ROMNEY'S MARRIAGE VOWS: Boston Globe editorial

...Governor Romney's prepared remarks were heartfelt but repeated the old arguments opponents have raised ever since the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court found that homosexual couples have the same rights to civil marriage as others. