naïve and impossible to say that you can change civil marriage without it having an impact on religious marriage and religious institutions,” a statement from Canada’s largest evangelical church group, the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, read.

“The Prime Minister has said that this is an issue of fundamental rights. He has said that in redefining marriage, he is defending the Charter,” the statement read. “If that is the case, there is no room for those of us who have a different vision of family life in Canada. We are already being pushed to the margins of Canadian life. We are being made to feel unwelcome.”

“This is not tolerance and it is not upholding the Charter.”

According to Tom Reilly, general secretary of the Ontario Conference of Catholic Bishops, the church has been talking with other faith group leaders to join forces on the matter.

“The way they’re set up is not as hierarchical as we are. So you can be talking to a representative of a group but you don’t know if it’s the whole group... we’ll see what ideas we can exchange and if there are areas where we can cooperate,” he told Reuters.

McVety meanwhile said he plans to campaign in and around the Toronto – Canada’s largest city and home to several dozens of Liberal legislators backing the bill.

Said McVety: “The greater Toronto area is where this battle will be won or lost.”

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Britain to allow gay civil unions (Washington Times, 050222)

LONDON -- Same-sex partners in Britain will be able to enter into civil unions beginning in December, joining homosexuals in parts of Europe and the United States in obtaining many of the rights enjoyed by married couples, the government said yesterday.

The Civil Partnerships Bill passed by Parliament last year gives same-sex couples the right to form legally binding partnerships and entitles them to some of the same tax and pension rights that married couples have.

Starting Dec. 5, couples will be able to notify the register office at their local council that they intend to form civil partnerships. After a 15-day waiting period, they will sign an official partnership document in front of witnesses.

“This legislation is going to make a real difference to these couples, and it demonstrates the government’s commitment to equality and social justice,” said Deputy Minister for Women and Equality Jacqui Smith.

“It opens the way to respect, recognition and justice for those who have been denied it for too long.”

The government said some register offices have started receiving inquiries from same-sex couples.

Separately yesterday, the armed services said they will allow same-sex couples with registered partnerships to share family quarters.

“We will be complying with the law. We are obliged to give equal treatment to gay and lesbian partnerships” under the new act, said Royal Navy spokesman Anton Hanney, adding that same-sex couples in the armed services already enjoy equal pension rights.

The Royal Navy yesterday also announced a drive to recruit homosexuals into the force. The navy has signed an agreement with the lobbying group Stonewall to promote homosexual rights in the force and is about to advertise in the homosexual press for the first time.

Britain lifted its ban on homosexuals serving in the military in 2000 after a European court ruling that their exclusion was unlawful.

A Ministry of Defense spokesman said the other main branches of the armed forces, the army and the air force, had their own ways of ensuring equal opportunity for homosexuals.

The air force, for example, had joined a pride parade last year to persuade more homosexuals to sign up.

The civil-union legislation does not use the term “marriage,” but among other benefits, it grants same-sex couples rights to their partners’ pensions, gives them next-of-kin status and exempts them from paying inheritance tax on a partner’s home. It also will require partners to provide maintenance for each other and any children in the case of a breakup.

Partners will be able to dissolve the agreement in a form of divorce settlement.

Officials at the Department of Trade and Industry estimate that there will be more than 42,000 same-sex partnership agreements in place by 2050.

“This is the moment we fought so hard for,” said Ben Summerskill, chief executive of Stonewall. “At last, lesbian and gay couples can begin to plan their future lives together.”

Nine European Union members allow same-sex partnerships, beginning with Denmark, which legislated for the unions in 1989.

In the United States, more than a dozen states recognize some form of domestic partnerships or civil unions, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, but 11 states voted in November to ban same-sex “marriage.”

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American, Canadian Conservatives Criticize Gay Marriage Bill (Christian Post, 050127)

Conservative and pro-family leaders across North America have spoken out against a government plan to legalize gay marriage in Canada, siding with traditional Christian leaders who fear the passage of such a legislation would threaten the sanctity of the family in both the US and Canada.

Same-sex marriage “could bring in its wake bitter and unpredictable demographic, social, cultural and religious consequences,” said Cardinal Marc Ouellet, the highest-ranking Roman Catholic clergyman in Canada.

The legislation, backed by Prime Minister Paul Martin, would permit same-sex “marriage” across all of Canada. Currently, only seven of the provinces and one of the territories recognize same sex marriage. In arguing his case, Martin said marriage is a “human rights” issue that can strengthen the unity of the diverse nation.

However, pro-family leaders in Canada pointed to the fact that in legalizing gay “marriage,” it will marginalize the Christians who strive to uphold the traditional definition of marriage.

“Regardless of what the government decides to do, there are going to be sizable members of the Christian community that are never going to be accepting of same-sex marriage,” said Derek Rogusky, a spokesman for Focus on the Family Canada. “What kind of space are we going to allow for them?”

Rogusky argued that while Martin’s bill would not require churches to allow same-sex marriages, it may trample on the rights of religious groups that publicly oppose such unions on moral and biblical grounds.

James Dobson, one of the most influential Christian figures in America and chairman of the Colorado-based Focus on the Family, said he hoped Christians will stand up for their beliefs in Canada, as did evangelicals in America.

“It is clear here in the United States that the American people do not want same-sex marriage,” said Dobson, during one of his broadcasts. “I would hope that Canadians who also do not want same-sex marriage would be encouraged by what has happened down here.”

Dobson also encouraged Canadians to pray on the issue, and to remember the victory at the U.S. polls last November.

“I am among those who believe the president would not have won re-election if it had not been for the power of this issue to drive conservative voters to the polls,” said Dobson.

Rogusky agreed that evangelical Canadians must and will take action and rally against same-sex marriage in the nation.

“If they think they’re getting a lot of e-mails and letters now, it’s nothing compared to what it’s going to be over the month of February and however long it takes until there’s a final vote,” said Rogusky about the Parliament.

And responding to criticism from liberals who scorned American evangelicals for getting involved with the debate, Rogusky said the issue affects nations outside the Canadian border.

“It is not really a Canadian issue. It is an issue happening around the world.”

“There (are) a lot of voices out there saying that if you oppose redefining marriage that somehow you are an extremist or a bigot,” said Rogusky. “We needed to dispel that and I think hopefully we have done that and that will encourage some people to take some action.”

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The marriage newspeak (townhall.com, 050314)

Jeff Jacoby

Back in 2003, a few days after the highest court in Massachusetts unveiled a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, I ventured a prediction.

“Sooner than you think, it will become improper to speak of unique sex roles in family life,” I wrote. “The meanings and status associated with words like ‘husband’ and ‘wife’ will be erased from the law; most likely, the words themselves will be replaced in statutes with the unisex ‘spouse,’ just as ‘father’ and ‘mother’ will give way to ‘parent.’ “

The changes soon began. Massachusetts rolled out a new marriage license shorn of any reference to bride and groom. Couples getting married were now to be officially identified as “Party A” and “Party B.” The department of public health proposed a similar rewrite of the state’s birth certificate, replacing “mother” and “father” with “Parent A” and “Parent B.” To that, Governor Mitt Romney objected, though it is probably only a matter of time until a court orders him to make the change.

Meanwhile, others have gone far beyond Massachusetts in embracing the brave new world of unisex marriage. Last month, lawmakers in Ontario enacted Bill 171, stripping the statute books of all references to gender in connection with marriage. No longer do Ontario’s laws use words and phrases like “husband,” “wife,” “widow,” “widower,” or “persons of the opposite sex.” And it is not just family and marriage laws that have been de-sexed. Bill 171 eliminates the traditional language of matrimony from more than 70 provincial statutes, including the Gasoline Tax Act and the Public Libraries Act.

What is underway here is not simply a tweaking of legal terminology. The crusade for same-sex marriage has never been aimed merely at adjusting the familiar boundaries of married life to make it more inclusive. The real target is the significance of marriage itself -- the idea, fundamental to human happiness and all successful societies, that the purpose of marriage is to bring men and women together for their mutual welfare and for the protection and well-being of any children they create or adopt. It is that deeply ingrained belief that the marriage radicals are determined to do away with. One purpose of the official marriage Newspeak is to make such thoughts increasingly unthinkable.

Already it is becoming hazardous to speak of marriage as an opposite-sex institution or to suggest that one of its core functions is to provide children with fathers and mothers. Just ask actress Jada Pinkett Smith or Governor Romney.

When Pinkett Smith received an award at Harvard two weeks ago, she used her acceptance remarks to splash cold water on the idea that family obligations can make it difficult for married women to reach the top of the career ladder -- a hypothesis recently voiced by the university’s president, Lawrence Summers.

“Women,” Pinkett Smith told the audience, “you can have it all -- a loving man, devoted husband, loving children, a fabulous career. They say you gotta choose. Nah, nah, nah. We are a new generation of women. We got to set a new standard of rules around here. You can do whatever it is you want.”

That harmless bit of you-go-girl boosterism was all it took to arouse the wrath of Harvard’s Bisexual, Gay, Lesbian, Transgender, and Supporters Alliance. It denounced Will Smith’s wife for her “extremely heteronormative” comments, which “made BGLTSA members feel uncomfortable.” The group demanded -- and received -- an apology. And those who brought Pinkett Smith to campus will now undergo reeducation: The Harvard Crimson reports that the Foundation for Intercultural and Race Relations is working with the BGLTSA “to increase sensitivity toward issues of sexuality.” Translation: There will be no more talk of loving men or devoted husbands at Harvard. At least not from married women.

Romney’s offense against the new marital correctness was considerably more serious. In a couple of speeches to Republican groups out of state, he condemned same-sex marriage on the grounds that “every child has the right to have a mother and a father.”

The words were hardly out of his mouth before protesters were at his State House office, blasting him as “mean-spirited.” Editorial writers launched an attack on his “ignorance” and charged him with “stooping to pander to the rigid right.” In the Berkshire Eagle, one columnist slammed his statement of the obvious -- that every child deserves a mom and a dad -- as “really disturbing” and the brainless “fuzzy stuff of 1940s movies.” He was accused elsewhere of succumbing to the kind of thinking that once barred blacks from white lunch counters.

Be forewarned: This is just the start. The assault is not going to let up until the heteronormative deviants among us have all been silenced. You think the marriage radicals have gone too far? You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

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15,000 Canadians Rally For, Against Gay Marriage Bill (Christian Post, 050411)

Thousands rally on Parliament Hill in protest against same-sex marriage. (CP Photo)

Supporters and opponents of Canada’s same-sex marriage bill staged rallies throughout the weekend, as Members of Parliament prepare to vote on the issue on Tuesday.

Headed by Prime Minister Paul Martin, Canada’s Liberal government has proposed Bill C-38 to grant civil marriage rights to same-sex couples. The bill is a result of several court decisions that declare the prohibition of same-sex marriage a violation of equal rights.

On Saturday, around 15,000 people from throughout Canada gathered on Parliament Hill in Ottawa to protest the bill and advocate the protection of traditional marriage.

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper rallied the crowd, saying, “Undermining the traditional definition of marriage is an assault on the beliefs of all cultural and religious communities who have come to this country.”

“I am committed, when I am elected prime minister… to bring in legislation that will define marriage as the union of one man and one woman.”

On Sunday, hundreds of people gathered in support of same-sex marriage in several rallies throughout Canada. Leaders from Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and several other faiths joined the demonstrations in an effort to show faith-based support for same-sex marriages.

Reverend Brent Hawkes performed the first legal same-sex marriages in Canada at the Metropolitan Community Church, a non-denominational church where Hawkes serves as pastor. During the rallies on Sunday, Hawkes called on supporters to contact Members of Parliament and sign a petition of support for Bill C-38.

“Support is growing all across Canada and all across the faith spectrum,” said Hawkes.

Currently, courts have allowed same-sex marriage in six provinces and one territory. The proposed Bill C-38 would legalize same-sex marriage across all of Canada. On Tuesday, Parliament will vote on a motion introduced by Harper to refuse a second reading of the proposed same-sex marriage bill in Parliament.

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Gay Marriage Licenses Invalid, Says Oregon Supreme Court (Christian Post, 050415)

In its long-awaited ruling on Thursday, the Oregon Supreme Court invalidated 3,000 marriage licenses issued to same-sex couples last year, citing Multnomah County with a breach in authority for granting the licenses.

Last April, Multnomah County began to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples until Circuit Judge Frank Bearden halted the action six weeks later. By then, nearly 3,000 marriage licenses had been granted.

The case eventually reached the Oregon Supreme Court when the state’s Defense of Marriage Coalition argued that the marriage licenses were invalid.

The Supreme Court stated in its ruling that the county does not have authority to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, because marriage laws are under the jurisdiction of the state.

The court’s decision cited a state law and a constitutional amendment passed last November that ban same-sex marriage.

The court’s statement read: “Today, marriage in Oregon – an institution once limited to opposite-sex couples only by statute – now is so limited by the state Constitution as well.”

The court also recognized that decisions on marriage are under the power of the state legislature, opening up the door for lawmakers to decide whether or not to allow other types of unions between same-sex partners.

State legislators will use the high court’s decision to guide their actions on the issue of same-sex couples, an issue that has become the subject of nationwide debate.

On Wednesday, Governor Ted Kulongoski announced a bill legalizing same-sex civil unions. The bill would give same-sex couples the rights and privileges of marriage.

Co-sponsored by Senators Kate Brown (D-Portland), Alan Bates (D-Ashland), Frank Morse (R-Albany), and Ben Westlund (R-Bend), the bill is part of Kulongoski’s promise to protect gays and lesbians in the state from discrimination.

On Wednesday, legislators in Connecticut approved a bill similar to the one proposed by Kulongoski. The amended bill awaits a second approval in the Senate before being sent to the governor.

If it passes, Connecticut would be the first state to allow same-sex civil unions without being prompted by a court order. Vermont recognizes same-sex civil unions and Massachusetts allows same-sex marriage, but in both states the actions were motivated by court rulings.

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Spain Gives Preliminary Approval for Homosexual Marriage (Christian Post, 050422)

The Spanish parliament gave initial approval for the legalization of gay “marriage” on Thursday.

The bill passed by a 183-136 majority, however the Senate needs to approve and the lower house must read the final bill. If the bill becomes law, as it is widely expected to do, it would make Spain the third European nation to legalize same-sex unions.

The bill would give same-sex unions the same status as heterosexual ones. It would give partners inheritance rights, pensions, and the ability to adopt children.

A statement by the bishops of Spain indicated that the legalization of same-sex “marriage” was “damaging to the common good.”

When the decision was made known, the public gallery in parliament erupted with cheers and dozens of activists gathered outside to celebrate.

Activist Antonio Poveda, of the gay rights group Lambda expressed his approval for the measure, saying “I’m going to get married for the sake of activism, for love and for a question of dignity,” according to AP.

Senior Roman Catholic church officials have criticized Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero’s liberal Socialist Party agenda, which also includes reduced abortion restrictions and permitting stem cell research.

Although Spain is listed as being 94 percent Catholic, according to the CIA fact book, fewer than a fifth young Spaniards are practicing Catholics according to AP. In a survey last year, 70 percent of Spaniards said they were in favor of Gay marriage.

Former Pope John Paul issued a statement last year warning that the increasing secularization of Spain was moving the country toward “restriction of religious freedom and even promoting disdain or ignorance of religion.”

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Canada’s Gay Marriage Bill Passes Second Reading (Christian Post, 050506)

A bill to legalize same-sex marriage in Canada passed a second reading in the Commons on Wednesday. Conservatives, meanwhile, vow to defeat the Liberal Government in blocking this measure.

Bill C-38 will grant civil marriage rights to same-sex couples throughout Canada. The legislation was introduced by the Liberal government, headed by Prime Minister Paul Martin, in response to several courts declaring that same-sex marriage prohibition was a violation of equal rights.

Conservatives, who largely opposed the bill, tried but failed to block the bill from getting a reading in the House. On Wednesday, the bill passed the second round by a vote of 164 to 137, with only thirty-five Liberals joining the Conservative Party to go against the bill.

Public hearings will be held before a House-appointed committee, to examine the legality of the bill. In order to become law, the bill must pass the committee and a third reading in the House. It must then pass the Senate before seeking royal approval.

The whole process could take at least a month, enough time for the Conservative Party to take action. Conservatives, led by Party Leader Stephen Harper, plan to force a confidence vote by next week, through which they hope to take control of the government. If they succeed, the marriage bill will most likely die.

“I don’t expect the bill to make it through this Parliament,” said Harper to reporters on Wednesday.

The bill has stirred up controversy and debate across the nation. On Sunday, thousands rallied in a showing of multi-faith unity for traditional marriage. A poll conducted by the Environics Research Group in March showed that Canadians are divided over the issue, with slightly more than half of whom are opposed to the bill.

Currently, six provinces and one territory recognize same-sex marriage. The proposed bill will extend marriage rights to same-sex couples across all of Canada. Currently, only two other countries recognize same-sex marriage on a nationwide scale.

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‘Let us Vote! Let Us Vote! Let Us Vote!’ (Christian Post, 050525)

Recently, hundreds of people gathered on the Halifax Mall at the State Legislature to rally in favor of a State Constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage in North Carolina. The amendment would clearly define marriage as the union of one man and one woman, preventing rogue judges from foisting a redefinition of marriage on North Carolina citizens. Supporters loudly chanted again and again throughout the rally, “Let us vote! Let us vote! Let us vote!”

A number of nationally recognized speakers -- Mike Johnston, Bob Knight, Bill Maier, and Tony Perkins -- made critical points concerning the impetus for a state marriage amendment.

Mike Johnson, legal counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, told the enthusiastic crowd: “I’m certainly preaching to the choir, but you all know our country is in big trouble right now. We are all seeing the full effects of the 1960s’ and 70s’ sexual revolution, radical feminism, no-fault divorce laws, and the rejection of moral absolutes -- and God’s created order. Forty-five million babies have been murdered by legalized abortion. Pornography and crime have reached crisis proportions. Sodomy is now embraced by our courts, and the radical homosexual agenda is threatening the very definition of marriage. The culture is slipping into chaos and sexual anarchy. And yet, when we take a stand for America’s Judeo-Christian heritage, for morality, for traditional marriage, we are marginalized and persecuted. We are accused of being ‘intolerant’ ... of violating the so-called ‘separation of church and state’ .... Thankfully, God’s people are finally waking up, and we are once again demanding a return to the Founder’s original intent, and to justice and righteousness in the public square .... The truth is religious conviction should influence our thinking on these issues, and on every aspect of our public lives.”

Robert Knight, director of the Culture and Family Institute, an affiliate of Concerned Women for America, argued this issue is about making sure our government doesn’t put its stamp of approval on wrongful sexual behavior. He said the term “sexual orientation” is a misleading term. “A lot of people misunderstand the term ‘sexual orientation,’ he said. “ ‘Sexual orientation’ was invented in the 1970s by homosexual activists as a radical challenge to the Christian worldview. In essence, ‘sexual orientation’ says you are born with certain desires, are therefore entitled to act on these desires, and this condition is just like skin color or ethnicity, thereby making it a civil right to be enforced against others who disagree. Contrast this with the Christian message, which is that we are all sinners in need of a Savior who offers us redemption. ‘Sexual orientation,’ quite simply, says that we are fine the way we are and don’t need Jesus. This is a terrible lie, and it traps people in sin instead of giving them hope for a better life. This is not about tolerance for homosexuals,” added Knight. “If the homosexual agenda is enacted, we will see the criminalization of Christianity in a few short years. It is already happening in Canada and Sweden, and we now have seen it happen in Philadelphia, where 11 Christians were arrested and jailed for preaching the Gospel at a public park during a homosexual street festival last October ... this should send a chill down the backs of all freedom-loving Americans.”

Bill Maier, vice president for Focus on the Family, told rally attendants “the saddest thing about same-sex marriage and parenting is that it places adult desires above the interest of children.” He added: “Same-sex marriage intentionally creates motherless or fatherless families .... Gay activists will tell you that all children need is two ‘caring adults.’ But children need more than that ... they need a mommy and a daddy. One of Hollywood’s most famous lesbians is comedienne Rosie O’Donnell. Two years ago, the ABC TV news program Primetime did a two-hour special on gay adoption. Host Diane Sawyer interviewed Rosie, who spoke glowingly about her lesbian relationship and the three children that she and her partner have adopted. During the program, Diane Sawyer asked Rosie if her six-year-old son Parker ever asks why he doesn’t have a daddy. Rosie said, ‘Oh yes, all the time.’ Diane seemed surprised by the admission, so she asked Rosie, ‘What do you tell him?’ When Parker asks her why he can’t have a daddy, Rosie said she tells him this: ‘Parker, you can’t have a daddy because I’m the kind of mommy who wants another mommy.’ Same-sex parenting really boils down to those two words ... ‘I want.’ It’s not about what Parker wants, or what he desperately needs. It’s about what Rosie and her lesbian partner want.”

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, contended that the potential for same-sex marriage is an urgent matter. He said many judges are just waiting for an opportunity to redefine the sacred institution. He warned North Carolina lawmakers resisting the push for a state marriage amendment: “Recent elections indicate that those politicians who get cold feet when it comes to giving the people a voice to defend marriage find themselves in the hot seat at election time. The people of North Carolina want to join the marriage march that is moving across this nation, promoting and protecting the institution of marriage.” Perkins called upon North Carolinians that support traditional marriage to do three things: (1) Pray for our leaders and for the promotion of marriage, (2) Don’t grow weary and stay in the battle, and (3) Don’t let America down. He said that North Carolina needed a State Constitutional marriage amendment to help make the case for a federal marriage amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Despite the fact that 18 states in our Union have already approved marriage amendments to their State Constitutions, the leadership in both the North Carolina Senate and House has resisted the hearing of legislation for the same in our state. For two years in a row, bills have been introduced in both chambers that would provide North Carolina citizens with the opportunity to amend its Constitution and clarify by the ballot box that marriage is between one man and one woman. Unfortunately, however, the legislation has been purposely bottled up in committee and left to die.

Although North Carolina’s laws against homosexual marriage are relatively strong, the State is still vulnerable to homosexual activists who would “judge shop” and challenge such laws and prevail in court. The definition of marriage is a matter the people, not the courts, should decide. Every day this matter is delayed is another day the gay rights coalition have time to plan and strategize to redefine the timeless institution that is the greatest pillar of society.

Phone calls need to be made to the office of House Speaker Jim Black (919.733.3451) and Senate President Pro Tempore, Mark Basnight (919.733.6854) asking them to stop playing Russian roulette with marriage and the family. They control what legislation is heard in our State. It’s time they stop stifling legislation for a State Constitutional amendment to protect marriage.

“Let us vote! Let us vote! Let us vote!”

___________________________________________________

Rev. Mark H. Creech (calact@aol.com) is the executive director of the Christian Action League of North Carolina, Inc.

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Canada’s Senate Debates Same-sex Marriage Bill (Christian Post, 050707)

The debate on legislation to legalize same-sex marriage in Canada continues in the Senate this week, bringing up sensitive issues such as religion, race, and civil rights.

Just last week, Spain became the third nation to legalize same-sex marriage, with Canada likely to be a close fourth. Like the House of Commons, the Senate has extended their session into the summer to finalize a decision over Bill C-38, a controversial bill proposed by Prime Minister Paul Martin that would grant marriage rights to same-sex couples.

The Commons approved the bill last week, despite opposition from Conservatives and some members of the Liberal party. The Senate began their debate on the bill last Sunday and approved a second reading by a 43 to 12 vote on Wednesday.

The debate has been heated, with sharp statements from both sides of the issue. Those in opposition to the bill proposed an amendment supporting heterosexual marriage only. The amendment was quickly shot down by supporters of the bill, who likened the struggle for same-sex marriage to the struggle for civil rights for all races.

Senator Anne Cools, who is black, argued that the debate over same-sex marriage is not comparable to the fight for human rights. Cools, who left the Liberal party over the bill, responded that “marriage… has never been a right.”

At one point, a senator posed the question, “What would Jesus do?” One of the Liberal Senators responded that she believed Jesus would approve the bill.

Despite the opposing views among Senators, the bill is expected to pass in the Liberal-dominated Senate. If it does, the bill would then have to be signed by the Governor General before becoming law.

Most provinces already allow same-sex marriage- only Alberta, Prince Edward Island, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut do not. Alberta recently announced that it will seek ways to circumvent the law if it is passed.

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Ex-Gay Ministry Head Criticizes Church Promotion of Same-Sex Marriage (Christian Post, 050725)

The largest evangelical network of former homosexuals in the world expressed disappointment with the United Church of Christ’s decision to endorse homosexual unions and said the resolution lacks a “truly compassionate” approach to the issue.

Early in the month, the UCC became the first mainline church to accept same-sex marriage within its pews, which came 35 years after it ordained an openly homosexual minister.

Former homosexual turned president of Exodus International, Alan Chambers, said he agrees the church needs to reach out more to homosexuals who feel alienated and excluded, but added that the United Church of Christ’s recent decision is not the answer.

“Embracing homosexual unions, but abandoning the very truth that could change lives may be politically correct, but it is not true compassion,” said Chambers. “Homosexuals need to know they are welcome at their local church, but they also need to know that hundreds of thousands of us have found freedom from the isolation and emptiness we experienced in gay life through the power of Jesus Christ.”

Chambers added that the existence of ex-gays is living proof that the lifestyle is not an inherited trait.

“Therefore, marriage is not a civil right to be extended to any group of individuals who demand it,” he said.

And that the union set up by God must be preserved as it was intended in the Bible so that those who are confused and questioning their sexuality can find healing.

“As a former homosexual who is now happily married, I am grateful for the laws that protected and esteemed this life-preserving, authentic union,” he said.

Exodus International is a resource and referral organization with over 125 member chapters across North America. The organization has been in existence for 30 years and offers help to the over 400,000 people who contact the ministry each year.

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No Moratorium on Canadian Gay Marriage Blessings (Christian Post, 050428)

Bishops of the Anglican Church of Canada agreed not to encourage same-sex union blessings but fell short of placing a moratorium on such ceremonies. The House of Bishops also sidestepped a request that the church voluntarily withdraw from a key international ANglican meeting because of the same-sex marriage blessing issue.

The Anglican Church of Canada, alongside its US counterpart, was asked to refrain from attending the Anglican Consultative Council in 2005 by churches worldwide. The U.S. Church decided to abide by the request last month but the Canadian church had not yet responded.

During the House of Bishops’ meeting in Windsor, Ontario, the Canadian bishops pushed asside the decision on gay marriage blessings to the General Synod - the church’s highest decision-making body, which meets in 2007. The bishops committed themslves “neither to encourage nor to initiate the use of such rites until (the) General Synod has made a decision on the matter.”

Ultimately in the time being, the same-sex marriage blessings within the Canadian Episcopal Church will continue.

“As of now, the rites are continuing. There’s no change indicated,” Neale Adams, spokesman for the Ottowa diocese, told Reuters.

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Canada Legalizes Gay Marriage (Foxnews, 050720)

TORONTO — Canada legalized gay marriage Wednesday, becoming the world’s fourth nation to grant full legal rights to same-sex couples.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin signed the legislation making it law, hours after it was approved by the Senate late Tuesday night despite strong opposition from Conservatives and religious leaders.

The bill gives homosexual couples the same rights as those in traditional unions between a man and a woman, something already legal in eight of Canada’s 10 provinces and in two of its three territories.

The legislation drafted by Prime Minister Paul Martin’s minority Liberal Party government easily passed the Senate, which essentially rubber stamps any bill already passed by the House of Commons, which passed it late last month.

The Netherlands, Belgium and Spain are the only other nations that allow gay marriage nationwide.

The law comes after years of court battles and debate that divided families, religious groups and even political allies. The Roman Catholic Church, the predominant Christian denomination in Canada, has vigorously opposed the legislation.

But Martin, a Roman Catholic, has said that despite anyone’s personal beliefs, all Canadians should be granted the same rights to marriage.

Alex Munter, national spokesman for Canadians for Equal Marriage, which has led the debate in favor of the law, was triumphant Wednesday: “It is a signal to the world that Canada is an open and inclusive society that believes in the notion of full citizenship for all.”

Churches have expressed concern that their clergy would be compelled to perform same sex ceremonies. The legislation, however, states that the bill only covers civil unions, not religious ones, and no clergy would be forced to perform same-sex ceremonies unless they choose to do so.

Charles McVety, a spokesman for Defend Marriage Canada and president of Canada Christian College, said he was “very sad that the state has invaded the church, breached separation of church and state and redefined a religious word.”

McVety vowed his group would work to vote out lawmakers who supported the legislation in the next general elections.

“A new Parliament is going to readdress this issue and common sense ultimately will prevail,” McVety said.

In the United States, Massachusetts is the only state that allows gay marriages; Vermont and Connecticut have approved same-sex civil unions.

Though hundreds of foreigners have come to Canada to seek civil ceremonies since gay marriages were first allowed in Ontario and British Columbia in 2003, not all countries or states recognize the unions.

The U.S. government does not recognize same-sex marriage, and most states refuse to acknowledge marriage certificates from gay and lesbian couples, regardless of where they wed.

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Pro-Family Groups ‘Horrified’ at Gay Marriage Bill Approval in Calif. (Christian Post, 050902)

Pro-family groups blasted the California Senate’s passage of a bill Thursday that would legalize same-sex marriage and make it the first legislative body in the country to approve a gay marriage legislation.

“How can God bless California when our lawmakers do this?” asked Randy Thomasson, president of Campaign for Children and Families.

After the state Assembly rejected the bill by a narrow vote in June, the measure made a comeback and passed the Senate by a 21-15 vote.

The proposed act would redefine marriage in California as a union between two persons, making marriage gender-neutral and thereby permitting same-sex marriages in the state.

“A leading California pro-family organization is reacting with horror to today’s passage of homosexual marriage licenses in the State Senate,” stated a CCF news release. “The Democrat-controlled Senate has completely overturned the people’s vote on marriage.”

An overwhelming vote by the people of California opposed gay marriage in 2000 with the passage of Prop 22, which only recognizes marriage between a man and a woman in the state.

While Prop 22 won in 52 of California’s 58 counties, the state senate dropped a bomb on pro-family advocates.

“They’re violating the state constitution, which specifically prohibits the Legislature from repealing voter-approved initiatives!” stated Thomasson.

The measure is now headed for the state Assembly from where it will reach Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s desk if passed.

Democratic Sen. Debra Bowen said several churches backed the gender-neutral bill, according to the Associate Press.

Nevertheless, opponents are now making efforts to qualify initiatives for the 2006 ballot to ban gay marriages in the state Constitution.

“If the Legislature flushes the people’s vote on marriage down the drain, the people will rise up, override the politicians and the judges, and protect marriage rights for one man and one woman in the state constitution,” said activist Ed Hernandez, a proponent of VoteYesMarriage.com, during a news conference outside the State Capitol.

CCF urges both Governor Schwarzenegger and “every Californian who believes marriage is for a man and a woman” to rise up in opposition to the gay marriage license.

“This corrupt deed by state legislators will energize voters to sign the www.VoteYesMarriage.com petition a month from now, to protect marriage rights for one man and one woman once and for all,” stated Thomasson.

The Vote Yes Marriage amendment is already circulating across the state to place the initiative on the 2006 ballot.

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Schwarzenegger Vetoes Gay Marriage Bill (WorldNetDaily, 050930)

SACRAMENTO, Calif, -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger followed through Thursday on his promise to veto a bill to legalize same-sex marriage, leaving the issue up to voters or judges who will likely face the volatile issue in the next year.

“This bill simply adds confusion to a constitutional issue,” the Republican governor said in a veto message.

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger shakes hands with nurse/ student Gina Santa Cruz as he tours the Pasadena Community College Skills Lab’s nursing preparatory class Tuesday, Sept. 27, 2005, in Pasadena, Calif. Gov. Schwarzenegger signed legislation expanding California schools’ vocational education programs which equip students with essential skills and experience to prepare them for various careers in today’s job environment. Nurse students Ketty Ok, left, and Joseph Ganata, middle, look on. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes, Pool)

Schwarzenegger had announced his intention on Sept. 7, a day after the Legislature became the first in the country to approve a bill allowing gays and lesbians to wed.

Schwarzenegger said the bill by Democratic Assemblyman Mark Leno contradicted Proposition 22, which was approved by voters in 2000 and said only a marriage between a man and woman is valid.

The governor said the state constitution bars the Legislature from enacting a law allowing gay marriage without another vote by the public and that Leno’s bill wouldn’t provide for that vote.

Schwarzenegger noted that a state appeals court was considering whether the state’s ban on gay marriage is constitutional and that the issue would likely be decided by the California Supreme Court.

“If the ban of same-sex marriage is unconstitutional this bill is not necessary,” he said. “If the ban is constitutional this bill is ineffective.”

Leno, who is openly gay, said Schwarzenegger had missed a historic opportunity to stand up for civil rights.

“He cannot claim to support fair and equal legal protection for same-sex couples and veto the very bill that would have provided it to them,” Leno said. “Words are cheap. We’re looking for action. We’re looking for leadership.”

In his veto message, Schwarzenegger said he supports the state’s domestic partner laws, which give same-sex couples most of the rights and obligations of married couples, and would oppose efforts to overturn or weaken those statutes.

Leno’s bill was approved by bare majorities in the state Assembly and Senate. It would take two-thirds votes in both houses to overturn the veto and there hasn’t been a veto override in California in more than 20 years.

Eddie Gutierrez, a spokesman for Equality California, a gay rights group that supported the bill, said Schwarzenegger had merely delayed the day when gay marriage is legal.

“We are extremely disappointed with the governor’s decision,” he said. “By denying us marriage equality he has turned a back to our community.”

Randy Thomasson, president of the Campaign for California Families, a group that opposed the bill, said Schwarzenegger had done the right thing. He also said voters should approve an initiative next year that would put a ban on same-sex marriages in the state Constitution.

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The people’s voice on same-sex marriage (townhall.com, 051007)

When California lawmakers narrowly passed a bill legalizing same-sex marriage last month, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced that he would veto it. Not because he opposes legal rights for gay and lesbian couples -- he doesn’t -- but because he opposes treating California elections as meaningless. Five years ago, Californians went to the polls and approved Proposition 22, a ballot initiative confirming the traditional definition of marriage. Unless they change their minds or are overruled by the Supreme Court, Schwarzenegger said, their decision ought to be binding. As his spokesperson put it in a statement, “We cannot have a system where the people vote and the Legislature derails that vote.”

Needless to say, liberal supporters of gay marriage had a fit. “The governor is disingenuously claiming that the Legislature has overturned the intent of voters,” a Los Angeles Times editorial growled. “Does he not believe in the American system of representative democracy?” A letter to the editor mocked a governor who “runs and ducks for cover behind the courts and ‘the people.’ Who’s the girlie man now?”

But it wasn’t Schwarzenegger who was being disingenuous, and it would be no bad thing if more politicians showed comparable respect for laws passed at the polls. Proposition 22 -- which read, in its entirety, “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California” -- was ratified by a lopsided majority of California voters, winning more than 4.6 million votes and carrying 52 of the state’s 58 counties. What could the people possibly have done to make their intent any clearer?

In an earlier era, liberalism and respect for the vote went hand in hand. Liberals fought to extend the franchise to women. They were leaders in the civil rights movement, raising their voices -- and sometimes laying down their lives -- for the right of Southern blacks to vote. A century ago, progressives championed the direct election of US senators, a movement that culminated in the adoption of the 17th Amendment in 1913.

But today liberalism all too often displays a strong antidemocratic streak, and nowhere is it more blatant than on the issue of same-sex marriage.

Every time voters have been asked whether the fundamental definition of marriage -- the legal union of a man and woman -- should be radically redefined, they have given the same answer, and generally in a landslide. California is no anomaly. In the past five years, voters in 16 other states have adopted constitutional amendments barring same-sex marriage. (Statewide votes are pending in five more states.) Those who believe that gender should be irrelevant to marriage may be passionately convinced of the justice of their cause. But they have not managed to convince a majority of their fellow citizens.

Faced with such strong and consistent electoral opposition, same-sex marriage advocates ought to be reworking their arguments and finding better ways to make their case. They could be trying harder to understand the concerns and depth of feeling on the other side. Or they could decide to wait until public sentiment has shifted, and then go back to the voters with a new referendum.

Instead they seem to have decided that if they can’t win democratically, winning undemocratically will suffice. And so we have seen same-sex marriage by judicial fiat, as in Massachusetts. We have seen same-sex marriage by executive decree, as in New Paltz, N.Y., San Francisco, and a few other cities where marriage licenses were issued to gay and lesbian couples by order of the mayor. And we have seen same-sex marriage by legislative snub, as with the California bill last month.

The marriage radicals are not coy about their willingness to brush democratic scruples aside. When 130,000 Massachusetts voters petitioned state lawmakers in 2002 for a constitutional amendment in defense of traditional marriage, the Legislature’s liberal leadership refused to bring it to the floor. Though the state Constitution required an up-or-down vote before the measure could be sent to the voters, the Legislature simply adjourned, strangling the amendment in its crib. The gleeful reaction of one lawmaker, state Senator Cheryl Jacques, was telling. “I’ll take a victory on this any way I can get it,” she said. Not long afterward, Jacques became executive director of the Human Rights Campaign, one of the nation’s leading gay and lesbian advocacy organizations.

Same-sex marriage proponents do themselves no favors with this win-at-all-costs, to-hell-with-democracy approach. And it is no defense to say that gay and lesbian marriage is a matter of civil rights, and no one’s civil rights should be put to a vote. Whether same-sex marriage should be thought of as a civil right is precisely the question to be decided. The way to decide it fairly is to decide it democratically.

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New York Court Upholds Traditional Marriage Laws (Christian Post, 051210)

On Friday, a New York appeals court upheld the state’s one man, one woman marriage laws in a 4-1 decision and reversed a lower trial court decision.

The court said that the lower court had created a new constitutional right, exceeding its power by usurping power meant by the legislature. Prior to the Hernandez v. Robles case, three other courts had upheld the marriage laws.

“This court correctly exercised judicial restraint. Judges should not rewrite the law, said Mathew D. Staver President and General Counsel of the Liberty Counsel. “Every time the people speak on marriage, they always choose one man and one woman. Natural marriage is the bedrock of stable and healthy families.”

If the previous ruling had stood, gay marriages would have become legal in New York City. In its ruling the appeals court forbid same-sex marriage and added that the state had a legitimate and rational interest in promoting traditional marriage.

“Marriage promotes sharing of resources between men, women and the children that they procreate,” wrote the panel of the Appellate Division of State Supreme Court. “It is based on the presumption that the optimal situation for child-rearing is having both biological parents present in a committed, socially esteemed relationship.”

“In his decision, Judge Milton Williams should be commended for clearly articulating the importance of the traditional family and the compelling interest of the state in preserving this basic institution of society,” said the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition.

The suit was filed by the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund on behalf of the plaintiffs against the city clerk who is in charge of issuing marriage licenses, Victor Robles. A lawyer for the plaintiffs said the ruling would be appealed, meaning the suit could go to the New York Supreme Court.

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Controversy over U.K. Civil Partnerships Continues; Opposing Churches Chime In (Christian Post, 060109)

LONDON – The controversy regarding homosexuality in the Church and same-sex civil unions reached new levels over the weekend as one of Wiltshire’s most prominent religious figures took part in a civil partnership ceremony on Saturday.

Canon Jeremy Davies of Salisbury Cathedral formally and legally registered his homosexual relationship in the city, which will see him and his partner given similar legal rights as traditional heterosexual married couples. The Civil Partnership Act came into force in December 2005, and ceremonies have taken place in various sites across England since Dec. 21.

Canon Davies registered his long-term relationship in a ceremony that was held in private, and was combined with the Canon’s 60th birthday celebrations.

The highly controversial law introduced last month means that any homosexual couple that wants to form a partnership recognized by the law, must register their intentions with their local council. However, the legislation stops short of creating a married couple. Therefore, unlike marriages, the signing of the legal papers for a civil partnership does not need to take place in public.

The rights enjoyed by those signing up for civil partnerships include similar tax and inheritance benefits as married couples.

The Church of England, however, still bans same-sex marriage.

Just weeks after the controversial law came into force, Cardinal Keith O’Brien – the most senior Roman Catholic in Scotland – spoke out to accuse cabinet ministers in London and Edinburgh of devaluing family life by allowing the Civil Partnership Act to pass.

O’Brien said that the family remained “the basic social unit,” which should be recognized, protected and promoted a capstone of society.

“When our lawmakers condone and endorse trends in society which are ultimately ruinous of family life, we are entitled to question their motivation and condemn their behavior,” he told his congregation.

At the end of 2005, Pope Benedict XVI also called on the U.K. Government to acknowledge “the indispensable role of stable marriage and family life” for the good of society.

In December 2005, Anglican Mainstream urged the Government to reconsider the Civil Partnerships Act. Dr Philip Giddings and Canon Dr Chris Sugden of Anglican Mainstream told U.K.-based Christian Today in a joint statement: “Marriage is a God-given institution between a man and a woman in which children are born and nurtured so that human society may flourish. The Civil Partnership Act 2005 is both confusing and unjust. It is confusing because it obscures the vital distinction between same-sex relationships and marriage.

“The rights in law which the Act confers are designed to be the same as the rights which flow from marriage. Yet the government insists that a civil partnership is not marriage. Some people are understandably referring to these partnerships as ‘marriage,’ but calling something marriage does not make it marriage as properly understood.”

Anglican Mainstream said the Act was unjust because it excludes siblings and close relatives who are not married and “yet should surely be eligible for the same rights.”

“By excluding close relatives, the Act clearly identifies the rights it confers on same-sex relationships with those consequent upon marriage,” said Dr Giddings and Canon Sugden. “Civil partnerships are thus a parody of the marriage relationship, which is God’s provision for human flourishing.”

The two men concluded: “The church cannot bless something that harms those we are in God’s name seeking to help. The government would be wise to re-consider this unjust and confusing legislation.”

The Evangelical Council has also warned of the negative consequences of the Civil Partnerships Act following the hundreds of gay civil partnership ceremonies that took place up and down the country.

The Chairman of the Church of England Evangelical Council, the Rev. Dr. Richard Turnbull, warned Christians in particular of the need to uphold the unique position of marriage between one man and one woman.

“We recognize, of course, the need for fair and equal treatment before the law for all people,” he told Christian Today. “However, Christians need to be very concerned indeed at the assertion of moral equivalence between marriage and civil partnerships. They are not of equal moral standing.”

He added that Christians have a unique role to teach others about the sanctity of the traditional family.

The Rev. Turnbull said: “Christians must be clear, while acting with sensitivity and care, to assert the Christian teaching that celibate singleness or monogamous marriage are the ways in which God has provided for the best moral family framework for society. We depart from that at our peril both as a society and indeed as a church.”

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Cultural death wishes (townhall.com, 060120)

by Debra Saunders

When social conservatives argue that legalizing same-sex marriage could lead to legalized polygamy, same-sex marriage advocates either laugh or sneer. It’s a scare tactic, they say. It’ll never happen.

Last year, however, as Canada legalized same-sex marriage, Prime Minister Paul Martin commissioned a $150,000 study to debunk the polygamy argument. Big mistake: The study confirmed the scare tactic by recommending that Canada repeal its anti-polygamy law.

It also suggested that a legal challenge to Canada’s anti-polygamy laws would succeed. “Why criminalize behavior?” asked Martha Bailey, one of the study’s three law-professor authors. “We don’t criminalize adultery.”

Confession time: I am one of those who, for years, has argued that legalizing same-sex marriage would not open the door for polygamy. The limit for marriages would remain two, I argued. Two doesn’t mean three or four.

Wrong. In these politically correct times, do-gooders expand definitions until words — or institutions — lose all meaning. Marriage can mean what you want it to mean.

And: If you don’t prosecute all crimes in a category, you can’t prosecute one.

That’s essentially what Bailey argued.

The study recognized the “strong association between polygamy and gender inequality.” Then the authors apparently decided that Canadian law should eliminate any legal unfairness — in inherently unequal marriages.

One Kuwaiti wife can’t move to Canada to live with her husband and another wife. That’s unfair to the wife and unfair to Muslims. The study noted, “The parties most likely to suffer from this rule are the left-behind wives.” To eliminate that inequity, these professors are ready to provide legal cover for all polygamous (and polyandrous) marriages.

“There’s a logical extension to it,” laughed Rob Stutzman, who worked on the Proposition 22 campaign in 2000, a measure that limited marriage in California to a union between a man and a woman. “If you accept the premise that marriage should be whatever relationships people want to enter into,” he said, polygamy is legit.

Brad Luna of the Human Rights Campaign, which supports same-sex marriage, finds any linkage of polygamy to same-sex marriage “offensive.” He warned against reading too much into one Canadian study. In America, he said, “two people is the defining element in our system of government on contractual marriage.”

Assemblyman Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, who has pushed for same-sex marriage in California, noted “a unique nature of a relationship with two. If you go beyond two, you can’t draw a line anywhere else that isn’t arbitrary.” I agree, but the Canadian study gives me pause. The authors use a very American argument: that adults already are living in de facto polygamous relationships, so why make their arrangements illegal?

The answer is that even if authorities cannot and should not jail adults for group cohabitation, the state should not extend legal protections to those unions.

Extending marital protections to same-sex couples bestows equality. Extending protections to unequal unions protects inequality.

The Washington Times interviewed polygamous Mormons who argued they lead happy, harmonious lives. That may be, but the practice is poison for cultures at large. Rich men marry many wives. Poor men do not. Women have few opportunities and limited rights. It can’t be good for the kids. Consider polygamy’s most famous son: Osama bin Laden, whose father sired 54 children with 22 wives.

Many elites argue that Canada is 10 years ahead of America when it comes to gay rights. But when legal scholars are so progressive that they are willing to shove marriage back to the Stone Age, they reveal a culture with a death wish.

American advocates for same-sex marriage may want to reconsider supporting civil unions in lieu of same-sex marriage. Or some way to limit marriage to two adults.

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Nigeria Takes ‘Pre-Emptive’ Step to Outlaw Same-Sex ‘Marriage’ (Christian Post, 060121)

The Nigerian government is taking a “pre-emptive step” toward introducing a specific ban on same-sex marriages as Europe and the United States become increasingly pro-gay marriage.

Nigeria’s information minister, Frank Nweke, told the BBC this week that the government was taking the “pre-emptive step” because of developments elsewhere in the world.

“In most cultures in Nigeria, same-sex relationships, sodomy and the likes of that, is regarded as abominable,” said Nweke.

It is already illegal to engage in gay sex in Nigeria. Under a new proposed ban, gay couples who join in a wedding ceremony, as well as anyone who officiates at one, will risk five years in jail.

Justice Minister Bayo Ojo also made clear that homosexuals would not be able to press for any specifically gay rights or recognition, reported AFP.

The Anglican Church in Nigeria has taken a clear stance against same-sex marriage and the ordination of gay priests under the firm leadership of the outspoken Archbishop Peter Akinola.

“The Anglican Church in Nigeria has been in the forefront of condemning the attitude because the Church sees it as an aberration, in other words, we see it as against the norm. We see it as an abomination,” the Rev. Tunde Popoola, a spokesman for the Anglican Church of Nigeria, told Voice of America.

The president of Nigeria, Olusegun Obasanjo, has given his public support to the Church’s position on homosexuality. “Such a tendency is clearly un-Biblical, unnatural and definitely un-African,” the president told a conference of Nigerian bishops in October 2004.

South Africa became the first African country and fifth country in the world to permit same-sex marriage in December 2005, following the Netherlands, Spain, Belgium and Canada.

The decision was opposed not only by the vast majority of South Africa’s citizens, but also the rest of Africa where homosexuality is still largely unaccepted.

Christian groups expressed deep concern to the latest move by the court. South Africa’s biggest Christian party – the African Christian Democratic Party – sternly objected the decision. It warned of the disintegration and deterioration that may be resulted when “a society strays from the sexual ethic of marriage,” as previous civilizations has showed, according to Reuters.

In addition, Steven Swart, spokesman for the African Christian Democratic Party declared that “we as Christian Democrats believe we should treat all people with compassion, but there are certain guidelines that we stand by; Marriage is a union between a man and woman.”

And Primate of the Anglican Church of the Province of Southern Africa Njongonkulu Ndungane stated that while the Church “valued diversity as expressed in the court ruling,” it would not change its stance against gay marriage.

In his statement released after the Constitutional Court’s ruling, Ndungane said, “We have repeatedly affirmed that we do not regard partnership between two persons of the same sex as a marriage in the eyes of God.”

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Colorado State Prepares for Marriage Showdown (Christian Post, 060120)

Two separate state voter initiatives that could impact gay couples in Colorado may come before voters in November, with one seeking to affirm traditional marriage and the other seeking to give marriage-like rights to gay couples.

A proposal being led in part by evangelical ministry Focus on the Family will seek to collect 68,000 petition signatures to amend the state’s constitution by placing the option to define marriage as being only between a man and a woman in the ballot. The other one, which is being supported by a pair of state legislators, will seek to allow domestic partnerships.

“We are going to do everything we can to make sure marriage is protected in Colorado,” said Jim Pfaff, national representative for family policy at Focus on the Family, according to the Colorado Springs-based Gazette. “It’s our goal to make sure that marriage is defined as a union of one man and one woman.”

Focus is working together with other like-minded groups through a coalition called Coloradans for Marriage. They are set to launch their constitutional marriage amendment drive before the end of the month. Similar efforts by traditional marriage supporters have resulted in 19 other states amending their constitutions.

Proponents of such measures seek to keep judges from ruling that state marriage laws are unconstitutional because they exclude homosexual couples. Colorado is just one of several states expected to vote on an amendment this year.

The other voter measure in the works would not change state constitution but would simply add a law to give same-sex couples legal rights currently afforded only to married couples, including medical, tax and inheritance benefits.

Senate President Joan Fitz-Gerald (D-Coal Creek), who held a press conference on Tuesday along with other politicians, said that the need for a domestic partnerships measure arose in part because of future legislation that could ban gay marriages.

“Domestic partnerships do nothing to impact my marriage,” added Fitz-Gerald, according to the Gazette. “All it does is give basic human rights to citizens who enter into a lifetime relationship.”

Rep. Tom Plant (D-Nederland), who also supports domestic partnerships, says that the language of the initiative has not been finalized but added that it will not conflict with the marriage proposal.

A spokeswoman for Focus on the Family doesn’t agree with the proposal backed by Fitz-Gerald and Plant because it would only allow homosexuals to file for domestic partnership rights.

“It should be based on need and should be available to anyone based on need,” said Amanda Banks, an analyst with Focus, according to The Denver Channel.

She noted that two friends who live together or a mother and daughter might also want to benefit from the protections offered by domestic partnerships.

Linda Devocelle, executive director of the Pikes Peak Gay and Lesbian Community Center, thinks that domestic partnership rights are insufficient and indicated that “equality” in marriage is what is needed.

“Having both on the ballot gives people an out so they can say they can vote for the amendment and for domestic partnerships and think everything is taken care of,” she said. “But that would deny us equality.”

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Maryland Judge Strikes Down Marriage Law (Christian Post, 060120)

A judge stuck down a 33-year-old Maryland law validating only heterosexual marriages, following a lawsuit by nine gay couples and one individual who said the law violated the state’s constitution.

Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge M. Brooke Murdock ruled Thursday that the current law violates the state constitution because it “discriminates based on gender.” City clerks will not be allowed to issue marriage licenses since the decision was stayed, pending an appeal.

“After much study and serious reflection, the Court holds that Maryland’s statutory prohibition against same-sex marriage cannot withstand this constitutional challenge,” wrote Murdock.

The state attorney general had argued for the constitutionality of Maryland’s 1973 law, which only validates a marriage only between a man and a woman.

Currently 19 states across the country have passed amendments to their state constitutions defining marriage as being a covenant between a man and a woman, in order to avoid legal challenges. Massachusetts is the only state allowing “gay marriages” due to a ruling by that state’s highest court.

In her ruling, the judge said there is “no apparent compelling state interest” in prohibiting homosexual marriage.

In 1972, Maryland voters passed the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), which states that the “equality of rights under the law shall not be abridged or denied because of sex.”

However in 1973, the legislature passed the marriage law making heterosexual marriages the only ones considered valid. The Judge found that the state law violated the ERA.

A spokesman for Maryland Gov. Robert Ehrlich (R) said the governor had heard of the ruling, but had not seen it, according to the Associated Press.

“It has been forwarded to his legal counsel for review,” spokesman Henry Fawell said. “It would be premature to comment on the ruling at this point, but as the governor has said before, he believes marriage is between one man and one woman.”

Ken Choe, an American Civil Liberties Union Lawyer who argued the case before the judge, referred to two of the plaintiffs he argued for.

“The court was right to conclude that preventing same-sex couples from marrying is sex discrimination,” he said in a released statement. “The only reason Lisa Polyak can’t marry her partner of 24 years, Gita Deane, is because she is another woman and not a man, as the court recognized, is unconstitutional.”

However the Senate President, Thomas V. Mike Miller (D), believed the ruling would be overturned.

“In my opinion, the plaintiffs forum-shopped,” Miller said, according to AP. “I don’t think the same opinion would have been rendered in 90 percent of the other circuits in the state of Maryland.”

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Friends with Benefits: Shaking up the marriage debate in Colorado. (National Review Online, 060216)

The debate over gays and marriage in Colorado has recently taken a different turn from the national debate. Until a few weeks ago, the debate looked familiar. Gay-rights advocates were trying to get the legislature to enact a bill recognizing civil unions (or “domestic partnerships”) for same-sex couples. Social conservatives were trying to get voters to adopt a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. Now conservative state senator Shawn Mitchell has changed the script by introducing legislation that grants some benefits to same-sex couples — with the support of James Dobson and Focus on the Family.

His legislation results from an asymmetry in the debate. One of the reasons many people support civil unions or same-sex marriage is to get certain practical advantages for gay couples. The main reason other people oppose these policies is that they do not want the government to recognize homosexual relationships as marital, or even as akin to marriage.

Mitchell’s idea is to make certain benefits available to gay couples — and to many other pairs of people. His legislation would make it easier, for example, for gay men to arrange to give each other a say in their medical care by becoming “reciprocal beneficiaries.” But two brothers, or a brother and sister, or two male friends, could enter the same arrangement. Thus there would be no recognition of homosexual relationships as such. (Hence Dobson’s support.)

No benefit would be contingent on any assumption by the government that the beneficiaries were involved in a sexual relationship outside traditional marriage. In extending the benefit, the state would be blind to the precise nature of the relationship between the beneficiaries.

Mitchell says that he got the idea for his legislation from an article I wrote in National Review last year. He modified my idea a little. I would have allowed couples who could legally marry to sign up as reciprocal beneficiaries. His legislation forbids them to sign up, presumably out of concern that doing so might keep them from marrying.

I didn’t propose this idea in the expectation that it would resolve the questions surrounding gays and marriage. It doesn’t give people who believe that gay marriage is a matter of civil rights any reason to stop working toward it, and it doesn’t give the opponents any reason to quit, either. It does not, that is, attempt to bring the debate to an end satisfactory to all sides (which would be impossible). But it does solve some practical problems in a way that nobody should find objectionable.

The politics of the proposal will vary sharply with circumstances. In Colorado, which has a Democratic legislature, liberals seem to think that they can get civil unions. Their initial reaction to Mitchell’s bill has therefore been to reject it as insufficient while offering a little praise to Mitchell for being willing to seek compromise. As the debate unfolds, however, it is possible that some Democrats will conclude that Mitchell’s approach offers progress for gay couples at low political risk. In more conservative states, where civil unions are off the table, a bill like Mitchell’s may look positively progressive and Democrats may wish to offer it themselves.

— Ramesh Ponnuru, an NR senior editor, is at work on a book about the sanctity of life and American politics.

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Poll: Opposition to Gay Marriage Declining (Christian Post, 060323)

WASHINGTON (AP) - The public backlash over gay marriage has receded since a controversial decision by the Massachusetts Supreme Court in 2003 to legalize those marriages stirred strong opposition, says a poll released Wednesday.

Gay marriage remains a divisive issue, with 51 percent opposing it, the poll by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found. But almost two-thirds, 63 percent, opposed gay marriage in February 2004.

“Most Americans still oppose gay marriage, but the levels of opposition are down and the number of strong opponents are down,” said Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Research Center. “This has some implications for the midterm elections if this trend is maintained. There are gay marriage ballot initiatives in numerous states.”

Gay marriage got intense media coverage in 2004 after the Massachusetts court case, the decision by San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom to issue thousands of marriage licenses to gay couples and similar cases. But the intense focus on gay marriage has declined in the last year.

In 2004, opponents of gay marriage were able to pass ballot initiatives banning the practice in 11 states, from Georgia to Oregon. Those gay marriage initiatives also helped conservatives rally their voters to the polls.

The number of people who say they strongly oppose gay marriage has dropped from 42 percent in early 2004 to 28 percent now. Strong opposition has dropped sharply among senior citizens and Republicans.

People are now evenly split on allowing adoptions by gay couples and six in 10 now favor allowing gays to serve openly in the military.

Legal challenges of laws on gay marriage could result in more court decisions that stir public opinion, but this midterm election year is starting with far less public anxiety about one of the nation’s most volatile social issues.

The telephone poll of 1,405 adults was conducted March 8-12 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

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Gay ‘Marriage’ Numbers Continue To Decrease In Netherlands (Christian Post, 060329)

The number of same-sex “marriages” has stabilized since the introduction of gay marriage in the netherlands five years ago, according to new figures recently released by a dutch governmental institution that gathers statistical information about the western european nation.

Statistics netherlands, or “centraal bureau voor de statistiek” (cbs), said last monday that 1,166 gay and lesbian couples got “married” in 2005, compared with 1,210 the year before. When the netherlands became the first country in the world to introduce same-sex marriage in 2001, some 2,414 gay or lesbian couples married. There was also a rush to the registry office the following year when 1,838 same-sex couples “tied the knot.”

“there was an element of hype in 2001. Lots of people who had already been together for 30 or 40 years got married,” explained demographics professor jan latten at the cbs, according to the report by netherlands-based expatica. The numbers peaked in 2002.

“after that it decreased,” he added. “everyone asked how this was possible because the opening up of marriage seemed to be so popular. It appears this peak was the ‘start-up’ effect. The figures in 2004 and 2005 were roughly equal.”

Dr. Latten expects approximately 1,200 gay or lesbian marriages in 2006 as the marriage rate so far this year is at the same level as this time last year. He also expects the annual marriage rates to be similar from now on.

According to cbs, total number of marriages – heterosexual and same-sex – has fallen noticeably in the last five years. In 2001, 82,091 couples married compared with the 73,861 last year.

The institution also found that divorce rates between same-sex couples did not differ from heterosexual couples, but that lesbian couples who divorced tended to do so earlier than married gay men.

The netherlands is one of a small handful of countries that have passed a law allowing homosexuals to enter a registered partnership since denmark took the first dive in 1989. Others include norway, sweden, germany, belgium, argentina, france, spain, canada, and most recently the czech republic.

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Ireland Prime Minister Backs Legalizing Same-Sex Partnerships (Christian Post, 060405)

DUBLIN, Ireland (AP) - Ireland will legalize civil partnerships for gay couples, Prime Minister Bertie Ahern pledged Monday as he opened new offices for the country’s main gay rights group.

Civil partnerships allow gay couples the same rights to inheritance, state benefits and other financial rights as held by married heterosexual couples.

“Sexual orientation cannot, and must not, be the basis of a second-class citizenship. Our laws have changed, and will continue to change, to reflect this principle,” Ahern told an audience at Ireland’s Gay and Lesbian Equality Network.

Ahern said it would be more difficult to legalize gay marriage in Ireland than it was in the United Kingdom, which approved the civil unions in December. Ireland’s constitution has a clause requiring the predominantly Roman Catholic state to protect the institution of marriage, whereas the UK, which includes neighboring Northern Ireland, has no written constitution.

“This challenge, however, is one that the government is determined to meet. We are committed to legislating on this issue,” said Ahern, who noted that a government-appointed group of experts would recommend several possible options in a report expected in November.

“Although there is a growing climate of equality and support for anti-discrimination action, I also recognize that members of the gay community still face isolation, abuse and victimization on the basis of their sexuality,” Ahern said.

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Banned in Boston: The coming conflict between same-sex marriage and religious liberty. (Weekly Standard, 060508)

CATHOLIC CHARITIES OF BOSTON made the announcement on March 10: It was getting out of the adoption business. “We have encountered a dilemma we cannot resolve. . . . The issue is adoption to same-sex couples.”

It was shocking news. Catholic Charities of Boston, one of the nation’s oldest adoption agencies, had long specialized in finding good homes for hard to place kids. “Catholic Charities was always at the top of the list,” Paula Wisnewski, director of adoption for the Home for Little Wanderers, told the Boston Globe. “It’s a shame because it is certainly going to mean that fewer children from foster care are going to find permanent homes.” Marylou Sudders, president of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, said simply, “This is a tragedy for kids.”

How did this tragedy happen?

It’s a complicated story. Massachusetts law prohibited “orientation discrimination” over a decade ago. Then in November 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ordered gay marriage. The majority ruled that only animus against gay people could explain why anyone would want to treat opposite-sex and same-sex couples differently. That same year, partly in response to growing pressure for gay marriage and adoption both here and in Europe, a Vatican statement made clear that placing children with same-sex couples violates Catholic teaching.

Then in October 2005, the Boston Globe broke the news: Boston Catholic Charities had placed a small number of children with same-sex couples. Sean Cardinal O’Malley, who has authority over Catholic Charities of Boston, responded by stating that

the agency would no longer do so.

Seven members of the Boston Catholic Charities board (about one-sixth of the membership) resigned in protest. Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, which lobbies for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender equal rights, issued a thundering denunciation of the Catholic hierarchy: “These bishops are putting an ugly political agenda before the needs of very vulnerable children. Every one of the nation’s leading children’s welfare groups agrees that a parent’s sexual orientation is irrelevant to his or her ability to raise a child. What these bishops are doing is shameful, wrong, and has nothing to do whatsoever with faith.”

But getting square with the church didn’t end Catholic Charities’ woes. To operate in Massachusetts, an adoption agency must be licensed by the state. And to get a license, an agency must pledge to obey state laws barring discrimination—including the decade-old ban on orientation discrimination. With the legalization of gay marriage in the state, discrimination against same-sex couples would be outlawed, too.

Cardinal O’Malley asked Governor Mitt Romney for a religious exemption from the ban on orientation discrimination. Governor Romney reluctantly responded that he lacked legal authority to grant one unilaterally, by executive order. So the governor and archbishop turned to the state legislature, requesting a conscience exemption that would allow Catholic Charities to continue to help kids in a manner consistent with Catholic teaching.

To date, not a single other Massachusetts political leader appears willing to consider even the narrowest religious exemption. Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey, the Republican candidate for governor in this fall’s election, refused to budge: “I believe that any institution that wants to provide services that are regulated by the state has to abide by the laws of the state,” Healey told the Boston Globe on March 2, “and our antidiscrimination laws are some of our most important.”

From there, it was only a short step to the headline “State Putting Church Out of Adoption Business,” which ran over an opinion piece in the Boston Globe by John Garvey, dean of Boston College Law School. It’s worth underscoring that Catholic Charities’ problem with the state didn’t hinge on its receipt of public money. Ron Madnick, president of the Massachusetts chapter of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, agreed with Garvey’s assessment: “Even if Catholic Charities ceased receiving tax support and gave up its role as a state contractor, it still could not refuse to place children with same-sex couples.”

This March, then, unexpectedly, a mere two years after the introduction of gay marriage in America, a number of latent concerns about the impact of this innovation on religious freedom ceased to be theoretical. How could Adam and Steve’s marriage possibly hurt anyone else? When religious-right leaders prophesy negative consequences from gay marriage, they are often seen as overwrought. The First Amendment, we are told, will protect religious groups from persecution for their views about marriage.

So who is right? Is the fate of Catholic Charities of Boston an aberration or a sign of things to come?

I PUT THE QUESTION to Anthony Picarello, president and general counsel of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. The Becket Fund is widely recognized as one of the best religious liberty law firms and the only one that defends the religious liberty of all faith groups, “from Anglicans to Zoroastrians,” as its founder Kevin J.

Hasson likes to say (referring to actual clients the Becket Fund has defended).

Just how serious are the coming conflicts over religious liberty stemming from gay marriage?

“The impact will be severe and pervasive,” Picarello says flatly. “This is going to affect every aspect of church-state relations.” Recent years, he predicts, will be looked back on as a time of relative peace between church and state, one where people had the luxury of litigating cases about things like the Ten Commandments in courthouses. In times of relative peace, says Picarello, people don’t even notice that “the church is surrounded on all sides by the state; that church and state butt up against each other. The boundaries are usually peaceful, so it’s easy sometimes to forget they are there. But because marriage affects just about every area of the law, gay marriage is going to create a point of conflict at every point around the perimeter.”

For scholars, these will be interesting times: Want to know exactly where the borders of church and state are located? “Wait a few years,” Picarello laughs. The flood of litigation surrounding each point of contact will map out the territory. For religious liberty lawyers, there are boom times ahead. As one Becket Fund donor told Picarello ruefully, “At least you know you’re not in the buggy whip business.”

Picarello is a Harvard-trained litigator experienced in religious liberty issues. But predicting the legal consequences of as big a change as gay marriage is a job for more than one mind. So last December, the Becket Fund brought together ten religious liberty scholars of right and left to look at the question of the impact of gay marriage on the freedom of religion. Picarello summarizes: “All the scholars we got together see a problem; they all see a conflict coming. They differ on how it should be resolved and who should win, but they all see a conflict coming.”

These are not necessarily scholars who oppose gay marriage. Chai Feldblum, for example, is a Georgetown law professor who refers to herself as “part of an inner group of public-intellectual movement leaders committed to advancing LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual] equality in this country.” Marc Stern is the general counsel for the center-left American Jewish Congress. Robin Wilson of the University of Maryland law school is undecided on gay marriage. Jonathan Turley of George Washington law school has supported legalizing not only gay marriage but also polygamy.

Reading through these and the other scholars’ papers, I noticed an odd feature. Generally speaking the scholars most opposed to gay marriage were somewhat less likely than others to foresee large conflicts ahead—perhaps because they tended to find it “inconceivable,” as Doug Kmiec of Pepperdine law school put it, that “a successful analogy will be drawn in the public mind between irrational, and morally repugnant, racial discrimination and the rational, and at least morally debatable, differentiation of traditional and same-sex marriage.” That’s a key consideration. For if orientation is like race, then people who oppose gay marriage will be treated under law like bigots who opposed interracial marriage. Sure, we don’t arrest people for being racists, but the law does intervene in powerful ways to punish and discourage racial discrimination, not only by government but also by private entities. Doug Laycock, a religious liberty expert at the University of Texas law school, similarly told me we are a “long way” from equating orientation with race in the law.

By contrast, the scholars who favor gay marriage found it relatively easy to foresee looming legal pressures on faith-based organizations opposed to gay marriage, perhaps because many of these scholars live in social and intellectual circles where the shift Kmiec regards as inconceivable has already happened. They have less trouble imagining that people and groups who oppose gay marriage will soon be treated by society and the law the way we treat racists because that’s pretty close to the world in which they live now.

The (Gay) Public Intellectual

Of all the scholars who attended, perhaps the most surprising is Chai Feldblum. She is a Georgetown law professor who is highly sought after on civil rights issues, especially gay civil rights. She has drafted many federal bills to prohibit orientation discrimination and innumerable amicus briefs in constitutional cases seeking equality for gay people. I ask her why she decided to make time for a conference on the impact of same-sex marriage on religious liberty.

“Not because I was caught up in the panic,” she laughs. She’d been thinking through the moral implications of nondiscrimination rules in the law, a lonely undertaking for a gay rights advocate. “Gay rights supporters often try to present these laws as purely neutral and having no moral implications. But not all discrimination is bad,” Feldblum points out. In employment law, for instance, “we allow discrimination against people who sexually abuse children, and we don’t say ‘the only question is can they type’ even if they can type really quickly.”

To get to the point where the law prohibits discrimination, Feldblum says, “there have to be two things: one, a majority of the society believing the characteristic on which the person is being discriminated against is not morally problematic, and, two, enough of a sense of outrage to push past the normal American contract-based approach, where the government doesn’t tell you what you can do. There has to be enough outrage to bypass that basic default mode in America. Unlike some of my compatriots in the gay rights movement, I think we advance the cause of gay equality if we make clear there are moral assessments that underlie antidiscrimination laws.”

But there was a second reason Feldblum made time for this particular conference. She was raised an Orthodox Jew. She wanted to demonstrate respect for religious people and their concerns, to show that the gay community is not monolithic in this regard.

“It seemed to me the height of disingenuousness, absurdity, and indeed disrespect to tell someone it is okay to ‘be’ gay, but not necessarily okay to engage in gay sex. What do they think being gay means?” she writes in her Becket paper. “I have the same reaction to courts and legislatures that blithely assume a religious person can easily disengage her religious belief and self-identity from her religious practice and religious behavior. What do they think being religious means?”

To Feldblum the emerging conflicts between free exercise of religion and sexual liberty are real: “When we pass a law that says you may not discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation, we are burdening those who have an alternative moral assessment of gay men and lesbians.” Most of the time, the need to protect the dignity of gay people will justify burdening religious belief, she argues. But that does not make it right to pretend these burdens do not exist in the first place, or that the religious people the law is burdening don’t matter.

“You have to stop, think, and justify the burden each time,” says Feldblum. She pauses. “Respect doesn’t mean that the religious person should prevail in the right to discriminate—it just means demonstrating a respectful awareness of the religious position.”

Feldblum believes this sincerely and with passion, and clearly (as she reminds me) against the vast majority of opinion of her own community. And yet when push comes to shove, when religious liberty and sexual liberty conflict, she admits, “I’m having a hard time coming up with any case in which religious liberty should win.”

She pauses over cases like the one at Tufts University, one of many current legal battles in which a Christian group is fighting for the right to limit its leaders to people who subscribe to its particular vision of Christianity. She’s uncertain about Catholic Charities of Boston, too: “I do not know the details of that case,” she told me. “I do believe a state should be permitted to withhold tax exempt status, as in the Bob Jones case, from a group that is clearly contrary to the state’s policy. But to go further and say to a group that it is not permitted to engage in a particular type of work, such as adoptions, unless it also does adoptions for gay couples, that’s a heavier hand from the state. And I would hope we could have a dialogue about this and not just accusations of bad faith from either side.”

But the bottom line for Feldblum is: “Sexual liberty should win in most cases. There can be a conflict between religious liberty and sexual liberty, but in almost all cases the sexual liberty should win because that’s the only way that the dignity of gay people can be affirmed in any realistic manner.”

The Litigator

Marc Stern has known Chai Feldblum since she was eight years old. “Vivacious, really extraordinary,” he says as he smiles, shaking his head at the memories of the little girl whose father he knew well. “Chai is among the most reasonable [gay rights advocates],” he says. “If she’s having trouble coming up with cases in which religious liberty should win, we’re in trouble.”

As general counsel for the American Jewish Congress, Marc Stern knows religious liberty law from the inside out. Like Anthony Picarello, he sees the coming conflicts as pervasive. The problem is not that clergy will be forced to perform gay marriages or prevented from preaching their beliefs. Look past those big red herrings: “No one seriously believes that clergy will be forced, or even asked, to perform marriages that are anathema to them. Same-sex marriage would, however, work a sea change in American law. That change will reverberate across the legal and religious landscape in some ways that are today unpredictable,” he writes in his Becket Fund paper.

Consider education. Same-sex marriage will affect religious educational institutions, he argues, in at least four ways: admissions, employment, housing, and regulation of clubs. One of Stern’s big worries right now is a case in California where a private Christian high school expelled two girls who (the school says) announced they were in a lesbian relationship. Stern is not optimistic. And if the high school loses, he tells me, “then religious schools are out of business.” Or at least the government will force religious schools to tolerate both conduct and proclamations by students they believe to be sinful.

Stern agrees with Feldblum that public accommodation laws can and should force truly commercial enterprises to serve all comers. But, he asks, what of other places, such as religious camps, retreats, and homeless shelters? Will they be considered by courts to be places of public accommodation, too? Could a religious summer camp operated in strict conformity with religious principles refuse to accept children coming from same-sex marriages? What of a church-affiliated community center, with a gym and a Little League, that offers family programs? Must a religious-affiliated family services provider offer marriage counseling to same-sex couples designed to facilitate or preserve their relationships?

“Future conflict with the law in regard to licensing is certain with regard to psychological clinics, social workers, marital counselors, and the like,” Stern wrote last December—well before the Boston Catholic Charities story broke.

Think about that for a moment. Of all the experts gathered to forecast the impact of gay marriage on religious organizations, no one, not even Stern, brought up adoption licenses. “Government is so pervasive, it’s hard to know where the next battle will be,” he tells me. “I thought I had a comprehensive catalog, but the adoption license issue didn’t occur to me.”

Will speech against gay marriage be allowed to continue unfettered? “Under the American regime of freedom of speech, the answer ought to be easy,” according to Stern. But it is not entirely certain, he writes, “because sexual-harassment-in-the-workplace principles will likely migrate to suppress any expression of anti-same-sex-marriage views.” Stern suggests how that might work.

In the corporate world, the expression of opposition to gay marriage will be suppressed not by gay ideologues but by corporate lawyers, who will draw the lines least likely to entangle the company in litigation. Stern likens this to “a paroxysm of prophylaxis—banning ‘Jesus saves’ because someone might take offense.”

Or consider a recent case at William Paterson University, a state school in New Jersey. A senior faculty member sent out a mass email inviting people to attend movies with a gay theme. A student employee, a 63-year-old Muslim named Jihad Daniel, replied to the professor in a private email asking not to receive messages “about ‘Connie and Sally’ and ‘Adam and Steve.’” He went on, “These are perversions. The absence of God in higher education brings on confusion. That is why in these classes the Creator of the heavens and the earth is never mentioned.” The result: Daniel received a letter of reprimand for using the “derogatory and demeaning” word “perversions” in violation of state discrimination and harassment regulations.

Interestingly, Stern points out, a single “derogatory or demeaning” remark not seeking sexual gratification or threatening a person’s job security does not constitute harassment under ordinary federal and state sexual harassment law originally intended to protect women in the workplace. Moreover, Stern says, “our entire free speech regime depends on the principle that no adult has a right to expect the law will protect him from being exposed to disagreeable speech.”

Except, apparently in New Jersey, where a state attorney general’s opinion concluded, “[C]learly speech which violates a nondiscrimination policy is not protected.” “This was so ‘clear’ to the writer,” notes Stern, “that she cited not a single case or law review article in support.” Ultimately, the school withdrew its reprimand from Daniel’s employment file after receiving negative publicity and the threat of a lawsuit from the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE).

Sexual harassment law as an instrument for suppressing religious speech? A few days after I interviewed Stern, an Alliance Defense Fund press release dropped into my mail box: “OSU Librarian Slapped with ‘Sexual Harassment’ Charge for Recommending Conservative Books for Freshmen.” One of the books the Ohio State librarian (a pacifist Quaker who drives a horse and buggy to work) recommended was It Takes a Family by Senator Rick Santorum. Three professors alleged that the mere appearance of such a book on a freshman reading list made them feel “unsafe.” The faculty voted to pursue the sexual harassment allegation, and the process quickly resulted in the charge being dropped.

In the end the investigation of the librarian was more of a nuisance—you might call it harassment—than anything else. But the imbalance in terms of free speech remains clear: People who favor gay rights face no penalty for speaking their views, but can inflict a risk of litigation, investigation, and formal and informal career penalties on others whose views they dislike. Meanwhile, people who think gay marriage is wrong cannot know for sure where the line is now or where it will be redrawn in the near future. “Soft” coercion produces no martyrs to disturb anyone’s conscience, yet it is highly effective in chilling the speech of ordinary people.

Finally, I ask Stern the big question on everyone’s mind. Religious groups that take government funding will almost certainly be required to play by the nondiscrimination rules, but what about groups that, while receiving no government grants, are tax-exempt? Can a group—a church or religious charity, say—that opposes gay marriage keep its tax exemption if gay marriage becomes the law? “That,” says Stern, “is the 18 trillion dollar question.”

Twenty years ago it would have been inconceivable that a Christian or Jewish organization that opposed gay marriage might be treated as racist in the public square. Today? It’s just not clear.

“In Massachusetts I’d be very worried,” Stern says finally. The churches themselves might have a First Amendment defense if a state government or state courts tried to withdraw their exemption, he says, but “the parachurch institutions are very much at risk and may be put out of business because of the licensing issues, or for these other reasons—it’s very unclear. None of us nonprofits can function without [state] tax exemption. As a practical matter, any large charity needs that real estate tax exemption.”

He blames religious conservatives for adopting the wrong political strategy on gay issues. “Live and let live,” he tells me, is the only thing around the world that works. But I ask him point blank what he would say to people who dismiss the threat to free exercise of religion as evangelical hysteria. “It’s not hysteria, this is very real,” he tells me, “Boston Catholic Charities shows that.”

Fundamentally, Stern sees this as a “religious war” between people for whom an egalitarian secular ethic is the only rational option and people who can make room for an ethic based on faith in a God who commands. There are very few signs of a willingness to compromise on either side, he notes.

“You look around the world and even the right to preach is in doubt,” he tells me. “In the United States we are not foreseeably in that position. Fundamentally speech is still safe in the United States. Beyond speech, nothing is safe.”

The Health Care Law Expert

Robin Wilson is an expert in both family law and health care law. So when Anthony Picarello approached her about thinking through the impact gay marriage may have on religious institutions, she had a ready model at hand: the struggles over conscience exemptions in the health care field after Roe v. Wade elevated abortion to a constitutional right.

Wilson predicts “a concerted effort to take same-sex marriage from a negative right to be free of state interference to a positive entitlement to assistance by others. Although Roe and Griswold established only the right to noninterference by the state in a woman’s abortion and contraceptive decisions, family planning advocates have worked strenuously to force individual institutions to provide controversial services, and to force individual health care providers to participate in them.”

“This litigation after Roe,” she says, “provides a convincing prediction about the trajectory that litigation after Goodridge will take” (Goodridge being the Massachusetts supreme court decision that legalized gay marriage). The post-Roe litigation also provides fair warning about the limits of First Amendment protection. The lever used to force hospitals and doctors to perform abortions and sterilizations was the receipt of any public money. “Given the status of most churches as state nonprofits and federally tax-exempt organizations, it is likely that public support arguments will be advanced to compel churches to participate in same-sex marriage. Thus, churches in Massachusetts (and perhaps soon other states) may have much to worry about,” Wilson writes. “Churches that oppose same-sex marriage today may perceive a credible, palpable threat to their tax-exempt status, the benefits of which are substantial.”

This threat is credible, she explains, because to be recognized as tax-exempt under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, an organization must have purposes and activities that do not violate fundamental “public policy,” a concept that neither the Supreme Court nor the IRS has fully defined.

The case that worries Wilson in this regard is one that Chai Feldblum mentioned: Bob Jones University v. United States, in which the IRS revoked the federal tax exemption of Bob Jones University because the school prohibited interracial marriage and dating among its students. The Court easily dismissed Bob Jones’s claim that its prohibition on interracial dating was religiously grounded and therefore protected by the First Amendment. The denial of tax benefits, the Court asserted, would not prevent the school “from observing their religious tenets.”

Equally, the First Amendment did not prevent religious hospitals from being punished for refusing to perform abortions, once abortion became a constitutional right. It was Congress and state legislatures that stepped in to provide generous statutory religious exemptions. Once gay marriage is legal, it too will probably become fundamental public policy. To protect the tax-exempt status of religious groups that oppose gay marriage will thus likely require legislative intervention to create religious exemptions at either the state or federal level or both, says Wilson. She means the same kind of religious exemption that, to date, no politician in Massachusetts besides the outgoing governor is willing to support.

The Legal Eagle

Jonathan Turley, the George Washington professor who is a First Amendment specialist, also sees a serious risk ahead. Turley has no problem with gay marriage. But the gay marriage debate, he notes, exposes “long ignored weaknesses in doctrines relating to free speech, free exercise, and the right to association.”

Before 1970 the law was “viewpoint neutral” with regard to the tax exempt status of all charitable, religious, and public interest organizations under section 501(c)(3), he says. The tax exemption was viewed not as a public subsidy, but as a means of encouraging private donations and charitable conduct in general. In 1971, the IRS issued a decision redefining the tax exemption as a public endorsement or subsidy. This meant that the IRS would strip an organization of its exempt status if its purposes, although legal, were “contrary to public policy.” The goal at the time was to use legal pressure to end private racial discrimination. But why stop there?

Right now, Turley notes, there is no clear federal public policy against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. But such a policy is imminent, he believes, most likely within the decade. Once that occurs, he agrees with Robin Wilson: “Any organization that engaged in such discrimination as a matter of faith would be in a position similar to Bob Jones University.”

It’s not that hard to imagine: Pass an antidiscrimination law at the federal level, which polls suggest the majority of Americans already support; look for a 5-or 10-point swing in public opinion on gay marriage; then add a new IRS commissioner (not directly accountable to the voters) who wants to make his or her progressive mark, and religious groups would wake up to find themselves playing in a whole new ballgame.

Religious bodies may be as simple as the small, independent congregations that exist all over America, but often they are large and complex institutions with extensive property and multiple missions, notably saving souls. Even a slight risk of anything so damaging as the loss of tax-exempt status will persuade many such groups to at least mute their marriage theology in the interest of preserving the rest of their activities. Such a self-imposed muting on the part of faith communities would change our culture of marriage, and our understanding of the free exercise of religion, without necessarily creating visible martyrs.

The Consensus Broker

Charles Haynes, a senior scholar at the Freedom Forum’s influential First Amendment Center, specializes in helping groups in conflict find common ground on First Amendment issues. For example, he recently got the Christian Educators Association International and the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Networks (GLSEN) to agree to what he calls “consensus guidelines” for public schools dealing with orientation issues. I went to him for an outside opinion from a First Amendment expert who had not attended the Becket Fund conference. Like every other expert I interviewed, Haynes told me he wasn’t concerned that clergy will be forced to marry same sex couples. What about the other potential conflicts? Are they real? “There are already tensions,” he tells me. “I think there is a kind of collision course here that is inevitable.”

For a man in the conciliation business, Haynes doesn’t sound optimistic. “I think it’s a serious question that will grow more difficult. I think we will have more and more tension between efforts by the state to protect gay rights and the need to protect religious freedom. This will have an impact on religious individuals as well as perhaps religious organizations in areas such as housing, the workplace, hiring.”

I ask him whether his concerns are shared by the wide spectrum of religious and civil rights groups he deals with. “Everyone’s talking about it, thinking about it,” Haynes tells me. “There are a lot of different ideas about where we are going to end up, but everyone thinks it is the battle of our times.”

The Marriage Line

How much of the coming threat to religious liberty actually stems from same-sex marriage? These experts’ comments make clear that it is not only gay marriage, but also the set of ideas that leads to gay marriage—the insistence on one specific vision of gay rights—that has placed church and state on a collision course. Once sexual orientation is conceptualized as a protected status on a par with race, traditional religions that condemn homosexual conduct will face increasing legal pressures regardless of what courts and Congress do about marriage itself.

Nevertheless, marriage is a particularly potent legal “bright line.” Support for marriage is firmly established in our legal tradition and in our public policy. After it became apparent that no religious exemption would be available for Catholic Charities in Massachusetts, the church looked hard for legal avenues to continue helping kids without violating Catholic principles. If the stumbling block had been Catholic Charities’ unwillingness to place children with single people—or with gay singles—marriage might have provided a legal “safe harbor”: Catholic Charities might have been able to specialize in placing children with married couples and thus avoid collision with state laws banning orientation discrimination. After Goodridge, however, “marriage” includes gay marriage, so no such haven would have been available in Massachusetts.

Precisely because support for marriage is public policy, once marriage includes gay couples, groups who oppose gay marriage are likely to be judged in violation of public policy, triggering a host of negative consequences, including the loss of tax-exempt status. Because marriage is not a private act, but a protected public status, the legalization of gay marriage sends a strong signal that orientation is now on a par with race in the nondiscrimination game. And when we get gay marriage because courts have declared it a constitutional right, the signal is stronger still.

The method and the mechanism for achieving protected status may be different for orientation and for race. Even the Massachusetts supreme court, for example, declined to rule explicitly that orientation is a protected class, subject to strict scrutiny. But in Massachusetts, the end result may be similar. If state courts declare gay marriage a constitutional right, they are likely to see support for gay marriage as state public policy.

On the cultural level, the declaration by a court that only animus explains why anyone would treat two men differently from a husband and wife represents an unfolding civil rights logic that has real consequences. As Boston Globe columnist Ellen Goodman put it, “But if you give one church permission to discriminate against gays, what’s next? Permission to discriminate against blacks or Jews who want to adopt?”

End Game

On April 15, the Boston Globe ran a story about three other Catholic adoption agencies, in Worcester, Fall River, and Springfield, that do not do gay adoptions. The story noted that, for now, these agencies will not be punished for their refusal. Constantia Papanikolaou, general counsel for the state Department of Early Education and Care, said her agency is holding off taking any action because the governor has proposed legislation that would provide a religious exemption for adoption agencies. “We’re going to wait and see how the legislation plays out,” Papanikolaou said.

The reprieve is likely to be short-lived. Observers universally say the religious exemption has no chance of passage, and in a few months, Mitt Romney will no longer be governor. What then? The Boston Globe story provides a clue: “Gary Buseck, legal director of the Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders in Boston, said his group realizes that Massachusetts will have a new governor next year, and it expects that he or she will aggressively enforce the state’s antidiscrimination laws.”

Marc Stern is looking more and more like a reluctant prophet: “It’s going to be a train wreck,” he told me in the offices of the American Jewish Congress high above Manhattan. “A very dangerous train wreck. I don’t see anyone trying to stem the train wreck, or slow down the trains. Both sides are really looking for Armageddon, and they frankly both want to win. I prefer to avoid Armageddon, if possible.”

Maggie Gallagher is president of the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy (marriagedebate.com) and coauthor of The Case for Marriage.

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Public Opposition to Gay Marriage Remains High (Christian Post, 060523)

A new Gallup poll released just weeks before a scheduled senate debate over the federal marriage amendment revealed that public opposition to gay marriage remains at a constant majority.

A poll of 1,002 adults taken from May 8-11 and released on Monday showed that 58 percent of American adults oppose extending the definition of marriage to include homosexuals; Thirty-nine percent said they would support such a redefinition. The poll also showed that 50 percent favor and 47 percent oppose a constitutional federal marriage amendment.

The results follow a close party-line vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee last week on a constitutional marriage amendment, which is headed for the Senate floor beginning the week of June 5.

This month’s results are similar to figures from other Gallup polls in recent years. In August 2005, some 59 percent of Americans opposed gay marriage, while in May 2005, opposition stood at 55 percent. Support for a marriage amendment has also remained consistent, at 50 percent in March 2004, 57 percent in March 2005, and 53 percent in April 2006.

Also as in the past, opposition to gay marriage remained significantly higher among Republicans than Democrats. Some 79 percent of Republicans oppose gay marriage while 53 percent of Democrats support it.

Opposition remains higher among those who attend religious services than the non-religious – 77 percent of service-goers oppose such marriages compared to 51 percent of those who seldom or never attend church.

Senators are scheduled to begin consideration of the Marriage Protection Amendment on June 5, with a floor vote expected on June 6 or 7.

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With this Bill . . .The Senate debates marriage. (Weekly Standard, 060529)

JUNE 6, 2006, is an important date, not only because it’s the 62nd anniversary of D-Day. It’s also the day the Senate will vote on the so-called marriage amendment, which would amend the Constitution to restrict marriage in America to a man and a woman.

It won’t pass. A constitutional amendment requires a two-thirds majority in the Senate and the House. When the Senate voted in 2004, the amendment got only 48 votes. This time, it’s likely to get more—probably between 52 and 58—in part because a powerful and unusually ecumenical religious coalition is now backing the amendment. And President Bush, despite his wife Laura’s admonition that the marriage issue ought to be kept out of politics, plans to host a pro-amendment event at the White House and speak out in favor of the amendment.

Once dismissed as a sop to social conservatives, the proposed amendment has become a serious rallying point for opponents of same-sex marriage. The June 6 vote will put senators on the record and make their position on the amendment a potential campaign issue. And the formation of the religious coalition means the issue won’t go away soon.

Much of the conventional wisdom about the amendment and the marriage issue turns out to be wrong. For instance, the amendment is not being pushed by Republicans as a wedge issue aimed at dividing Democratic voters. Republican senators regard the issue as touchy and awkward. In fact, they agree with First Lady Laura Bush, who said on Fox News Sunday that the

subject of gay marriage “requires a lot of sensitivity” and shouldn’t “be used as a campaign tool.” They’d prefer the issue—and the amendment—go away.

When Majority Leader Bill Frist asked Senate Republican committee chairmen in 2004 if they wanted him to schedule a vote on the amendment, none urged him to. Frist did anyway. This year, the same was true. He received no pressure from Republican senators for a vote. Instead, his talks with Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council led Frist to put at least a day of debate on the amendment, then a vote, on the Senate schedule.

The hands-off attitude of Republican senators, Perkins says, “does not reflect what’s happening in the states.” Whenever a referendum barring same-sex marriage gets on the ballot, it’s nearly always approved by 70 percent or more of voters, he noted.

A second misconception is that it’s sufficient for an elected official merely to declare his opposition to gay marriage. It’s not anymore. The question now is whether an official will support efforts to block gay marriage from being imposed by judges at the federal or state level. And the way to do that in the Senate is to vote for the amendment.

The conventional wisdom in the political community is also wrong on another point: that the marriage amendment won’t have a significant role in the race for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination. It will. A Gallup poll found two-thirds of Republicans back the amendment. Perkins, for one, insists the marriage issue has “reached the same plane as the right to life issue” among Republican voters. “I don’t think you can win the presidential nomination without endorsing the marriage amendment,” Perkins says.

This is a huge problem for Senator John McCain, the Republican frontrunner in 2008. McCain has moved to the right on taxes and abortion and recently reconciled with Jerry Falwell, the prominent conservative Christian. He drew sharp criticism for the Falwell overture and is leery of shifting again and being accused of pandering to the Christian Right.

McCain voted against the amendment in 2004. And he repeated his opposition on Fox News Sunday last month. “I will vote against it because I believe very strongly, first of all, in the sanctity of union between man and woman, but I also believe that the states should make these decisions.” Many religious conservatives regard this as an unacceptable dodge.

Why? Because states have already been thwarted in their efforts to make these decisions. The problem is not voters or legislators. They overwhelmingly support traditional marriage. Thirty-seven states have enacted laws in recent years—19 by referendum, the others by statute—to bar gay marriage. The problem is judges. On May 16, a Georgia judge struck down the state’s ban on gay marriage, which had been enacted in 2004 with 76 percent of the vote. The judge seized on a technical point, ruling the referendum covered two issues, same-sex marriage and civil unions, and not one, as Georgia law required. In truth, the referendum was drafted to deal with one issue, the protection of heterosexual marriage. At least nine states face lawsuits challenging their traditional marriage laws.

In Nebraska as well, a federal judge on May 12 nullified a referendum barring gay marriage. And in Massachusetts, the state supreme court by a 4-3 vote imposed same sex marriage, basing its decision on a state constitution adopted centuries before gay marriage became an issue.

In response, the Religious Coalition for Marriage was formed specifically to back the amendment. It grew out of two conferences of religious leaders and academics organized by Professor Robert George of Princeton. George and others found politicians, even conservative ones, are “afraid” to oppose gay marriage by backing the amendment: “They don’t like to talk about it.” The coalition was created to put strong public pressure on both politicians and judges.

The coalition’s initial statement said: “We take the unprecedented stand of uniting to call for a constitutional amendment to establish a uniform national definition of marriage as the exclusive union of one man and one woman. . . . This is the only measure that will adequately protect marriage from those who would circumvent the legislative process and force a redefinition of it on the whole of our society.”

What’s surprising about the coalition is its breadth. It includes all eight Catholic cardinals in America, liberal and conservative, plus officials of the Southern Baptist Convention, the Greek Orthodox Church, the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, the Church of God in Christ, the National Association of Evangelicals, and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormons), among others.

As for Bush, he will appear on June 5 in the Rose Garden before a gathering of amendment supporters and, a White House official says, “strongly support” the amendment. The president has rarely mentioned the amendment in the past. The choice of the Rose Garden as a venue means he is raising the marriage amendment to a higher level on his agenda, his wife’s advice notwithstanding.

Fred Barnes is executive editor of The Weekly Standard and author of Rebel-in-Chief (Crown Forum).

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Gay agenda means less freedom for all (townhall.com, 060529)

by Star Parker

The latest Gallup polling on attitudes regarding same-sex marriage shows a trend that should concern conservatives as well as all Americans.

From the narrow view of just the same-sex marriage issue, although the majority of Americans are still opposed to legalization, they are a lot less opposed than they were in the a decade ago. From the vantage point of homosexual activists, the trend certainly appears to be their friend.

Moreover, given how this debate is formulated and presented, I see a broader message emerging. I get a sense that Americans are increasingly confusing entitlement and political power with freedom and tolerance. This does not bode well for the future of a free and vibrant country.

The most recent polling shows that a strong majority of Americans oppose legal recognition of same sex marriage (58 percent) and a slight majority favor a constitutional amendment (50 percent for, 47 percent opposed). The support breaks out consistently along partly lines. Republicans favor the amendment (66 percent for) and Democrats oppose (55 percent against).

These results are about the same as they were last year. However, they have changed a lot over the last 10 years. Today 39 percent of Americans support legal recognition of same sex marriage, up from 27 percent 10 years ago and 58 percent oppose, down from 68 percent 10 years ago.

Completing the picture of what seems reasonable to call a trend, the area of the population where support for same-sex marriage is strongest and growing is among young people. Time does not seem to favor those who want to preserve tradition.

A more qualitative measure of this trend is to just listen to how the debate is cast.

A Washington Post editorial opposing the Federal Marriage Amendment accuses Republicans of “picking on gays and lesbians.” According to the Post, such an amendment would “discriminate against a class of people.”

Mary Cheney in her new book equates this alleged discrimination to denial of rights in the past to women and blacks and prohibitions against interracial marriage.

So, along with the trend toward increasing acceptance of the idea of same-sex marriage has been the complete obliteration of the idea that homosexuality is a type of behavior as opposed to a state of being. The discussion has long disappeared that this is about attitudes regarding this behavior and it has become almost exclusively cast as discrimination claims against gays and lesbians.

Philosophers of science point out that there is nothing we can prove. We can only disprove things. The only thing that it takes to disprove something is to find one incident where the theory doesn’t work.

We have, for instance, a law of gravity. However, if we find one morning, while someone is eating their bowl of cheerios, that their spoon jumps out of their hand and flies up to the ceiling, we kiss goodbye to our law of gravity.

Now there are without question instances where individuals change their sexual behavior.

I have never heard of instance of a black person becoming white or vice versa.

Yet, somehow we have gotten to the point where it is generally accepted that being gay is a fact and not a choice.

The more we obscure where choice lies and the more we obscure where responsibility lies, we become increasingly transformed into a political entitlement society rather than a free and tolerant society.

If gay activists really wanted freedom, as opposed to advancing a particular political agenda, they would be hard at work moving government control out of areas of our society that limit their as well as everyone else’s freedom.

They should be fighting for nationwide school choice, so they can send their children to schools that teach what they want. They should be fighting for private social security accounts and so they could stop complaining about discrimination in survivor benefits. They should fight for private health care accounts and getting corporations out of the benefits providing business and so they could stop complaining about discrimination in benefits toward gay couples.

Unfortunately, this is not happening. From what I see, despite the hijacking of the language of freedom, rights, and discrimination, this movement is about sleight of hand and political power.

And, more unfortunately, it appears to be succeeding. Particularly among our young people.

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No Excuses: Top three bad reasons for opposing a federal marriage amendment. (National Review Online, 060602)

The Federal Marriage Amendment (FMA) comes up for a vote very soon. Those who favor homosexual “marriage” or polygamy have obvious reasons for opposing the amendment. But some of those who claim to believe that marriage is the union of one man and one woman also oppose the amendment, albeit for different reasons. Here are some of the most popular bad excuses for voting against the FMA:

1. Marriage should be left to the states.

The FMA does leave marriage to the states. If a legislature wants to legalize homosexual “marriage,” it can do so. What the FMA does is stop federal and state courts from forcing states to allow same sex “marriage.” So if you’re pro-state choice, you should support the FMA.

2. The FMA would write discrimination into the Constitution.

The Constitution already discriminates in countless ways. You can’t vote if you’re under 18. You can’t become president if you weren’t born a U.S. citizen. You can’t vote in the Senate unless you are a senator (or, in case of a tie, the vice president). The question is whether reserving marriage to a man and a woman is a worthy thing to do.

3. We don’t need the FMA yet. Let’s wait until a federal court forces a state to accept same-sex “marriage.”

This excuse is like saying we should not shore up the levees until after a hurricane or flood knocks them down. Be serious.

So far, every state marriage amendment has passed by overwhelming margins. But state laws, even state constitutional amendments, are no obstacle to a federal court bent on imposing its view of “inclusive” marriage. To oppose the FMA out of devotion to the homosexual (or gender-is-irrelevant) worldview is honest, if misguided. But to oppose the FMA for other reasons is, at best, just plain misguided.

—Walter M. Weber, senior litigation counsel with the American Center for Law and Justice, has specialized in constitutional law for over 20 years.

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Smoking Gun: The Netherlands shows the effect of same-sex marriage. (National Review Online, 060602)

By Stanley Kurtz

The numbers for 2005 are in, and the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate has done it again, shooting up a striking 2.5 percentage points. That makes nine consecutive years of average two-percentage-point increases in the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate, a rise unmatched by any country in Western Europe during the same period. Ever since the Dutch passed registered partnerships in 1997, followed by formal same-sex marriage in 2000, their out-of-wedlock birthrate has been moving up at a striking clip. That fact has created a serious problem for advocates of same-sex marriage. (For a visual on this, see the chart in “Going Dutch?” and imagine two further years of two-percentage point increases in 2004 and 2005.

In the last decade, only Eastern Europe has seen an increase in out-of-wedlock birthrates comparable to the Netherlands (even there, only Bulgaria’s rates are rising faster than the Netherlands’). Demographers explain the stunning increase in Eastern Europe’s out-of-wedlock birthrates by pointing to the economic and cultural traumas set off by the collapse of Communism. How striking that a prosperous country like the Netherlands should experience a spike in out-of-wedlock birthrates matched only by a region recovering from the collapse of its entire social system.

In several previous pieces (“Going Dutch?” “No Explanation,” “Dutch Debate,” and “Standing Out”) I’ve argued that the Dutch example provides us with a best-case scenario for isolating the negative causal impact of same-sex marriage on marriage itself. Increasingly, same-sex marriage advocates are running out of ways to explain the Dutch data away.

Too Early?

In their book, Gay Marriage: For Better or for Worse?, William Eskridge and Darren Spedale say it’s too early to draw conclusions from the Dutch experience. Too early? We’ve had a continuous nine-year spike in out-of-wedlock birthrates since the passage of registered partnerships, and a five-year continuous spike since formal gay marriage went into effect. Scholars recognized the first nine years of demographic upheaval in Eastern Europe following the collapse of Communism as significant. So why aren’t nine years of comparable change in the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate also significant (especially since there’s nothing else like it in Western Europe)?

I’ve argued that the long Dutch campaign for same-sex marriage (which began around 1990) helped set the stage for the big continuous spike in out-of-wedlock birthrates that began in 1997. Gay-marriage advocates rejected the idea that marriage is intrinsically connected to parenthood, and the Dutch public bought that argument. Once marriage stops being about binding mothers and fathers together for the sake of the children they create, the need to get married gradually disappears. That’s why I’ve argued that the successful campaign for same-sex marriage led to the spike in Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrates. A preliminary spike between 1994 and 1995 was likely influenced by this long public debate, even before formal passage of registered partnerships in 1997.

Eskridge and Spedale dismiss the notion that the long and successful battle for same-sex marriage could have had any effect on the Dutch public. According to Eskridge and Spedale, the Dutch campaign for same-sex marriage merely “consisted of a few lawsuits brought by a handful of lesbian and gay activists.” The campaign “had virtually no public visibility,” say Eskridge and Spedale: “Only a tiny number of straight people, and a minority of gays, would even have been aware that lesbians and gay men were seeking the right to marry....”

A Public Campaign

The Dutch gay community’s own history of the campaign for same-sex marriage shows otherwise. (See “No gay marriage in the Netherlands.”) This history details an extensive and highly visible public effort throughout the early 1990’s and beyond. Around 100 Dutch municipalities set up symbolic gay-marriage registries (much like the mayor of San Francisco and other municipalities here in the United States after the Massachusetts Goodridge decision), with ceremonies sometimes attended by hundreds of people demonstrating their support for gay marriage. These ceremonies, along with public petitions, and pressure for partnership recognition on prominent Dutch businesses, provoked a national debate on same-sex marriage that forced reluctant politicians to act. As the Dutch gay community’s own history emphasizes, public opinion polls throughout the early 1990s show that the campaign worked. Ever-larger percentages of the Dutch public came to favor same-sex marriage: it was at 73 percent by 1995.

What is the purpose of a movement if not to change fundamentally the way the public thinks? In the Dutch case, we know the movement for same-sex marriage succeeded. When they aren’t denying the obvious truth that public campaigns matter, Eskridge and Spedale make the point themselves. In their account of the Danish struggle for same-sex unions, Eskridge and Spedale describe polls showing growing public support for registered partnerships as the debate proceeded, but before the law was actually passed. Is it surprising that the same thing happened in the Netherlands?

Why has so much heat been generated over the seemingly uncontroversial point that the long Dutch campaign for gay marriage had an effect on the public’s view of marriage? Gay-marriage proponents care about this issue because of that preliminary spike in the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate in 1995. Since this small spike occurred before the passage of registered partnerships in 1997, gay-marriage proponents argue that the big uptick in Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrates began even before new laws were passed. Supposedly, if Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrates began to rise even before the passage of registered partnerships in 1997, this would somehow prove that gay marriage had nothing to do with the huge, continuous nine-year spike in out-of-wedlock birthrates after the passage of registered partnerships in 1997, and formal gay marriage in 2000. But the critics are wrong on several counts.

To begin with, it’s a mistake to pretend that only legal changes matter. If a campaign convinces nearly three quarters of the Dutch public that marriage has little to do with parenthood, this can easily have an effect on behavior well before any new laws get passed. But for the sake of argument, let’s say the two-percentage point rise in the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate in 1995 had absolutely nothing to do with the previous five-year-long debate over same-sex marriage. That still wouldn’t begin to explain away the continuous nine-year spike in out-of-wedlock birthrates following the passage of registered partnerships in 1997, or formal gay marriage in 2000. You can’t extrapolate from a rate spike in a single year to the longest continuous Western European rate spike of the last decade.

Not Inevitable

No matter what happened in 1995, there was nothing inevitable about the extraordinary and continuous nine-year acceleration in the Dutch out-of-wedlock birth-rate from 1997 to 2005. In 2002, for example, demographers David Coleman and Joop Garssen published, “The Netherlands: paradigm or exception in Western Europe’s demography?” (I discuss that article in “Going Dutch?”) Coleman and Garssen concentrated on data through 1998, so they were well aware of the small spike in the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate in 1995, and of the consecutive rises in 1997 and 1998. Although Coleman and Garssen knew that the Netherlands’ famously low out-of-wedlock birthrate was on the rise, they did not assume (nor should they have assumed) that the rate spike would continue for nine consecutive years. On the contrary, at the time, it still seemed as though the Netherlands represented a relatively moderate and stable alternative to the Scandinavian pattern of large-scale parental cohabitation. Coleman and Garssen were interested in the Dutch case because it still looked as though Holland was not going the way of Scandinavia. Yet in just a few short years, because of the ongoing and unexpected acceleration in the out-of-wedlock birthrate, that prognosis has changed. As the more recent report by Dutch demographer Jan Latten confirms, the Netherlands seems to be going the way of Scandinavia after all. (See “Trends in Cohabiting and Marriage” and my discussion of Latten’s report in “Standing Out.”)

So in the unlikely event that the highly successful campaign for same-sex marriage did nothing to shift Dutch views of marriage prior to the passage of registered partnerships, that would still leave same-sex marriage advocates with the problem of explaining the continuous nine year spike in the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate, beginning with the passage of registered partnerships in 1997, and continuing through the five years of experience with formal gay marriage between 2001 and 2005.

Failed Explanations

Recognizing this, Eskridge and Spedale make a perfunctory attempt to explain away the data. They suggest that the accelerating Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate is being produced by the entry of women into the workforce, much as we saw in Scandinavia. Yet in “No Explanation,” I’ve shown that the work patterns of Dutch women are very different from the work practices of Scandinavian women. In marked contrast to Scandinavia, Holland is the land of the “mommy track,” where women work part-time, and where the childcare sector is still small and largely private.

Eskridge and Spedale further suggest that the spike in out-of-wedlock birthrates may be explained by the fact that Dutch registered partnerships are accessible to heterosexual as well as homosexual couples. Yet in “No Explanation,” I show that this is not the case. The number of registered heterosexual partnerships is too small to explain the huge surge in the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate. Nor do Eskridge and Spedale address my points on women’s work or registered partnerships.

Eskridge and Spedale also claim that, contrary to my own account of the debate, Dutch advocates put forward a “conservative case” for gay marriage. The official history of the movement for Dutch same-sex marriage (linked above) tells a different tale. Nor do Eskridge and Spedale address my detailed account of the Dutch legislative debate over same-sex marriage, in which this reform was treated by legislators on all sides as anything but conservative (see “Going Dutch?”).

So despite efforts to explain away the continuous nine-year spike in the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate since the passage of registered partnerships in 1997, and formal gay marriage in 2000 (an increase unmatched in Western Europe, and virtually unmatched even in Eastern Europe), the case of the Netherlands constitutes powerful evidence for the negative causal effect of same-sex marriage.

Back to Scandinavia

I’ve already responded to Eskridge and Spedale on the subject of Scandinavian marriage (see “No Nordic Bliss”). Yet the new Dutch data returns us to the question of Scandinavia. We’ve seen that the continuation of statistical trends cannot be taken for granted. Although out-of-wedlock birthrates bumped up a bit in the Netherlands in the mid-nineties, it was neither inevitable nor predictable that they would accelerate for so long. Nor was it inevitable that the decline of marriage in Scandinavia would continue after the advent of registered partnerships. Eskridge and Spedale dismiss post-registered-partnership increases in Scandinavian out-of-wedlock birthrates as the mere continuation of pre-existing trends. In contradiction to this, Eskridge and Spedale tout small resurgences in Scandinavian marriage rates, as if they prove that gay marriage strengthens marriage. So for Eskridge and Spedale, Scandinavian martial decline is inevitable...until it isn’t. In fact, post-registered- partnership increases in Swedish and Norwegian out-of-wedlock birthrates were not inevitable, and the slight recent resurgence in Scandinavian marriage rates has nothing to do with registered partnerships.

Talk about setting the bar high—Eskridge and Spedale say that the only acceptable proof of gay partnerships’ negative effect on Scandinavian marriage would be a 100 percent out-of-wedlock birthrate! That is an unserious claim, which merely shows that Eskridge and Spedale are ignoring key parts of my argument. I’ve said from the beginning that the ongoing deterioration of Scandinavian marriage has been partially offset and disguised (especially in Denmark) by “catching up” (delayed childbirth by older working women), and by remarriage among the large pool of divorced.

I’ve also argued that sharp initial accelerations in Scandinavian out-of-wedlock birthrates were bound to slow down. That’s because Scandinavians tend to use the first out-of-wedlock child as a test for a possible marriage. Only gradually are Scandinavians giving up on marriage after the birth of even the second child. Given factors like “catching up,” remarriage among the divorced, and the tendency to marry before the birth of the second child, there is no way I would expect to see an acceleration of Scandinavian out-of-wedlock birthrates to 100 percent in the wake of registered partnerships. The ongoing growth in Scandinavian out-of-wedlock birthrates, especially as they move through the “tougher” territory of second and third births, is itself quite significant, and can in no way be taken for granted.

Eskridge and Spedale would be more convincing if they acknowledged and addressed my points about catching up, remarriage among divorced, and the greater likelihood of marriage before the birth of the second child. Yet they ignore these points, and instead demand absurd proofs, like 100 percent out-of-wedlock birthrates.

Eskridge and Spedale also fail to address the regional comparison so critical to my treatment of Norway. Marriage has deteriorated far more markedly in Norway’s socially liberal, gay-marriage-accepting north than in its more conservative, religious south. Eskridge and Spedale effectively ignore this comparison, falsely characterizing my regional case as merely anecdotal. (For more on the regional issue in Norway, and on the birth-order issue, see “Unhealthy Half-Truths.”)

Smoking Gun?

This brings us back to the Netherlands. The Netherlands is so important because it provides evidence for an actual acceleration of out-of-wedlock birthrates following the passage of same-sex unions—proof demanded by Eskridge and Spedale. We see this in the Netherlands because, in contrast to Scandinavia, out-of-wedlock birthrates were relatively low in Holland prior to the advent of registered partnerships and gay marriage. So in the Netherlands, we aren’t comparing apples and oranges (out-of-wedlock births for second-born children and above, as opposed to first-born children). In the Netherlands, we are still largely dealing with an increase in out-of-wedlock births for first children. And the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate has in fact accelerated dramatically following the introduction of legal same-sex unions.

All indications are that the Dutch case is a causal smoking gun for gay marriage’s negative effects. Although the matter is fair game for continued debate, no one has yet offered a convincing alternative explanation, or even fully confronted the arguments already on the table. At a bare minimum, the rapid and ongoing deterioration of Dutch marriage shows that the “conservative case” for same-sex marriage has been proven wrong in the Netherlands. Convince the public that marriage is not about parenthood, and increasingly parents simply stop getting married.

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Why So Few? Looking at what we know about same-sex marriage. (National Review Online, 060605)

Why have so few gays chosen to marry? A new study by Maggie Gallagher’s Institute for Marriage and Public Policy (iMAPP) estimates that, in countries that legally recognize same-sex unions, typically between 1 percent and 5 percent of gays and lesbians have entered into a same-sex marriage. Obviously, that is a very low number. Much of the argument for gay marriage turns on the claim that same-sex couples need the cultural, legal, and economic benefits of marriage. Yet if only a small number of gays actually marry, the practical impact of the change on gays themselves would be minimal.

The fundamental purpose of marriage is to encourage mothers and fathers to maintain stable families for the children they create. It would be a mistake to undercut that purpose by redefining marriage, whatever the take-up rate for same-sex unions. Yet, for those receptive to arguments for same-sex marriage, the case for this reform would be greatly weakened if it turned out that only a few gays actually marry.

And there’s more at stake than numbers. Since the “conservative case” for same-sex marriage holds that marriage will import a more conservative ethos to the gay community, we need to know something besides how many same-sex couples actually marry. If substantial numbers of gay couples take advantage of the legal benefits of marriage, while simultaneously rejecting traditional martial norms (like monogamy), that would greatly weaken the “conservative case” for same-sex marriage.

Despite the few short years formal same-sex marriage has been available, we can now offer some preliminary answers to questions about why so few gays marry, and how those gays who have married understand their unions. The iMAPP study covered only countries that have formal same-sex marriage, with data going back, at most, five years (for the Netherlands). Yet a turn to Scandinavia provides a fuller story. A series of recent empirical studies on Scandinavian registered partnerships have made available a fascinating body of data about a same-sex partnership system that has been in existence for 17 years in Denmark, 13 years in Norway, and 12 years in Sweden (19 years if we go back to the same-sex unions Sweden created in 1987).

The new studies show that after nearly two decades of Scandinavian registered partnerships, only a very small number of gays have actually entered legal unions. And there are clear indications are that even many couples who have registered may be doing so more for legal benefits than because they aspire to traditional marital norms. In short, there are now clear signs that same-sex marriage is not working the way its defenders claim it should, even for gays.

De Facto Marriage

Before turning to the new Scandinavian studies, we need to consider an obvious objection. Scandinavian same-sex unions are “registered partnerships,” not “marriage.” Presumably, the iMAPP study excluded data on take-up rates for Scandinavian same-sex unions because they were not formal “marriage.” Yet there is good reason to believe that take-up rates for Scandinavian registered partnerships are not substantially different than they would be for formal marriage.

The title of an important new study by prominent Scandinavian demographers, Gunnar Andersson, Turid Noack (and associates) tells the tale: “The Demographics of Same-Sex Marriages in Norway and Sweden.”

Andersson and Noack use the terms “registered partnership” and “same-sex marriage” interchangeably, explaining that Scandinavians generally see registered partnerships as a de facto form of marriage. To be sure, in addition to their unions being called something other than “marriage,” Scandinavian registered partners were initially not permitted to adopt children, to receive state funded artificial insemination, or to be married in the state church. (Many of those differences have now fallen away, especially in Sweden and Denmark.) Yet few Scandinavian gays and lesbians consider these exclusions barriers to registration.

Along with the work of Andersson and Noack, a recent book by William Eskridge and Darren Spedale, Gay Marriage: For Better or for Worse? sheds light on Scandinavian registered partnerships. Eskridge and Spedale criticize me in their book, and I’ve responded to them in “No Nordic Bliss,” “Zombie Killers,” and “Smoking Gun.” Certainly, I find the rosy picture of Scandinavian registered partnerships painted by Eskridge and Spedale unconvincing and incomplete. Notwithstanding my objections to their broader approach, however, Eskridge and Spedale provide us with some fascinating material. And one point they make convincingly is that the differences between registered partnerships and formal same-sex marriage do not account for the low take-up rate.

In their conversations with registered partners, and in an online survey of 812 Danish gays and lesbians, Eskridge and Spedale found that most gay Danes consider registered partnerships and marriage to be “about the same thing.” Words like “marriage” and “spouse” are frequently used to describe the relationship of registered partners. And very few respondents said they would be any more likely to enter a union if “partnerships” were converted to formal “marriage.” Eskridge and Spedale note that the lifting of adoption restrictions in Sweden and Denmark has had no discernable effect on partnership registration rates.

The experience of the Netherlands with a system of registered partnerships also suggests that take-up rates for such an institution do not substantially differ from rates of same-sex marriage. After an initial surge of 3,010 Dutch same-sex partnership registrations during the first year of availability in 1998, registrations leveled off to 1,757 in 1999 and 1,600 in 2000. When Dutch same-sex marriage came into effect in 2001, there was an initial surge of 2,414 marriages (many converted from prior registered partnerships), followed by a leveling off to 1,838 in 2002, 1,499 in 2003, 1,210 in 2004, and 1,166 in 2005. So in both the initial surge pattern, and in absolute amounts, the take-up rates, first for Dutch registered partnerships and then for Dutch same-sex marriage, have been about the same. If anything, the Dutch same-sex marriage rate is down somewhat from the earlier rates of registered partnerships.

In short (and following Andersson, Noack, Eskridge, and Spedale), it seems perfectly fair to take the nearly two-decade-long experience of Scandinavia with same-sex registered partnerships as a rough approximation of what take-up rates would have been had full and formal gay marriage been in effect during the same period.

Very Low Numbers

According to Andersson and Noack, the incidence of same-sex marriage in Norway and Sweden is “not particularly impressive.” As Eskridge and Spedale put it, the number of same-sex couples in legal unions is “at best, modest.” Given the numbers, even these characterizations border on understatement. Andersson and Noack’s data on Norway run from 1993 through 2001. In that time, a mere1,293 same-sex partnerships were contracted. During the same period, 196,000 heterosexual marriages were entered into in Norway. That indicates a ratio of about 7 new same-sex marriages for every 1,000 new opposite-sex marriages. The Swedish numbers are starker still. Andersson and Noack show a mere 1,526 same-sex partnerships registered in Sweden between 1995 and 2002. Given the 280,000 heterosexual marriages recorded during the same period, we are talking about 5 same-sex partnerships per thousand heterosexual marriages. These ratios of same-sex partnerships to opposite-sex marriages are considerably lower than various estimates of the proportion of gays in the population.

These comparisons are important, because one of the key objections to the iMAPP study was that it did not offer a clear juxtaposition of the yearly marriage rates of heterosexuals and homosexuals. Drawing on comments by UCLA demographer, Gary Gates, same-sex marriage advocate Jonathan Rauch argued that it was unfair to compare the small percentage of gays who had married in just a few years (in, say, the Netherlands) with the massive accumulated number of heterosexual marriages contracted over decades. Yet the Andersson-Noack study does give us a comparison of yearly marriage rates between heterosexuals and homosexuals, and the results continue to show a strikingly low rate of same-sex marriage.

In fact, the differences are larger than the numbers indicate. In a response to Rauch, Maggie Gallagher noted that comparisons of yearly marriage rates have their own drawbacks. After all, said Gallagher, since gays start out with 0 percent married, you would expect them to get married at a higher yearly rate than heterosexuals, many of whom are already “taken.” Given that, the striking discrepancies in yearly marriage rates between Scandinavian heterosexuals and homosexuals are all the more impressive.

Any way you slice it–whether as a proportion of the total gay population, or as a likelihood of getting married in any given year–Scandinavian gays are far less likely to get married than heterosexuals. In contrast to Andersson and Noack’s yearly-marriage-rate comparison, Eskridge and Spedale offer an estimate of married gays as a proportion of the total gay population. Using estimates of the gay population ranging from 1 percent to 5 percent of national populations, Eskridge and Spedale say that anywhere from less than 10 percent (they don’t give an actual figure) to less than 1 percent of Scandinavian gays have taken advantage of registered partnerships.

For the BenEFITS

So the numbers of Scandinavian gays actually getting married are very low. But that’s only the beginning. What proportion of the already very small number of Scandinavian registered partners enter their unions with what we might call a reasonably “conservative” attitude? The answer is uncertain, yet there are strong indications that, despite the tendency to call these unions “marriage,” a great many registered partners have decidedly untraditional views about what their unions entail.

In that online survey of 812 Danish gays and lesbians run by Eskridge and Spedale, 49 percent of respondents claimed that their “primary” reason for entering into a registered partnerships was, or would be, to secure the legal rights of marriage. Only around 41 percent said that demonstrating their commitment to their partner or their community was, or would be, their chief motivation for registering. We don’t have results for a comparable heterosexual population, yet it’s striking that so many Danish gays see partnership as chiefly a matter of legal benefits. It seems unlikely that half of heterosexuals would say that securing legal benefits was their “primary” reason for getting married. At any rate, that sort of response from heterosexuals would indicate a significant hollowing out of marriage.

The reported focus of Danish gays on the legal benefits of marriage, rather than on the relationship, tells us something meaningful. As an explanation for low European take-up rates, University of Minnesota professor of law and same-sex marriage advocate Dale Carpenter notes that many gays take an “oppositional” stance toward social convention. “Just give us the benefits of marriage and you can keep the word,” is one way Carpenter describes that oppositional attitude. In her 1999 study, From This Day Forward, sociologist Gretchen Stiers found that even many of those American gays and lesbians who actually disdain traditional marriage (and even gay commitment ceremonies) might possibly get legally married. Why? For “the bennies”–the financial and legal benefits of marriage. So gay couples with an interest in the legal benefits of marriage can have a decidedly unconservative view of the institution itself. Returning to Denmark, the fact that fully half of those gays surveyed said benefits were their “primary” reason for marrying suggests that the number of Danish registered partners with a “conservative” attitude toward their unions may be far smaller than the already minimal partnership registration numbers would indicate.

To a degree, Eskridge and Spedale concede this. Same-sex couples approach legal union “with more pragmatism than their heterosexual counterparts,” they say. Even the couple Eskridge and Spedale select as their demographically “typical” registered partners saw no reason to register for years, until concerns about death benefits that made them change their minds. At that point, this typical registered couple, like many others, told no one about their registration, so as to avoid a wedding ceremony altogether.

Immigration Marriages

The pragmatic cast of Scandinavian same-sex unions likely goes further still. While half of Scandinavian partners say they marry chiefly for the benefits, as many as one third of Scandinavian partners likely have a very specific benefit in mind. Around one third of Scandinavian registered partnerships involve a foreign-born member. The numbers are particularly striking for men. In Norway, 43 percent of male partnerships include a non-Norwegian citizen. In Sweden, the figure is 45 percent. Many of these cross-national unions are with non-Europeans.

This huge disproportion of dual-nationality unions suggests that many Scandinavian same-sex couples have married chiefly to facilitate immigration. Andersson and Noack clearly recognize this phenomenon. Eskridge and Spedale downplay it. They call immigration rights “only the tip of the iceberg” when it comes to the benefits of same-sex unions. Yet the numbers say that unions contracted primarily for immigration purposes probably represent, not merely the tip, but a huge part of the base of the iceberg. This suggests that, among the already extremely small number of Scandinavian same-sex partnerships, a far smaller number are undertaken for anything like “conservative” reasons.

So after an experiment in same-sex marriage that has lasted between one and two decades, Scandinavian marriage rates are still exceedingly low. As many as half of all partnerships may be undertaken primarily for legal benefits, and only secondarily, if at all, out of a “conservative” attitude toward union formalization. About a third of all same-sex unions involve non-citizens, often from non-European countries. Many of these partnerships would likely not have been entered at all were it not for the immigration rights.

In short, if registered partnerships were designed to bring a more stable and conservative family ethos to Scandinavia’s gays, far too few have married for this to have happened. And the actual attitudes of Scandinavian gays toward their marriages may be even less conservative than the numbers we’ve seen so far indicate. In Part II of “Why So Few?” we’ll see why.

—Stanley Kurtz is a fellow at the Hudson Institute.

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The Senator who cried ‘bigot’ (townhall.com, 060606)

by Maggie Gallagher

Sen. Ted Kennedy certainly let us know what he really thinks of Americans who support the Marriage Protection Amendment, defining marriage as the union of husband and wife: “A vote for this amendment is a vote for bigotry, pure and simple.” According to Minority Leader Harry Reid, even suggesting the Constitution should protect marriage as the union of husband and wife constitutes something like hate speech: “For me, it is clear the reason for this debate is to divide our society, to pit one against another,” Reid said. “This is another one of the president’s efforts to frighten, to distort, to distract and to confuse America.”

Gay marriage activists published even more vitriolic denunciations. My personal favorite came from Paula Ettelbrick, the NYU law professor who heads something called the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, a U.S.-based organization. She called the Marriage Protection Amendment “an unquestioned violation of international treaties” and a “clear violation of international human rights.”

I was in the room on Monday when President Bush made his remarks in support of a constitutional amendment to protect marriage. I applauded with the rest of the crowd when he said: “Every American deserves to be treated with tolerance and respect and dignity. On an issue of this great significance, opinions are strong and emotions run deep. And all of us have a duty to conduct this discussion with civility and decency toward one another.”

I certainly believe that. But I have to wonder, do advocates for gay marriage also believe it? Will no one turn to Ted Kennedy and say, “Sir, have you no decency?” The six in 10 Americans who oppose gay marriage (and the majority who in the latest Gallup poll support a constitutional amendment to protect marriage) do not deserve to be denounced as bigots by their own elected officials.

The “B” word is also fueling new fears about the ultimate consequences of gay marriage. As Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., said on the floor of the Senate: “Same-sex marriage proponents argue that sexual orientation is like race, and that opponents of same-sex marriage are therefore like bigots who oppose interracial marriage. Once same-sex marriage becomes law, that understanding is likely to be controlling.” Brownback pointed to a litany of potential negative consequences for traditional faiths: “So in states with same-sex marriage, religiously affiliated schools, adoption agencies, psychological clinics, social workers, marital counselors, etc. will be forced to choose between violating their own deeply held beliefs and giving up government contracts, tax-exempt status, or even being denied the right to operate at all. ... It’s already happening, as we’ve seen in Massachusetts with Boston’s Catholic Charities being forced out of the adoption business entirely rather than violate church teaching on marriage and family.”

Brownback was drawing on the conclusions of an impressive group of religious liberty scholars, brought together by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty to consider the implications of same-sex marriage. (You can read the paper yourself at www.becketfund.org/index.php/article/494.html.)

For the foreseeable future, Americans are going to live with some deep moral disagreements on the marriage issue. Conducting this debate in a spirit of mutual respect and civility would be a lot easier if gay marriage advocates stopped pretending that only fear, hatred or bigotry is at the root of these disagreements.

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Same-sex amendment? (townhall.com, 060606)

by William F. Buckley

Key figures in the administration have involved themselves in the matter of the amendment to limit marriage to members of complementary sexes. Mrs. Bush was heard to say on television that she hoped the question would not become a “campaign tool.” To let this happen, she suggested, would remove it from the moral plane on which it should travel.

Precisely such a plane is where Mrs. Cheney’s daughter Mary believes it belongs. She is a lesbian, a fact everywhere acknowledged but here noted with reluctance, because it oughtn’t to figure in the discussion. Ms. Cheney’s point is that the contemplated amendment is exactly that, a moral ruling given constitutional dress. If it were passed, it would be “writing discrimination into the Constitution, (which is) fundamentally wrong.”

Mrs. Bush’s appeal, however appealing, is not likely to inform the debate ahead. Almost all public issues tend to be politicized. The rule shouldn’t be strictly applied, but it is generally so that liberals, whose party is Democratic, tend to permissive alternatives. In the debate on Prohibition, which was passed with overwhelming popular endorsement in 1917, the anti-liquor forces were associated with that part of America on the warpath against sinful practices. It was a decade before liberals consolidated their position in favor of repeal, as urged by Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

It is an item of minor historical interest that the repeal of the 18th Amendment zipped through the state legislatures faster than any other in constitutional history. But those who wish to make a libertarian point against the amendment currently proposed have got to grope for appropriate language, which doesn’t come readily to mind.

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Because the point at issue has to do not exclusively with connubial relations, but with the sanctions that are visited by the state on connubial unions. It is one thing for a state to decree that a man cannot have sexual relations with another man — such an intrusion attempts prohibitions that are blissfully unenforceable. What the Supreme Court ruled in Lawrence v. Texas (2003) was that sodomy is protected under the 14th Amendment. It did not rule that the state of Texas was required to enshrine homosexual unions as “marriages.”

The making of civil laws is a political enterprise. States have differed over the years on what it is that is required in order to qualify for a marriage license. The most obvious differences have had to do with age. Others require variable lengths of time between the filing of an application and the issuance of a license. Some have differing health requirements.

It is important to stress the point made by the president in advancing his defense of the marriage amendment. Sure, it has moral implications, but there is more to the amendment than that. What it seeks to do is to guard the right of individual states to devise their own requirements in the matter of marriage. We know that contemporary interpretations of the authority of the courts have had the effect of nullifying state authority in the matter. Already in Massachusetts, the highest state court has ruled that a law defining marriage conflicts with what amounts to state constitutional rights.

It is the point here that in an age of judicial activism, we have in effect the nullification of state laws. Not a single state legislature has passed a same-sex marriage law. But there is no reason to bet that when faced with such a law, the Supreme Court will deny itself the authority to override states that affirm traditional distinctions.

It is a pity that more time is not given to the constitutional question of state vs. federal authority. The reason for this has to do with the tendency of the Supreme Court in past decades to set itself up as a moral tribunal for the entire country. That superordination of the judiciary can’t be coped with except by a constitutional asseveration, and the only way to do this is by an amendment.

On the matter of how this will play politically, we have as the major contender, of course, the gay lobby. It is asking individual states to extend to homosexual unions the same accommodations it makes to marriages. That is a direct challenge to traditional assumptions. If a demand were made merely to extend identical protections to gay unions in matters of tax or inheritance, the issue could be negotiated without fearing to step on judicial toes.

As it works out, the Democratic Party will almost certainly associate itself with the opposition to the amendment — pleading individual “rights.” Whether Mr. Bush can succeed in bringing proper attention to the real issues at stake is, unhappily, bound up in the question of the prestige he now has, diminished by matters that do not affect the reasoning of his appeal for a constitutional amendment.

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Senate rejects ‘gay marriage’ ban: But GOP supporters point to new votes, say lawmakers will be held accountable (WorldNetDaily, 060607)

The Senate rejected a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, but supporters say the measure is gaining ground and today’s vote should help energize the Republican base.

The 49-48 tally was 11 short of the 60 needed to hold an up-or-down vote by the full Senate. A roll call showing how senators voted can be found here.

A sponsor of the joint resolution, Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., warned opponents will have to answer for their positions.

“People are going to be responsible for this vote,” he said. “We are making progress in America on defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman.”

Forty-five states have acted to define marriage in traditional terms, as a union between one man and one woman.

But one GOP opponent, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., told the Senate he won’t support the federal amendment because most Americans “are not yet convinced that their elected representatives or the judiciary are likely to expand decisively the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples.”

Along with McCain, Republicans Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, Judd Gregg, Arlen Specter, Lincoln Chafee and John Sununu voted against the cloture vote, which would end debate and move to an up-or-down tally. Democratic Sens. Ben Nelson and Robert Byrd voted for cloture.

Supporters argue an amendment is needed because of “judicial activism,” as courts have overturned marriage-protection acts in several states.

Yesterday, 81 percent of Alabama voters backed the state’s proposed constitutional amendment recognizing marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Also, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives voted 136-61 in favor of that state’s Marriage Protection Amendment, the first step in the process toward full adoption.

The Senate’s joint resolution says:

“Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman.”

A new ABC News poll shows affirms most Americans support the amendment’s definition of marriage, as between one man and one woman, but an equal number oppose amending the Constitution.

One new supporter, however, Sen. David Vitter, R-La., pointed out the measure is gaining new votes.

“That’s often what’s required over several years to get there, particularly to a two-thirds vote,” he said.

A two-thirds majority is required to send an amendment to the states for ratification by three-quarters of the union.

After the vote, Senate Majority leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., told reporters: For thousands of years, marriage — the union between a man and a woman — has been recognized as an essential cornerstone of society. ... We must continue fighting to ensure the Constitution is amended by the will of the people rather than by judicial activism.”

The House plans to take up the amendment next month, said Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio. The vote will only be ceremonial, however, because constitutional amendments must first be passed by the Senate.

“This is an issue that is of significant importance to many Americans,” Boehner said. “We have significant numbers of our members who want a vote on this, so we are going to have a vote.”

A House vote in 2004 fell short of the two-thirds support required.

Jan LaRue, chief counsel of Concerned Women for America, said in a statement it’s “inconceivable that the U.S. Senate didn’t ‘deem it necessary’ to protect marriage by refusing even to vote on the amendment.”

“Our country cannot function with radically different definitions of what constitutes this sacred union,” she said. “If the founders could have imagined a time when same-sex ‘marriage’ would be forced upon the people by judicial fiat, they would have established a uniform rule of marriage in the Constitution just as they did for naturalization and bankruptcy.”

CWA says it supports a single-sentence amendment that would strictly define marriage as between one man and one woman, and not leave any room for misinterpretation.

LaRue said it also would “remove cover from those in Congress who use their alleged concerns for civil unions to prevent Americans from voting to preserve marriage.”

Some opponents, including Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., have impugned the motives of the amendment’s supporters. Kennedy said a vote for the amendment would be a “vote for bigotry, pure and simple.”

Robert Knight, director of CWA’s Culture & Family Institute called Kennedy’s statement the “crudest and dumbest point made by a liberal opposing a federal marriage amendment.”

Knight said another point made by opponents is that “we have more important things to do.”

“Really?” he responded. “There’s nothing more important than protecting marriage and families, because without them, the United States faces a bleak future in which government is ‘Daddy and Mommy’ and the state keeps growing to pick up the pieces of the shattered social order. Marriage-phobic Europe is fast committing social suicide, but we don’t have to let liberals take the United States down that path.”

[NOTE: In my own state, Georgia, an amendment to our Constitution which would have protected marriage—which was approved by 74% of the voters in 2004—was thrown out on a technicality by an activist Superior Court judge.]

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Constitutional Amendment on Marriage Fails (Foxnews, 060607)

WASHINGTON — A constitutional amendment to define marriage as a union between one man and one woman stalled Wednesday in a 49-48 vote, but conservative backers say they are pleased to have had the vote nonetheless.

“For thousands of years, marriage — the union between a man and a woman — has been recognized as an essential cornerstone of society. ... We must continue fighting to ensure the Constitution is amended by the will of the people rather than by judicial activism,” said Senate Majority leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., after the vote.

A constitutional amendment needs two-thirds votes to pass, but first had to get through the procedural cloture vote, which requires 60 senators to agree to end the debate and move toward final passage.

Shy 11 votes to go to a final debate, few crossed the political aisle to vote against their party’s majority position. Republican Sens. John McCain, Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, Judd Gregg, Arlen Specter, Lincoln Chafee and John Sununu voted against the cloture vote. Democratic Sens. Ben Nelson and Robert Byrd voted for it, as they did in 2004.

Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel and Democratic Sens. Chris Dodd and Jay Rockefeller were absent.

A two-thirds majority would have been required to send an amendment to the states for ratification by three-quarters of the union. But since constitutional amendments originate in the Senate, failure to get it through that body means any vote in the House is purely for ceremony.

Trying to put the best spin on it, Senate supporters said they were pleased with Wednesday’s outcome.

“There’s many of us who have not had an opportunity to debate and discuss this,” said Sen. Mel Martinez, R-Fla., a freshman who gave his support to what has become a near-perennial vote.

“We’re building votes,” said Sen. David Vitter, R-La., another supporter who cast his first vote on the issue on Wednesday. “That’s often what’s required over several years to get there, particularly to a two-thirds vote.”

President Bush, who several times in the last week called for passage of the amendment, also expressed his satisfaction with the outcome.

“Today’s Senate vote on the Marriage Protection Amendment marks the start of a new chapter in this important national debate. ... Our nation’s founders set a high bar for amending our Constitution — and history has shown us that it can take several tries before an Amendment builds the two-thirds support it needs in both houses of Congress. My position on this issue is clear: marriage is the most fundamental institution of our society, and it should not be redefined by activist judges. The people must be heard on this issue,” he said in a statement.

A majority of Americans define marriage as a union of a man and a woman, as does the amendment, according to a new ABC News poll. But just as many oppose amending the Constitution, the poll found.

Forty-five of the 50 states have acted to define traditional marriage in ways that would ban same-sex marriage — 19 with their own state constitutional amendments and 26 with statutes.

“Most Americans are not yet convinced that their elected representatives or the judiciary are likely to expand decisively the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples,” said McCain, R-Ariz., a possible presidential candidate in 2008. He voted against the procedural maneuver to end debate.

Jody M. Huckaby, executive director of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG), said the vote was one of discrimination versus fairness.

“Forty-nine of our elected leaders voted to support legislation that would write discrimination against our loved ones into the Constitution. ... Without a shred of credible evidence, they shamefully concluded that ‘traditional’ marriages would be torn apart if we were to grant all Americans equal rights, and used this as their justification for their extreme position,” Huckaby said in a statement.

“On the other hand, 48 of our legislators displayed great courage and wisdom in opposing the Federal Marriage Amendment. Whether they voted no because they believe that this bill is discriminatory, or because they believe that this should be left to the states and not a federal mandate, or because they believe this to be a deeply misplaced priority, they have made a tremendous statement. Their votes prove that this political pandering will not be tolerated,” the statement continued.

The House plans a vote on the amendment next month, said Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio.

“This is an issue that is of significant importance to many Americans,” Boehner told reporters. “We have significant numbers of our members who want a vote on this, so we are going to have a vote.”

Like the Senate, the House in 2004 fell short of the two-thirds vote needed.

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Will It Go ‘Round in Circles? (Christian Post, 060523)

The decade of the 1970s was a unique period of creativity and innovation in many fields. They were strategic years in which our nation made many far-reaching, cultural choices. Many voices attempted to help us grasp the significance of the times in which we lived. Former gospel music artist, Billy Preston, wrote an entertaining song with deep prophetic overtones as his 1972 contribution to the generation’s understanding. A few of the lyrics follow:

I’ve got a song I ain’t got no melody

How’m I gonna sing it with my friends

Will it go round in circles

Will it fly high like a bird up in the sky

I’ve got a lil’ story ain’t got no moral

Let the bad guy win every once in a while

I’ve got a lil’ dance ain’t got no steps

I’m gonna let the music move me around

This era had a cultural war with changing sexual mores, young people re-examining their values, and a concern that our business community was selling us down the river for filthy lucre…sounds just like today!

Preston’s never-ending song is likened to a story without a moral, a dance without steps, and a bird that wanders in endless circles. As I thought back on the era, this song without a melody seems to have begun a decline in musical creativity—leading to music genres like hip hop and punk rock. The last 30 years also gave birth to a new genre of movies in which the “anti-hero” emerged from numerous amoral screen plays. Dance and the arts have also eclipsed from their popularity in the mid-20th century.

Not only was our music going around in circles in the ‘70s, our new-fangled cultural, spiritual, and emotional rituals took our entire society downhill quickly. Using commitment to traditional marriage as a barometer of moral decline, it is easy to perceive that the very fabric of our society was being ripped apart as we chanted, “Make love and not war.”

From 1970 to 2000, white marriage levels declined from 72.6% to 60%. Black marriages, however, dropped from roughly two-thirds to one-third during the same time span. During the ‘70s we examined everything except the impact our society was having on marriage. If we had only known the slippery slope on which we were treading, we would have made different choices.

As stated earlier, this millennium is just like the ‘70s in many ways. No wonder Ecclesiastes 1:9 says, “…what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun” (NIV). The major difference between the ‘70s and today is that now our foundational building blocks are being reconstructed. In the ‘70s, the sexual revolution redefined both the place of sex and the gender roles of our society. The concept of unisex has now given vent to gay and lesbian cultural expression in both fashion and attitude. In the new millennium, marriage is being redefined. The devaluation of marriage has the potential to destroy the nuclear family as we know it.

To discuss the redefinition of values and marriage may sound very lofty and esoteric. Nothing could be further from the truth. Attitudes form values and values become the ethical basis for actions. Actions create habits and habits form lifestyle patterns. Therefore, our thoughts about what goes on in people’s bedrooms can affect the course of our society. For the last 15 years or so, there has been a subtle battle to reclassify marriage and family. In 2004, Massachusetts courts raised the stakes in this winner-take-all poker game for the definition of marriage.

A constitutional amendment to protect marriage is a vital step in shielding our culture from self-destruction like the Greek and Roman cultures of antiquity. The work of Stanley Kurtz, a Harvard-trained sociologist, records the fact that Swedish and Dutch attempts to give all the rights of marriage to same-sex couples has resulted in two destructive trends. The first trend is longer singleness for adults due to a devaluation of this sacred institution. Second, out-of-wedlock births escalated in both nations dramatically. In Sweden, out-of wedlock births increased from 47% to 55% in only ten years. In the Netherlands, out-of wedlock births rose from 19% to 31% in just six years.

These statistics are especially disturbing given soaring out-of-wedlock births and greater singleness rates in the U.S. today. If not addressed, in thirty years we could have created an America in which over half of the population never gets married and most kids have absolutely no bond with their biological fathers. Christians everywhere must fight these trends by using three powerful tools – prayer, political involvement, and building positive marriages that the world can emulate. Today may be our last chance to keep our culture from “going round in circles.” Let’s make the decision to fly right…today!

Harry R. Jackson, Jr.

Christian Post Guest Columnist

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Australia Invalidates Gay-Relationship Law (Christian Post, 060613)

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) - Conservative Prime Minister John Howard’s federal government has invoked special powers to invalidate a territory’s law that had been the first in Australia giving legal recognition to same-sex relationships.

The Australian Capital Territory, which includes the national capital Canberra, last month became the first of Australia’s six states and two territories to legally recognize gay and lesbian relationships.

The new law established a domestic relationship — separate to marriage — under which same-sex couples were to be given the same rights as heterosexual partnerships.

Officials in Howard’s center-right coalition — which amended federal marriage laws in 2004 to ensure that only men and women can marry — opposed the law, saying it effectively legalized gay marriage.

Attorney General Philip Ruddock said the government had used its power over territories — which have their own Parliaments and operate in a similar way to states — to invalidate the law. The authority is rarely used.

“The ACT civil relationships ordinance has been disallowed,” Ruddock told reporters Tuesday.

“That means, in effect, that the legislative amendments introduced to establish a civil arrangement for same-sex parties and others in the ACT will no longer be law.”

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False foundations: ‘Three of Hearts’ (townhall.com, 060615)

by Chuck Colson ( bio | archive )

Note: The subject matter of this commentary may not be suitable for children. Please use parental discretion.

Earlier this week, the cable network Bravo aired the documentary Three of Hearts: A Postmodern Family. The film is designed “to challenge conventional ideas of family,” according to director Susan Kaplan.

Three of Hearts shows two gay men, Steven Margolin and Sam Cagnina, bringing a woman into their relationship. For several years, the director followed Steven and Sam—and the woman they called their “wife,” Samantha Singh. (Sam actually married her, presumably on behalf of both men.) We see them interact with their families, run a business, and have a daughter, Siena. We do not find out until later which man is her father.

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Significantly, at least two of the trio come from difficult family situations. In particular, Sam speaks movingly about what life was like with his father in and out of prison. He confesses, “I chose [Steven and Samantha] as my parents. . . . I need someone to try to take care of me.” All three are in therapy, and Sam’s therapist thinks it is likely that as he matures, he may outgrow the relationship—an indication of the immature attitudes that got this relationship started in the first place.

But it is Steven who leaves after thirteen years, just before Samantha’s second child is born. Now, battling over everything from business arrangements to dog-care expenses, everybody has a different opinion of their former relationship. And Sam admits, “I think we were all building a house on false foundations.”

Although Sam is helping Samantha raise both children, he has no legal rights to the little girl. Steven turns out to be Siena’s biological father—but he has her only for a few days every month.

On top of it all, Sam and Samantha no longer have a sexual relationship. Though they are still married, Samantha calls the marriage a “technicality.” On the film’s website, Sam explains, “What we both want eventually is to live next door to each other raising our children together; we will both live with someone we love.” Since Steven already has a new partner, this would give Siena six parental figures and three homes!

If your head is spinning, I don’t blame you. It’s hard, however, not to feel sorry for these unhappy and disillusioned people—but it’s also hard not to get upset with them for bringing children into such an inherently unstable situation. You have to wonder, what on earth were they thinking?

Ironically, the director and her subjects consider this a “political” film striking a blow against defenders of traditional marriage, and legislation like the federal marriage amendment. But if they’re really proposing a mess like this as an alternative to traditional families, they are shooting themselves in the foot. The film makes you root for traditional marriage. If these confused people had had more stable families, they might not have grown into the kind of adults who mess up their kids’ lives just to prove a point.

Although Bravo aired Three of Hearts earlier this week, it will probably air it again. If it does, this is once when I am going to suggest to you that you watch what is meant as propaganda for “alternative” marriage. Get your friends and family to watch it too, because what they are going to see is what a wreck we make of our lives when we ignore God’s plan for marriage and families. And those watching will gain a new understanding of why we must fight to protect and promote marriage.

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The Die Is Cast (Christian Post, 060605)

Chuck Colson

Why We Need a Constitutional Amendment

Today Mark Earley and I will be at the White House, meeting with President Bush and leaders of the pro-family movement. The president will then speak to the nation in support of the federal marriage amendment [Marriage Protection Amendment]. Thank God we have a president who supports this. I have discussed it with him several times, and I can tell you that he understands fully the social, cultural, and legal reasons why amending the Constitution is the only way to protect marriage.

Unfortunately, a lot of politicians don’t get it. They argue that we do not need a marriage amendment. If we want to keep marriage between one man and one woman – which they say they do – then all we have to do is pass state referenda. Nineteen states have already done so. So amending the U.S. Constitution is unnecessary.

Well, these politicians apparently do not understand the inexorable logic of a series of cases that make it virtually certain that when state statutes barring gay “marriage” reach the Supreme Court, they will be struck down. Other politicians understand all too well, and when they claim that we do not need a marriage amendment, they are being disingenuous.

Let me explain the precedents that make it inevitable that the Court will uphold gay “marriage.” In the 1992 case CASEY v. PLANNED PARENTHOOD, Justice Kennedy affirmed the right of abortion with a sweeping definition of liberty as the right of a person to determine for himself the meaning of life.

Many feared this definition could embrace anything. Soon enough, it did.

In 1995 the Court struck down a democratically enacted state referendum in Colorado denying special civil rights based on sexual orientation. Kennedy wrote the opinion, ROMER v. EVANS, saying the vote of the people demonstrated “animus,” that is, bigotry, against homosexuals.

Then in 2003 in LAWRENCE v. TEXAS, the Supreme Court struck down a Texas law banning sodomy. Again Justice Kennedy, who could have used a very simple Fourteenth Amendment guarantee argument, resorted instead to his holding in CASEY and in ROMER v. EVANS. By legislating against homosexual behavior, the state was guilty of bigotry or prejudice.

Justice Scalia delivered a blistering dissent. “Today’s opinion,” he said, “dismantles the structure of constitutional law that has permitted the distinction to be made between heterosexual and homosexual unions . . . “ He went on to charge that the case meant the end to the possibility of all legislation concerning morality.

Now, what all of this means is that the Supreme Court, following its own precedents, will declare any law restricting the right of homosexuals to marry unconstitutional. The die is cast. An appeal is already coming up from a Nebraska case in which a judge threw out a statute banning gay “marriage” as unconstitutional. Within two years this will be at the Supreme Court, and the axe will fall.

Just as with ROE v. WADE, the Court will take away the states’ rights to legislate.

The time to act is now. Don’t let politicians deceive you and tell you this is a state issue. The Supreme Court has already closed the door on that. The federal marriage amendment [Marriage Protection Amendment] is coming up for a vote tomorrow or the next day. Call your senators right now. Tell them this is the time to vote to protect the most important institution in American life.

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Gay activists, Sharpton and the war on words (townhall.com, 060710)

By Star Parker

Conservatives had something to celebrate this past week in the way of a couple notable victories in battles in our ongoing cultural war. Two high courts, one in New York and one in Georgia, ruled supporting an understanding of marriage in state law as that which takes place between a man and a woman.

But, although a couple important battles have been won, there should be no doubt that a long and protracted war will continue. And it’s worth paying attention to the very special weapons of this war — words, and how they are used.

Usually, we think of words as building blocks for sentences, which are then used to construct ideas with which to make arguments. In today’s culture war, battles are not waged with ideas, but by attacking the building blocks themselves — the words — and changing their meaning. It’s kind of a verbal terrorism.

In this sense, I’ve come across an observation by the ancient Chinese philosopher Confucius that really fits what’s going on around us today: “When words lose their meaning, people will lose their liberty.”

The reasoning of the deciding opinion in the New York case is so simple and clear you can’t help but feel some sense of relief that the world indeed has not gone mad. The operative articles in the state’s Domestic Relations Law, the opinion says, “ ... nowhere say in so many words that only people of different sexes may marry each other, but that was the universal understanding ... in 1909” when the articles were adopted.

Furthermore, the opinion goes on to quote from the law: “The parties must solemnly declare ... that they take each other as husband and wife” and that clerks obtain relevant information from “the groom” and “the bride.”

For the gay activist plaintiffs the offense here is that there is something — in this case marriage — that might actually have some real, irreducible meaning, not accessible to political activism. Sort of the opposite of Shakespeare’s point that “...a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” That is, I commit a hate crime if I deny your claim that your dandelion is a rose.

The strategy in the assault on marriage is that if the institution is not providing what you want, change the meaning of the institution. Why it is the way it is, the fact that it has been this way from time immemorial and, indeed, the idea that there might be anything objectively true, becomes irrelevant.

The problem gets transformed from the preservation of the integrity of marriage, which was the original point of the law, to a claim that the law discriminates and “restricts an individual’s right to marry the person of his or her choice.”

Now the cheapening of language for political ends has great potential in the hands of a true artist and wordsmith like the Rev. Al Sharpton. Someone with Sharpton’s skills rightly has ambition beyond simply changing the meaning of marriage. Sharpton takes on Christianity itself.

So, in recent days Sharpton has been critical of black pastors for “narrowly” focusing on such marginal issues as abortion and gay marriage and ignoring such pillars of the Christian faith as affirmative action (I’ve been searching for the chapter and verse on this in my Bible) and “ending” poverty (my scripture says that “destitute people will not cease to exist within the land” and explains that this is the very reason for the personal obligation to give charity).

“Right” Christians, according to Sharpton, would not seek to deny a woman’s right to destroy the child within her (in this sense, black women, who account for 40 percent of the nation’s abortions, must be a truly blessed community) or a “gay couple’s right to marry.”

Yes, if the black church had its act together, according to Sharpton, it wouldn’t be so obsessed with the half million aborted black babies each year, the 70 percent of black babies born to unwed mothers, the 65 percent of black households headed by single parents and the rampant incidence of AIDS, and would instead focus more on the Voting Rights Act.

Can the Lord, as Christians understand Him, really be more concerned with majority minority voting districts than black children wandering the streets with no values, guidance or purpose in life?

I think Confucius had a point. If words have no meaning, if they can be manipulated and used as political tools, if indeed there is no sense of any truth rooted in tradition and experience, there will be no freedom.

Fortunately, a note of sanity was struck in New York and Georgia. But the war goes on.

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High courts rebuke activist judges (townhall.com, 060709)

By Kevin McCullough

Two rogue activist judges on lower courts in the states of New York and Georgia got the surprise slapped out of them this week.

It’s about time!

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg speaks to supporters during his re-election victory party at campaign headquarters in New York in this November 8, 2005 file photo. Following a landslide re-election win last November, the 64-year-old Bloomberg has been increasingly speaking out on national issues and become one of America’s most prominent mayors, fending off more and more questions about a White House bid. Such talk reached new heights this week after Bloomberg, ranked by Forbes magazine as the 112th richest billionaire worth $5.1 billion, playfully entertained the idea of running as an independent. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton/Files (UNITED STATES)

Judge Doris Ling-Cohen of New York and Constance Russell of Georgia were sent stinging rebukes by their state’s highest courts, and in cases that will be watched by other high courts in New Jersey, California and perhaps most importantly Washington. These women were given very clear lessons in judicial clarity and “We the People” rejoiced!

Judge Ling-Cohen knew when she issued the decision to allow marriage to be redefined in New York City that she had stirred up a hornet’s nest. The very same afternoon my radio show organized communications with some of the 8000 church leaders in the New York metro to begin aggressive opposition to her unilateral mandate that defied the state’s constitution. Mayor Michael Bloomberg also felt the sting; thousands of phone calls pouring into his office finally forced him to begrudgingly acknowledge that it was the city’s responsibility to attempt to have the decision overturned. He also then promptly went to several homosexual advocacy groups and made it clear that he preferred the ideas that Judge Ling-Cohen had put forward.

In addition, at the beginning of PRIDE month, the Mayor went on-air for his weekly radio address and promised quick compliance if the state high court returned a verdict that defended the radical activists seeking changes in the state law. He promised that the city would “immediately begin performing so called ‘gay’ marriages.” He also then added that should the decision go against the activists and for the families of New York, he would begin working to craft legislation in the state assembly to get voters to approve the redefining of marriage. (Good luck with that, Mayor.) I played the arrogant comments over and over the following Monday on my radio show and again thousands of calls poured into the Mayor’s office.

The Court of Appeals, the highest court in the Empire State, answered all the involved parties with a 4-2 spanking of the activists and made perfectly clear that only the people of New York have the ability to redefine the institution of marriage, clarifying the division that exists between the judiciary and the legislature. It is notable that this case mirrored nearly to perfection its predecessor in the Massachusetts courts that eventually legalized a redefinition of marriage.

Less than two hours later, the Georgia Supreme Court sent a much more recent decision by lower court Justice Constance Russell packing as well. In Russell’s flimsy decision to overturn the will of seventy-six percent of the electorate in the state of Georgia, she attempted to assert that no single piece of legislation could address both the idea of “marriage” and “civil unions that bear an uncanny resemblance to marriage” in the same bill. She found that perhaps Georgia voters had been confused about what nearly 8 out of 10 of them had voted to approve.

Nice try—but no dice.

The Georgia Supreme Court ruled unanimously to overturn Russell and found that, in fact, Georgians were very well-informed about what they had decided to vote for. (You know that old fashioned idea of one man and one woman before God for eternity silliness ...)

Of course, both decisions are hated by liberals and therefore received spotty coverage in the media, but make no mistake, these decisions portend large in the upcoming decisions in New Jersey (which can’t even seem to stay open), California (which seldom ever makes sense), and Washington. The Washington case being the biggest one of all.

In Washington there is no residency requirement for marriages to be performed. Simply put, if Washington courts go all Massachusetts on their voters—suddenly couples from every state in the union could apply for marriage licenses, be pronounced man and husband, or woman and bride, and return to their state to then test the federal statute called the Defense of Marriage Act.

The sides who have lost in each of these cases have pledged to work night and day to get legislative approval to redefine marriage. In New York—if Elliot Spitzer is elected governor, and Mayor Michael Bloomberg does throw in the millions of dollars and manpower to conduct a grassroots efforts—who knows what could happen! But at least such a scenario would still have to drive millions of voters to voting booths to get such a result. A good test of such a drive might be seen this fall in Massachusetts as the voters there will be allowed to weigh in on the issue for the very first time.

As you can easily see, the fight isn’t over. It’s barely just begun.

But it’s always a good day to see activist judges get their lunch handed to them.

And for Ling-Cohen and Russell all you can say is, “...Ouch! That’s gonna leave mark!”

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Mass. Court Backs Gay ‘Marriage’ Ban on Ballot (Christian Post, 060710)

BOSTON (AP) - The same court that made Massachusetts the first state to legalize gay marriage ruled Monday that a proposed constitutional amendment to ban future same-sex marriages can be placed on the ballot, if approved by the Legislature.

The ruling was the result of a lawsuit brought by gay-rights supporters who argued that Attorney General Tom Reilly was wrong to approve the question because the state constitution bars any citizen-initiated amendment that seeks to reverse a judicial ruling.

The Supreme Judicial Court, with a landmark 2003 ruling, cleared the way for same-sex marriages to begin in Massachusetts in May 2004. More than 7,000 gay couples have married since.

The state Legislature is expected to take up the question Wednesday during a constitutional convention.

Citizen-initiated ballot questions must be certified by the attorney general and then approved by two consecutive legislative sessions. Before the marriage question could be placed on the 2008 ballot, supporters would need to win the votes of 50 lawmakers — 25 percent of the Legislature — in two consecutive sessions.

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Marriage amendment falls short (Washington Times, 060718)

A constitutional amendment defining traditional marriage failed to earn the necessary backing of two-thirds of the House, but supporters say their cause is growing.

The vote for the amendment, which would define marriage strictly as a union between one man and one woman, was 236-187. The election-year measure was sponsored by Republican Rep. Marilyn Musgrave of Colorado.

In September 2004, the measure failed 227-186. It needed 290 to pass.

Republicans who control the chamber pushed the issue as part of a focus on values, putting lawmakers on record on the issue four months before the November mid-term elections, when all members will appear on the ballot.

However, not all Republicans agreed with amending the Constitution. Twenty-seven Republicans sided with 159 Democrats to oppose the proposal, while 34 Democrats voted in favor of it.

The chamber’s lone independent voted against it and one Democrat voted “present.”

Most Republicans said the amendment is necessary to protect families from “activist judges” in some states who are allowing same-sex couples to form legal unions.

They also said marriage is the foundation of traditional society. “The world did not start as Adam and Steve,” said Rep. Louie Gohmert, Texas Republican.

Most Democrats called the amendment a distraction that is being used to generate conservative support for the fall mid-term elections.

“Election year politics should not be used to target gay and lesbian families. As they have done before, the House today rightly rejected that ploy,” said Caroline Fredrickson, director of the Washington-based American Civil Liberties Union’s legislative office.

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State Supreme Court upholds gay marriage ban (WorldNetDaily, 060726)

The Washington Supreme Court today upheld the state’s 1998 ban on same-sex marriage — a ruling decried by gay activists but heralded by supporters of traditional marriage.

The decision came as a sobering defeat for gays and their advocates, who’d hoped the court would strike down the so-named Defense of Marriage Act — DOMA — which restricts marriage to one man and one woman.

Writing for a 5-4 majority, Justice Barbara Madsen said DOMA is constitutional because in establishing DOMA “the legislation was entitled to believe that limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples furthers procreation, essential to the survival of the human race and furthers the well-being of children by encouraging families where children are reared in homes headed by children’s biological parents.”

As such, DOMA does not violate the state Constitution’s privileges and immunities clause of the state Constitution, which requires that any benefit granted to one group must be granted equally to all. “Allowing same sex couples to marry does not, in the legislature’s view, further these purposes,” she wrote.

Although the ruling was the judiciary’s final word on gay marriage, it seemed to suggest that the legislature could act to provide civil unions or marriage to same-sex couples. The justices said given the clear hardship faced by same-sex couples evidenced in the lawsuit, the legislature may want to re-examine the impact of the marriage laws on all citizens of this state.

Madsen was joined by Chief Justice Gerry Alexander and Justice Charles Johnson. Justices James Johnson and Richard Sanders joined the majority in a separate concurrence. Justices Bobbe Bridge, Mary Fairhurst, Susan Owens and Tom Chambers dissented.

Madsen wrote that the plaintiffs did not sufficiently show that gays are members of a suspect class — a reference to groups entitled to protection against discrimination by virtue of characteristics such as race – or that there is a fundamental right to marriage that includes the right to marry a person of the same sex. Therefore, the Legislature’s decision that only opposite-sex couples are entitled to civil marriage is a “rational basis” for the Defense of Marriage Act.

DOMA, the majority found, also does not violate the due process clause of the state Constitution, which states that “No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”

“The people of Washington have not had in the past, nor at this time are they entitled to an expectation that they may choose to marry a person of the same sex,” Madsen wrote.

Additionally, the court wrote, DOMA does not violate the state’s Equal Rights Amendment, so-called ERA, because the law treats men and women equally in denying both the right to marry someone of the same sex.

Legislators quickly weighed in on the contentious issue.

Sen. Dan Swecker, R-Rochester, said the “Supreme Court’s ruling is in line with the public’s wishes.”

“I think that, historically, marriage has been about providing for the next generation, and that it is only in the modern era that we’ve decided the issue is love between two people,” Swecker said. “Love comes and goes, but a commitment to the next generation has to be sustainable. If we start to redefine marriage, it will diminish our commitment to marriage and stable families for future generations.”

Sen. Lisa Brown, leader of the Democratic majority in the Senate, said Democrats don’t have a unified position gay marriage. In the upcoming session, said Brown, D-Spokane, there will likely be “calls for full marriage equality for same-sex couples (as in Massachusetts), for civil unions (as in Vermont) and for a constitutional amendment banning both (as in Utah).”

In a strongly-worded dissent, Justice Bridge wrote that DOMA’s “religious and moral strains” make it an unconstitutional breach of the church-state wall. The majority’s deference to the Legislature “too early dismisses the proper role of the judiciary to protect the constitutional rights of those who have been historically disenfranchised from the political process,” she wrote.

Had the court struck down the law, Washington would have become only the second state in the nation, after Massachusetts, to allow same-sex couples to marry.

Washington passed DOMA in 1998, two years after the federal government passed such a law, defining marriage as a union between one man and one woman. Since then, a majority of states have passed similar gay-marriage bans.

Two separate lawsuits challenging the Washington statute were filed in 2004 — one against King County, the other against the state — by 19 gay and lesbian couples seeking the right to marry or to have their marriages from elsewhere recognized in this state.

In each of those cases, a Superior Court judge sided with the plaintiffs, applying different analyses to declare the state’s DOMA unconstitutional. The two cases were merged into one for the appeal to the Supreme Court, which was argued March 8, 2005, by attorneys for both sides.

The couples based their claim to marriage on specific principles of constitutional law. Central to their claim was that the ban on same-sex marriage violates the state constitution’s “privileges and immunities” clause, which requires that any privilege offered to one group be offered to all.

Those defending the law argued that the statute served a legitimate purpose in that the state has an interest in protecting children, and thus in the relationships that produce them.

But the couples called DOMA a scheme “that favors one class of children, not because of the way they were created but because of the identity of their parents.”

The plaintiffs also argued that marriage is a fundamental right, while the state and other defendants said that same-sex marriage has no roots in the nation’s history and tradition.

And the sides disagreed over whether gays are considered a so-called suspect class — a reference to groups entitled to protection against discrimination by virtue of such characteristics as race or gender.

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Same-sex marriage on rocks with voters: 20 out of 20 times, Americans choose to protect institution from changes (WorldNetDaily, 060727)

Yesterday’s stunning decision by Washington’s Supreme Court upholding traditional marriage is not the only setback dogging same-sex marriage advocates.

In fact, 20 out of the 20 times it has come before voters, Americans have chosen to protect by constitutional amendment the idea of limiting marriage to one man and one woman.

So this year as it’s brought before voters in another six – or eight – states, what do opponents plan to do to get their first single?

Obfuscate.

“The best that they (traditional marriage opponents) can do is confuse the issue,” States Issues Analyst Mona Passignano, of the Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family Action, told WorldNetDaily in an exclusive look-ahead at this fall’s election season.

“What they’re running up against is that people just want traditional marriage protected,” she said.

“We have six states that will have marriage amendments on their ballot (in 2006),” Passignano said, identifying them as Idaho, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia and Wisconsin.

Two more, Arizona and Colorado, still have yet to reach either deadlines for turning in petition signatures or decisions for whether enough signatures have been turned in. Arizona’s marriage supporters turned in 300,000 names, for a requirement of 184,000, but they still are being verified. In Colorado, the deadline to turn in names is Aug. 7, and 68,000 verified names are needed, she said.

“The atmosphere (around the issues) right now is actually positive,” she said. “But you can expect that to change in October.” Then, the campaigning will get confusing.

Colorado’s potential battle already is typical of what she expects.

There probably will be four ballot initiatives on the fall Colorado ballot addressing marriage or civil unions and the like. One would think that would be confusing, and Passignano said that’s the plan.

“The campaign in Colorado already is to confuse the voters. The more confusion, the better the chance (for same-sex marriage being endorsed),” she said. “It’s not exactly a new campaign, it’s exactly the strategy that unfolded in Texas last year.”

During that battle, same-sex marriage supporters actually “tried to get people to vote against the marriage amendment by pretending they were from the attorney general’s office and telling people they were going to nullify actual marriages with their vote,” Passignano said. Senior citizens, especially, were targeted.

She said she took calls in her office at Focus Action from Texans who would hesitate. “I think I voted the wrong way,” they would tell her. “Yes, you did,” she told them.

The salvation of the Texas amendment came from Christian pastors, she said.

“What’s going to be the key is church participation,” she said. “The IRS has said pastors have the right to talk about that, despite what we commonly hear, because it is a nonpartisan ballot issue. Pastors can talk about it all they want.

“Just because you’re a Christian doesn’t mean you checked your rights at the door,” she said.

Focus Action is a cultural action organization that is separate from Focus on the Family, the Christian broadcasting, publishing and ministry powerhouse. It was set up for Christians to have a platform for informing and rallying about moral issues.

Baptist Press earlier had cited a homosexual publication’s report about a multi-point plan devised by the Democratic National Committee to combat the marriage protection plans.

Damien LaVera, a spokesman for the DNC told Baptist Press the committee opposes Republican efforts to use the issue to get voters to ballot boxes. But he didn’t confirm or deny the homosexual publication’s report about a plan that calls for labeling such initiatives “divisive” and training operatives in all 50 states how to campaign against them.

That report also said the plan included working with a homosexual advocacy group and campaign organizations in each state fighting marriage protection plans.

During 2005, Texas and Kansas voters approved marriage protection amendments, and in the sweep of the 2004 vote, 13 states took the same action, including voters in Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Montana, Oklahoma, North Dakota, Utah, Michigan, Ohio and Oregon who did so on the same night. Five states had done so in earlier elections and another two dozen states have taken the same action, but by statute, not constitutional amendment.

Representatives are especially tenacious in pursuing this particular issue, too. In Wisconsin state lawmakers went through the process a second time after first passing a Defense of Marriage law in 2003, only to see Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle veto it. The second time around, for this year’s election, they pursued the constitutional amendment process, which does not require a governor’s signature.

State lawmakers in Washington also battled back to overturn a veto by Gov. Gary Locke in their pursuit of their 1998 Defense of Marriage Act, which limits marriages to couples of one man and one woman.

That battle was crowned with victory this week when the state’s Supreme Court affirmed its constitutionality. The court noted that there may be homosexual weddings at some point in the future, but it will be because people have brought it about, not because of a judicial opinion.

The underlying conclusion of the Washington state court was that the Legislature had a legitimate interest in protecting traditional marriage and that action did not violate equal protection and other laws.

Even in Massachusetts, where the state’s highest court created a right to homosexual marriage to become the only state ever to recognize such situations, supporters have collected 170,000 signatures and court approval and hope to have a marriage amendment on the ballot in 2008.

One defeat for the traditional marriage supporters came in June in the Senate, which failed to endorse a change in the U.S. Constitution limiting marriage to one man and one woman. But that wasn’t even on an up-or-down vote; only a procedural move.

It is “inconceivable” the U.S. Senate refused to even vote, said Jan LaRue, chief counsel of Concerned Women for America.

“If the founders could have imagined a time when same-sex ‘marriage’ would be forced upon the people by judicial fiat, they would have established a uniform rule of marriage in the Constitution just as they did for naturalization and bankruptcy,” she said.

However, just in the past few weeks, other courts in Georgia, Nebraska, Tennessee and New York have endorsed the legality of protecting marriage.

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Gay “marriage” (townhall.com, 060815)

By Thomas Sowell

Now that a number of state courts have refused to redefine marriage to include same-sex unions, cries of “discrimination” are being heard.

The “equal protection of the laws” provided by the Constitution of the United States applies to people, not actions. Laws exist precisely in order to discriminate between different kinds of actions.

When the law permits automobiles to drive on highways but forbids bicycles from doing the same, that is not discrimination against people. A cyclist who gets off his bicycle and gets into a car can drive on the highway just like anyone else.

In a free society, vast numbers of things are neither forbidden nor facilitated. They are considered to be none of the law’s business.

Homosexuals were on their strongest ground when they said that the law had no business interfering with relations between consenting adults. Now they want the law to put a seal of approval on their behavior. But no one is entitled to anyone else’s approval.

Why is marriage considered to be any of the law’s business in the first place? Because the state asserts an interest in the outcomes of certain unions, separate from and independent of the interests of the parties themselves.

In the absence of the institution of marriage, the individuals could arrange their relationship whatever way they wanted to, making it temporary or permanent, and sharing their worldly belongings in whatever way they chose.

Marriage means that the government steps in, limiting or even prescribing various aspects of their relations with each other — and still more their relationship with whatever children may result from their union.

In other words, marriage imposes legal restrictions, taking away rights that individuals might otherwise have. Yet “gay marriage” advocates depict marriage as an expansion of rights to which they are entitled.

They argue against a “ban on gay marriage” but marriage has for centuries meant a union of a man and a woman. There is no gay marriage to ban.

Analogies with bans against interracial marriage are bogus. Race is not part of the definition of marriage. A ban on interracial marriage is a ban on the same actions otherwise permitted because of the race of the particular people involved. It is a discrimination against people, not actions.

Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes said that the life of the law has not been logic but experience. Vast numbers of laws have accumulated and evolved over the centuries, based on experience with male-female unions.

There is no reason why all those laws should be transferred willy-nilly to a different union, one with no inherent tendency to produce children nor the inherent asymmetries of relationships between people of different sexes.

Despite attempts to evade these asymmetries with such fashionable phrases as “a pregnant couple” or references to “spouses” rather than husbands and wives, these asymmetries take many forms and have many repercussions, which laws attempt to deal with on the basis of experience, rather than theories or rhetoric.

Wives, for example, typically invest in the family by restricting their own workforce participation, if only long enough to take care of small children. Studies show such differences still persisting in this liberated age, and even among women and men with postgraduate degrees from Harvard and Yale.

In the absence of marriage laws, a husband could dump his wife at will and she could lose decades of investment in their relationship. Marriage laws seek to recoup some of that investment for her through alimony when divorce occurs.

Those who think of women and men in the abstract consider it right that ex-husbands should be as entitled to alimony as ex-wives. But what are these ex-husbands being compensated for?

And why should any of this experience apply to same-sex unions, where there are not the same inherent asymmetries nor the same tendency to produce children?

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Federal Marriage Amendment Defeat – Pro-Family Movement Weakness (Free Congress Foundation, 060612)

By Paul M. Weyrich

This past week the United States Senate voted down the proposed Federal Marriage Amendment, which is designed to place in the Constitution that marriage is between a man and a woman. Liberals in both parties voted against consideration of the issue. That is not surprising. Senate leaders knew they didn’t have the votes. Some people claim that the exercise was foolish and a waste of time. But pro-family movement leaders wanted the vote because they believe that some Senators up for re-election who have defied the will of the voters might be more vulnerable because of that vote.

The President discussed the issue on his Saturday radio show. Early in the week, he had made a strong statement to a group of movement leaders and following defeat in the Senate he issued a statement indicating that the fight will continue.

There is no anecdotal evidence that the President or the Majority Whip twisted arms on this issue. Therein lays the problem with social issues. Almost all Democrats want nothing to do with social issues. When they were in control of the Congress most such issues never saw the light of day. Republicans, with a few notable exceptions, are not enthusiastic about them either. Majority Leader William H. Frist, M.D., commonly known as Senator Bill Frist, was mercilessly dumped on by some of his colleagues when he announced he was bringing up the Marriage Amendment. So he must be given credit for that. And to his credit, he never, ever wavered on the issues, even when doing major Sunday news shows. The Conservative movement has too often been satisfied with rhetoric and too few times has the movement demanded action.

I mentioned this to Dr. Richard Land at the White House. Land represents the Southern Baptists at such events. “My standard is the prescription drug benefit,” Land quipped. In that expansion of big government, the President and Congressional leaders twisted arms until the bill was passed. The leadership in the House, in which the measure had considerable opposition, kept the vote open for over three hours until the leadership had enough votes. The President was on the telephone with Members of the House until he got sufficient commitments to pass the drug benefit bill. I know this to be true because I have spoken with several Members who talked with President Bush on the night of the vote.

Did the Majority Whip in the Senate twist arms until it hurts on the Marriage Amendment? No. Did the President talk with Senators, trading things as he did with the drug benefit? No. Was the Right angry about this? No. I asked one of the most visible and important leaders of the pro-family movement if he had conscience problems attending the event at the White House, since he and the rest of us were props in a non-effort to pass this Amendment. Without hesitation this major leader said, “Not at all. I felt we had to enforce what little this President did.”

Think of a Democratic President, such as William J. Clinton. The partial-birth abortion bill comes to his desk. Clinton makes statements supporting abortion but then signs the bill. The supporters of radical life styles would be out on the streets. Clinton may have betrayed other interest groups, but he never, ever betrayed the pro-aborts. Clinton knew that the pro-abortion crowd would not accept rhetoric. They demanded action within the Clinton Administration. Twice Congress passed partial-birth abortion bills by overwhelming numbers. Twice Clinton vetoed the bill.

When the Reagan Administration first came into office, James A. Baker III, Chief of Staff to the President, and Howard H. Baker, Jr., the Senate Majority Leader, met and declared that social issues would be on the back burner.

I was on a conference call immediately thereafter with sixteen of the top leaders of what at that time was called the Religious Right. I said if a Democratic Administration had been elected and the Administration and Senate leaders said that civil rights had to be on the back burner Jesse Jackson and other civil rights leaders would be on the street within 24 hours. I was told by my friend Dr. Jerry Falwell to calm down. They totally accepted what the Reagan Administration, represented by the two (unrelated) Bakers, had declared. President Ronald W. Reagan accomplished a number of things in eight years in office. He started an economic boom, which has continued to this day. He contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union. He appointed good federal judges as well. His legacy will revolve around those issues. But did he do anything on abortion? Did he really tackle social issues? He did advocate a school-prayer amendment but again did nothing to twist arms on the issue. The Right was satisfied with that.

Until the Right learns really to fight its agenda never will be enacted. In 2004, the pro-family forces, led by Dr. James Dobson, helped to take out Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle, of South Dakota, the first time the Majority Leader had been defeated in half a century. They also contributed to the election of several other pro-family Senators. Yet when it came to the proposed Federal Marriage Amendment the pro-family forces gained only one vote. Politicians do not fear the pro-family movement. Until they do pro-family forces will not achieve their objectives. Members of Congress operate on the pain/pleasure principle. If you inflict pain they want it to stop. They will beg for the pain to stop. At that point you can get a commitment on the Marriage Amendment or any other social issue. That has not happened. The only incumbent defeated was Daschle.

So they see only one scalp hanging in the Capitol. They are not impressed. The other Republican victories came in open seats. That does not impress the liberals.

If the pro-family movement is serious it must get into the States and defeat a whole number of incumbents. Also those Senators who voted no should never be nominated by their party for the Presidency of the United States.

The pro-family movement has real troops. If it wants to get serious it must get tough. It is not clear that the pro-family movement has the stomach for that. Time will tell.

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Calif. Court Rules Against Gay ‘Marriage’ (Christian Post, 061006)

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - A state appeals court upheld California’s ban on gay “marriage” Thursday, a critical defeat for a movement hungry for a win after similar losses in two other states.

In reversing the March 2005 ruling of a San Francisco trial judge, the 1st District Court of Appeal agreed with the state’s attorney general, who argued it is up to the Legislature, not the courts, to change the traditional definition of marriage as a union between a man and a woman.

“We conclude California’s historical definition of marriage does not deprive individuals of a vested fundamental right or discriminate against a suspect class,” the court said in a 2-1 decision. “The time may come when California chooses to expand the definition of marriage to encompass same-sex unions. That change must come from democratic processes, however, not by judicial fiat.”

The justices, in their 128-page opinion, noted that California’s ban on same-sex marriage does not discriminate against gays and lesbians because of the state’s strong domestic partner law, which gives registered couples most of the same rights as married spouses in California.

The ruling does not guarantee, however, that same-sex couples will not ultimately be able to get married in California. Gay marriage advocates said beforehand that they would appeal to the California Supreme Court if the intermediate court did not decide in their favor.

“Though we are disappointed, we always knew this issue was going to be decided by the California Supreme Court,” said Molly McKay, a spokeswoman for Marriage Equality USA. “We believe that the California Supreme Court will enforce the constitutional guarantee of equality under the law and strike down the discriminatory barriers denying same-sex couples access to civil marriage.”

Opponents of gay marriage praised the decision.

“This is a victory for the right of the people of California to make fundamental policy decisions through democratic processes,” said Monte Stewart, President of the Marriage Law Foundation, a Utah-based group that opposes same-sex marriage. “It is also a victory for society’s most consequential social institution, and that is marriage.”

In 2004, Massachusetts became the first state to legalize same-sex marriage after gay and lesbian couples in that state successfully sued for the right to wed. In the aftermath of that change, 19 states passed constitutional amendments barring gay marriage. Another 26 have statues limiting marriage to a man and a woman. Connecticut and Vermont allow civil unions.

Advocates of same-sex unions had seen California as one of their best chances to expand their marriage rights after recent high court rulings in New York and Washington state upheld bans in those states.

Thursday’s ruling came three months after the appeals court heard six hours of arguments in as many related cases — four of them filed by the city and lawyers for 20 couples seeking the right to wed, and two brought by groups that want to maintain the status quo barring same-sex unions.

The lawsuits arose out of the 2004 same-sex marriage spree that San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom ignited when he instructed city officials to issue marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples. Hundreds of couples from across the country flocked to City Hall to marry, but groups opposed to gay marriage persuaded the state Supreme Court to invalidate the licenses.

“This is a disappointing second round in what we’ve always known is a three-round fight,” San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera said of Thursday’s ruling.

In March 2005, San Francisco Superior Court Judge Richard Kramer ruled that the state’s existing marriage laws violated the civil rights of gays and lesbians by denying them “the basic human right to marry a person of one’s choice” and by discriminating on the basis of gender and sexual orientation.

Following Kramer’s decision, the Legislature last year became the first lawmaking body in the nation to legalize gay marriage. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed the bill, saying it was up to voters or the courts, not lawmakers, to settle the contentious issue.

With a gubernatorial election next month, Thursday’s ruling is sure to put the issue squarely back in the state’s political arena. The bill’s sponsor, Assemblyman Mark Leno, plans to reintroduce the measure to allow gay marriage at the end of the year.

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Same-sex marriage opponents, proponents court MP support (National Post, 061024)

OTTAWA - Religious leaders on both sides of the same-sex-marriage debate will descend on Parliament Hill today in an attempt to influence MPs who are expected to vote this fall on whether to revisit the contentious law.

Supporters and opponents will hold competing news conferences, armed with studies and reports to back up their positions, and some activists who are against same-sex marriage will meet privately with politicians in attempt to sway their votes.

The Defend Marriage Coalition, an alliance of about a dozen socially conservative groups, will hold a full-day “national marriage caucus” to convince MPs that the federal government “rushed to the alter” in 2005 by redefining the traditional definition of marriage” without fully examining the potential impact on Canadians.

“We are attempting to meet with the MPs who can be swayed,” said organizer Charles McVety, who suspects the event will draw about 50 community leaders and another 50 church leaders from across Canada.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper promised a vote during the last federal election campaign. Members of all parties widely expect that the Commons will reject re-opening debate at a time when more than 10,000 gay couples have already tied the knot.

Proponents of same-sex marriage, while acknowledging the numbers are in their favour, are not taking any chances.

The coalition Canadians for Equal Marriage, in a pre-emptive strike, issued two press releases on Monday to counter arguments from gay-marriage opponents, including an often-cited report from the French Parliament that recommended against gay marriage and gay adoption, in part because of its adverse effect on children.

The Canadian Psychological Association and the Canadian Association of Social Workers asserted that children of same-sex unions are better off if their parents are married.

“Opponents of equal marriage seem to base their arguments on the false assumption that excluding same-sex couples from marriage would prevent them from having or raising children,” said Eugenia Moreno, executive director of the Canadian Association of Social Workers.

“In fact, same-sex couples do have and raise children and excluding them from marriage would only harm these children.”

Laurie Arron, a spokesman for the equal-marriage group, called on Harper to hold a vote immediately so that the issue of gay marriage will be settled.

“From our perspective it’s quite clear that Parliament is prepared to defeat Mr. Harper’s motion,” he said. “It’s time for Mr. Harper to get on with it rather than delaying to please the religious right.”

Arron cited a poll conducted by the firm Environics in June showing that two-thirds of Canadians, including some who oppose same-sex marriage, are against reopening debate.

Clergy who oppose gay marriage will argue today that they fear that they will eventually lose their protection against marrying same-sex couples. They say that a clause inserted in the federal same-sex marriage law is meaningless since the Supreme Court of Canada had already declared that solemnization of marriage is provincial rather than federal jurisdiction.

“The point is to ask the government to study these things so MPs can make informed decisions instead of uninformed ones,” said McVety.

Religious leaders who support gay marriage, including David Giuliano, moderator of the United Church of Canada, are expected to counter that there is already strong protection for clergy in the religious freedom guarantees in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

In June 2005, the House of Commons voted 158-133 to legalize gay marriage, following court rulings across the country.

In the coming vote, the Bloc Quebecois and the NDP have both decided to vote as parties against reopening debate, a strong majority of Liberals are expected to take the same position, and even a sizeable number of Conservatives have publicly stated their intentions to vote no because they think it’s time to turn their attention to other issues.

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Conservatives Laud High Court Decision on Gay ‘Marriage’ Case (Christian Post, 061011)

Conservative legal groups lauded the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to decline an appeal Tuesday from a gay California couple who were denied a license to wed, but warned that pro-family Americans must remain vigilant in the fight to protect marriage as the battle is “far from over.”

“This is not just a good day for marriage; it’s a great year for marriage. The case drives another nail in the coffin of same-sex ‘marriage,’” said Matthew Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel.

The Supreme Court refused to intervene in the case “Smelt v. Orange County” without comment, reaffirming the constitutionality of the federal Defense of Marriage Act. Arthur Smelt and Christopher Hammer had sought a marriage license in Southern California’s Orange County in 2004 but were turned down. Soon afterwards, the men filed a lawsuit challenging both the federal DOMA and California laws confining marriage to a union between a man and woman only.

According to the Alliance Defense Fund, the victory is only one piece of a larger battle to define marriage.

“Marriage continues to be under attack because certain special interest groups are trying to reduce it to nothing more than a benefits system for emotionally attached couples,” said ADF Senior Counsel Glen Lavy.

Lavy warned Americans to remain vigilant and vocal since many critical decisions are still pending across state courts.

“Americans must continue to remain vigilant in the defense of marriage, especially since the attacks come from numerous directions,” he said.

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State marriage amendment and gay rights: New dilemmas (townhall.com, 061025)

By Maggie Gallagher

This week I’m speaking at a National Press Club event sponsored by the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association about the coming vote on state marriage amendments.

Here’s a sneak preview:

On Nov. 7, eight states will vote on state marriage amendments that define marriage as the union of husband and wife, and also confine the legal benefits of marriage to married couples (i.e., no government-created civil unions). Twenty states have already passed such amendments, with around 60 percent to 80 percent voter approval.

This time around, gay rights groups have grown excited about the prospect of knocking down one or more of these amendments. Three states in particular are in play: Wisconsin, Arizona and South Dakota, each of which has had polls in recent months suggesting the state marriage amendment may be in trouble. (Amendments in Tennessee, Idaho and South Carolina will likely pass by wide margins. In Virginia, 53 percent of likely voters tell pollsters they approve of the state marriage amendment, despite a vigorous campaign for its defeat. In Colorado, gay groups have focused less on opposing the state marriage amendment than on passing a ballot initiative creating civil unions for gay couples.)

For example, two polls in Arizona showed voters opposed to the state marriage amendment, and a South Dakota poll showed voters defeating the amendment by 49 percent to 41 percent. (Other polls in each state suggest wildly different results). Defeating a marriage amendment in either or both of two such red states would be an amazing landmark victory for gay groups.

What do we make of the political situation? Let me begin with the bad news for gay marriage advocates: I predict all eight state marriage amendments will pass.

Nonetheless, the margin of victory in the states that gay marriage advocates have chosen to contest will be narrower than in the past. The good news from their perspective (and expect to hear it trumpeted loudly) is that gay marriage advocates have hit upon a political formula that influences voters at least somewhat.

Here’s more pesky bad news: That strategy has almost nothing to do with increasing support for gay marriage. Campaigns in Arizona, Wisconsin and Virginia have largely abandoned marriage itself, and focused instead on generating opposition to domestic partnership provisions. “Why Take Away Health Care?” is the slogan of choice in Arizona, while in Virginia, opponents have marshaled an impressive array of highly credentialed legal experts to advance the improbable argument that the state marriage amendment will prevent unmarried opposite-sex couples from executing private contracts, receiving domestic violence protections or receiving visitation rights. (Virginia’s state attorney general recently issued a legal opinion: “I can find no legal basis for the proposition that passage of the marriage amendment will limit or infringe upon the ordinary civil and legal rights of unmarried Virginians.”)

I predict another piece of good news for gay rights groups: Colorado will pass domestic partnership legislation. That victory in Colorado suggests a possible new strategy for gay rights groups: Stop promoting gay marriage and start vigorously advocating for civil unions.

Doing so would create a powerful new wedge issue on their side, substantially separating Catholics from evangelicals, and moderates from harder-core religious conservatives. It’s an obvious winning political strategy.

But here’s the problem for gay rights groups. Civil union initiatives substantially undercut public support for gay marriage. The Human Rights Campaign’s own latest poll shows that, when offered a choice of civil unions, only 21 percent of Americans continue to support gay marriage.

After vigorously denouncing civil unions as a despised “separate but equal” insult, can gay rights groups switch course and invest their time and resources in passing civil union laws that offer their people “second-class citizenship”?

Interesting times ahead.

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New Jersey High Court Leaves Gay Marriage Rights to Legislature (Foxnews, 061026)

TRENTON, N.J. — New Jersey’s Supreme Court has left it to the Legislature to decide the rules for gay couples who want to marry in the state.

In a 4-3 ruling Wednesday, the court said the state constitution gives same-sex couples the same civil rights afforded to heterosexual couples, but the lawmakers must decide how to grant those rights.

“The Legislature must either amend the marriage statutes to include same-sex couples or create a parallel statutory structure, which will provide for, on equal terms, the rights and benefits enjoyed and burdens and obligations borne by married couples,” the court held.

The court ruled that the state does not have a “legitimate governmental purpose” in denying same-sex couples “the financial and social benefits and privileges given to their married heterosexual counterparts.”

Citing the equal protection clause, Article 1, Paragraph 1 of the New Jersey constitution, the court ruled that “committed same-sex couples must be afforded on equal terms the same rights and benefits enjoyed by opposite-sex couples under the civil marriage statutes. The name to be given to the statutory scheme that provides full rights and benefits to same-sex couples, whether marriage or some other term, is a matter left to the democratic process.”

The high court stopped short of fully approving gay marriage in the state, and gave lawmakers 180 days to rewrite marriage laws to either include same-sex couples or create new civil unions.

“The issue is not about the transformation of the traditional definition of marriage, but about the unequal dispensation of benefits and privileges to one of two similarly situated classes of people,” the court said.

Advocates on both sides of the issue had believed the relatively liberal New Jersey high court had the best chance of approving gay marriages since Massachusetts became the only state to do so in 2003. The Vermont Supreme Court ruled in 1999 that civil unions were constitutional. The state avoided using the word “marriage.”

Eight states have initiatives on this year’s ballots that could end up banning same-sex marriages. Fifteen states have amended constitutions to ban same-sex unions after ballot initiatives approved such action.

State courts including New York, Washington, Nebraska and Georgia have upheld voter-approved bans on gay marriage.

New Jersey lawmakers voted to allow domestic partnerships in 2004, but they have been reluctant to delve into the sensitive issue of marriage. Under domestic partnerships, gay couples have some benefits of marriage, such as the right to inherit possessions if there is no will and health care coverage for state workers.

Offering a concurring and dissenting view were Chief Justice Deborah T. Portiz, and Justices Virginia Long and James R. Zazzali. While the three agreed that denying rights and benefits to committed same-sex couples that are statutorily granted to heterosexual couples violates the state constitution’s equal protection clause, Portiz went further, saying she disagreed with the majority’s conclusion that “there is no fundamental due process right to same-sex marriage encompassed within the concept of ‘liberty’ guaranteed by the equal protection clause.” She added that same sex couples should be granted to use the title of “marriage.”

In the court ruling, the justices held that it would not seek to presume the constitutionality of a legal construct separate from existing marriage statutes nor whether “a difference in name is of constitutional magnitude.”

The court shot down the state’s claim that enactment of a law granting same-sex marriages would conflict with the full faith and credit clause in Article IV of the U.S. Constitution because “equality of treatment is a dominant theme of our laws and a central guarantee of our State Constitution.”

The court also suggested that the plaintiffs, seven long-term same-sex couples, must do more than fight their battles in court, they must change social mores.

The courts can ensure equal treatment, the ruling states, but it “cannot guarantee social acceptance, which must come through the evolving ethos of a maturing society. Plaintiffs’ quest does not end here. They must now appeal to their fellow citizens whose voices are heard through their popularly elected representatives.”

Just after the ruling was issued, Garden State Equality, New Jersey’s main gay and lesbian political organization, quickly announced that three lawmakers would introduce a bill in the Legislature to get full marriage rights to same-sex couples.

Democratic Gov. Jon S. Corzine supports domestic partnerships, but not gay marriage.

Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese commended the court, and urged the Legislature to “not go down the path of separate but equal, but rather ... embrace marriage equality.” Solmonese noted that the decision affects only civil marriage and allows religious institutions to decide if they want to honor same-sex unions.

Cases similar to the one ruled on Wednesday are pending in California, Connecticut, Iowa and Maryland. Supporters of gay marriage said they were invigorated by the court’s ruling.

“New Jersey is a stepping stone,” said Matt Daniels, president of the Virginia-based Alliance for Marriage, a group pushing for an amendment to the federal Constitution to outlaw same-sex marriage. “It’s not about New Jersey.”

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And Now New Jersey (National Review Online, 061026)

By The Editors

Earlier this year, defenders of marriage as we have known it enjoyed a string of victories in the courts. Several state and federal courts turned back challenges to states’ marriage laws, leaving it to voters and state legislators to decide whether those laws should be changed to allow for legal recognition of same-sex “marriages.”

At the time, some commentators took the decision as proof that constitutional protection for marriage was unnecessary. Those of us who had warned that the courts were going to impose same-sex marriage on a balking public were dismissed, as we have been before, as alarmist.

Our response was twofold. First, we pointed out that the tenor of the judicial decisions was in part a response to the political success of the campaign for the marriage amendment — without it, more courts would have followed the lead of the Massachusetts high court, imposed same-sex marriage, and patted themselves on the back as civil-rights pioneers. Second, we observed that as welcome as those decisions were, traditional marriage laws — and the right of the people and their elected representatives to draw them up — would exist only on judicial sufferance without an amendment. If the judicial mood changed, for example because the campaign for an amendment had flagged, then judges would recommence altering the marriage laws. And, of course, some bold court might decide to impose its conception of justice, political consequences be damned, by rewriting the marriage laws.

New Jersey’s supreme court has, alas, now proven us right. Even in that liberal state, protective of gay rights, the political process did not yield the marriage policy liberal legal activists have sought. So they have gotten the court to hand them victory.

It is being described as a partial victory, because the court has said that same-sex couples must have access to the same benefits as married ones but not that they must be eligible to be called “marriages.” Do not be fooled. The court has accepted the premise that treating married couples differently from same-sex couples is a kind of irrational discrimination. That premise leads fairly directly to same-sex marriage in logic, and may do so in future litigation.

There is another reason to expect this attempt to split the benefits from the name of marriage will collapse. Portability is a real benefit of a state-recognized marriage. When Texas declares you married, in the normal course of things Arkansas does too. You can cross state lines without worrying whether your marriage remains legally valid. For good reasons, the federal government has allowed states not to recognize same-sex “marriages” in other states. Whether that federal policy will withstand the activism of liberal courts remains to be seen. But even if it does, same-sex couples in New Jersey may legitimately ask: If we are to have all the benefits of marriage on an equal basis, then are we not entitled for the state to give us the best shot it can at ensuring that those benefits are portable? And does that not mean that we are entitled to the word “marriage” as well as to its accoutrements?

The basic move that the New Jersey court made was from a constitutional guarantee of equality to same-sex marriage rights. It is the same move that has been made in other courts. And it is the same move that has been made by social liberals in the court of public opinion: To deny marriage to same-sex couples is, supposedly, to treat homosexuals as less than full citizens. Not a few advocates have even said that it is to treat them as less than fully human.

Against this sentiment, conservatives have countered first that equal rights for individuals do not entail a right of couples to have marriage redefined to suit their desires, and second that it would not be up to courts to draw out that implication even were it true. There is an argument for letting the people of each state decide their own policy on marriage, although a uniform national definition of marriage has its advantages too. But there is no good argument for letting judges redefine marriage in one state after another and calling it federalism.

A healthy culture of marriage is, among other good things, a crucial prerequisite for self-government. We fear that both marriage and self-government will suffer if a constitutional amendment does not rein in the courts.

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New Jersey Supreme Court Says No Fundamental Right to Same-Sex Marriage (townhall.com, 061027)

By Jay Sekulow

In a decision that came dangerously close to authorizing same-sex marriage, the New Jersey Supreme Court concluded in the case of Lewis v. Harris that there was, in fact, no constitutional right under the New Jersey Constitution for same-sex marriage. This aspect of the opinion is very important. If advocates for same-sex marriage were successful in obtaining a decision mandating a marriage designation, they could have then challenged the federal Defense of Marriage Act and brought future challenges mandating that other states authorize same-sex marriages as well. In light of the court’s decision, that avenue is foreclosed.

The court noted that both the U.S. Supreme Court and decisions in New Jersey “fall far short of establishing” that same-sex marriage was a fundamental right. Advocates for same-sex marriage often rely on the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Loving v. Virginia, where a prohibition on interracial marriage was deemed to be unconstitutional. Same-sex marriage advocates have utilized the Loving case to draw an analogy to their ongoing fight for marriage recognition.

Ed Mather of Morristown, N.J. hands out ‘Marriage Equality’ signs to people who gathered at a rally in Montclair, N.J. on Wednesday, Oct. 25, 2006. New Jersey’s Supreme Court opened the door to gay marriage Wednesday, ruling that homosexuals are entitled to the same rights as heterosexuals, but leaving it to lawmakers to legalize same-sex unions. (AP Photo/Tim Larsen)

The New Jersey Supreme Court noted that Loving dealt with “intolerable racial distinctions that patently violated the Fourteenth Amendment.” The court noted that Loving and other cases cited by plaintiffs all dealt with heterosexual marriage. The court explained that:

“In searching for the meaning of ‘liberty’ . . . we must resist the temptation of seeing in the majesty of that word only a mirror image of our own strongly felt opinions and beliefs. Under the guise of newly found rights, we must be careful not to impose our personal value system on eight-and-one-half million people, thus bypassing the democratic process as the primary means of effecting social change in this State.”

Although the court ultimately concluded that there was no fundamental right to same-sex marriage, it did hold that, “under the equal protection guarantee of Article I, Paragraph 1 of the New Jersey Constitution, committed same-sex couples must be afforded on equal terms the same rights and benefits enjoyed by married opposite-sex couples.” The court, however, resisted the temptation to mandate a statutory scheme change that would require the adoption of a marriage law for same-sex couples. Rather, the court has put the burden on the legislature to come up with either a marriage definition or a civil union statutory framework.

In this case, advocates for same-sex marriage sought the title of marriage as being significant. In fact, they argued that the title “marriage” is “an intangible right, without which they are consigned to second-class citizenship.” In rejecting the requirement for marriage, the court said: “We will not presume that a difference in name alone is of constitutional magnitude.”

Same-sex marriage advocates were disappointed with the decision, as were those who favored traditional marriage. We filed briefs in the case asserting that the definition of marriage should be maintained as a relationship between one man and one woman. While the court agreed that there’s no fundamental right to same-sex marriage, the mandate for substantial and significant benefits identical to marriage means that New Jersey, like Vermont, now has a mandated civil union statute in place. While this saves for another day the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act and does not give the same-sex advocates what they wanted, the issue of marriage continues to be one of significance that will be litigated throughout the country.

Jay Alan Sekulow is Chief Counsel for the American Center for Law and Justice.

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Who’s to blame for anti-gay-marriage initiatives? (townhall.com, 061101)

By Linda Chavez

Voters in eight states will decide on Nov. 7 whether to amend their constitutions to ensure that marriage continues to be an institution limited to one man and one woman.

It’s too bad it has come to this, especially since the amendments won’t do much to restore marriage to its once lofty place in our society. But it’s not the Christian Right or the Republican Party that has brought us to this pass.

We shouldn’t have to clutter our state constitutions, much less the U.S. Constitution, with language defining marriage, but a few activist judges have left voters little choice unless they are willing to embrace judicially imposed gay marriage or its equivalent.

For millennia, all civilizations have understood marriage to exist exclusively between men and women (though many civilizations have chosen to allow husbands to marry more than one wife concurrently). Homosexual relationships surely have existed throughout history, but homosexuals have not sought marriage rights nor has any society formally sanctioned such relationships through its laws, that is until the late 20th century, and then in just a very few societies.

Now, some judges in the United States have cast aside tradition and law in favor of an experiment in reordering society, without the democratic consent of the citizens of the affected communities. Should it surprise anyone that a backlash has ensued?

Last week, the New Jersey Supreme Court decided that the state constitution “guarantees that every statutory right and benefit conferred to heterosexual couples through civil marriage must be made available to committed same-sex couples.” While the New Jersey justices didn’t go as far as their Massachusetts counterparts in actually ordering the state legislature to pass legislation giving the right to gay couples to marry, the difference may be more semantic than real.

Since New Jersey already allows for domestic partnerships through a 2004 law passed by the state legislature, the court was clearly insisting that the domestic partnerships law doesn’t go far enough because it distinguishes such relationships from actual marriages. New Jersey legislators appear likely to enact a civil union statute in response to the court’s action, but there is no guarantee that some future court decision won’t invalidate civil unions as unconstitutional, too, that is unless New Jersey amends its constitution to limit marriage to the union of one man and one woman.

Some of what gay couples say they hope to gain through legislation or court orders conferring them with marriage rights could easily be achieved by other means. Gay couples, just as any two individuals, can jointly own property together, and the rights to such property upon death or dissolution of the partnership can be spelled out in the contract itself.

States could — and should — pass laws that allow adults to choose who will make medical decisions for them in the absence of a spouse. Why should only homosexuals and not other single persons be allowed to designate someone other than a family member to make medical decisions if they become incapacitated?

Many employers and some states already allow gay couples to share medical and pension benefits. So long as the individual is paying the premiums, why shouldn’t he be able to designate who participates? And if the pension is deferred compensation that the employee has already earned, why shouldn’t she be able to leave what is in the account to the beneficiary of her choice? And why should such benefits be available exclusively to individuals who have a sexual relationship with each other?

The most nettlesome issue for gay couples involves parental rights when one partner is the biological or adoptive parent and the other has not adopted (or in some cases not been allowed to adopt) the child. If something happens to the non-adoptive or non-biological parent, the other person who has cared for and raised the child, often for the child’s entire life, does not have the right to obtain custody or, in some cases, even maintain a relationship with the child. This doesn’t seem fair to the parent or to the child. But this issue also can be specifically addressed without redefining marriage.

As with abortion 30 years ago, states were on their way to defining public policy on the rights of homosexual couples when the courts intervened. The initiatives on this year’s ballot will simply ensure that this tough social and moral issue is resolved through the normal democratic process and not by a few judges.

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The Homosexual Assault On Traditional Marriage (townhall.com, 070207)

By Ben Shapiro

There are those who do not believe that the institution of marriage is under assault. There are those who do not believe that same-sex marriage is a knowing attempt to undermine the nature of marriage. There are those who do not believe that many homosexuals bear a particular animus for heterosexual marriage, and have designs beyond mere tolerance.

Then there are those of us who live in the real world.

In Washington, proponents of same-sex marriage, under the banner of the falsely named Defense of Marriage Alliance, have proposed a state ballot initiative that would require straight married couples to have children within three years or face annulment. “For many years, social conservatives have claimed that marriage exists solely for the purpose of procreation,” explained DOMA organizer Gregory Gadow. “The time has come for these conservatives to be dosed with their own medicine. If same-sex couples should be barred from marriage because they cannot have children together, it follows that all couples who cannot or will not have children together should equally be barred from marriage.”

It seems intensely ironic that same-sex marriage advocates, who proclaim the basis of their politics to be consent, should sponsor such an initiative. But, of course, they are not serious; they are using marriage as a political club to make a point. Their point in Washington is purportedly to prove that traditional marriage is not solely about children — and that if it is not about children, it is about discrimination for its own sake. But even same-sex marriage advocates realize that though traditional marriage sees children as the first priority, it does not rest its legitimacy solely on the basis of child-bearing and rearing.

The goal of same-sex marriage proponents is to elevate homosexuality to the same moral level as heterosexuality. If children are not the sole purpose of marriage, they say, any marriage is merely a grouping of two people who love each other. This is absurd. Marriage is implicitly about the relationship between man and woman. Marriage is codification of the idea that a man and a woman in a committed and sexual union make each other and the surrounding society better.

Women and men are inherently different. They are not interchangeable parts. Men have different strengths and weaknesses than women. A marital relationship between a man and a woman provides spiritual enrichment for each. The union between a single man and a single woman is, as the liturgy says, blessed.

That this blessed union produces the blessing of children demonstrates the Divine origin of such unions. Children are not merely the product of traditional marriage and the beneficiaries of it; they are Divine confirmation that the union of man and woman is special and good. The fact that certain traditional marriages do not produce children does not invalidate the general point that men and women belong together, just as the fact that broken cars exist does not demonstrate that ignition keys ought generally to be put in exhaust pipes.

Advocates of same-sex marriage argue that gender is literally meaningless. It is for that reason that they compare gender to race in legal contexts. Citing Loving v. Virginia , the Supreme Court case that ruled anti-miscegenation statutes unconstitutional, advocates claim that distinctions based on sex are the same as distinctions based on race.

If gender is meaningless, children do not need both mother and father; a father and a father, two mothers, six fathers and a mother — any or all may suffice. To homosexual marriage proponents, the fact that only the sexual union between men and women produces children is an unfortunate accident of nature. Would that nature had made mankind completely androgynous, so as to demonstrate the complete and utter homogeneity of all people!

Gender is not meaningless, of course. The radical individualism that denies all distinction between men and women is deeply pernicious. It denies the spiritual in mankind. It denies the obvious physical and spiritual bounty springing from traditional marriage. It also denies to children the benefits of a mother and father.

In one sense, Washington’s same-sex advocates do us a favor: They make clear that in order to deny homosexual marriage, we must uphold the beautiful and natural distinctions between men and women. They also make clear that we must uphold the value of heterosexuality over homosexuality. We must take up the gauntlet and, in doing so, vindicate the possibility of a higher spiritual elevation through the deepest possible human relationship.

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>>Same-Sex Marriage — Challenges & Responses (townhall.com, 070211)

By Gregory Koukl

The latest in the aggressive efforts to redefine marriage is a Washington state initiative that would nullify marriages that don’t produce children. “Absurd.” That is even how the supporters describe their attempt to challenge the Washington State Supreme Court’s Anderson ruling last year. As we all know, the redefinition of marriage or the attempt to clarify the traditional definition has been the subject of courts, legislative houses, and voter initiatives across the country.

A few years ago, the L.A. Times quoted a homosexual mayor in New York State dismissing the cultural significance of same-sex marriage. “I’ve never heard of anyone’s life being destroyed because someone got married,” he sniffed. Reading this assertion charitably (he couldn’t have meant no one’s life was ever destroyed by marriage), I take it this government official was mystified by the idea that anything bad could come of men marrying men or women marrying women. I immediately knew I was listening to a man who didn’t understand a simple truth: Ideas have consequences. In the case of same-sex marriage, the consequences will be massive.

First, changing the definition of marriage implies that marriage is just a matter of cultural definition. If so, then “marriage” is nothing in particular and can be restructured at the whim of the people. It’s p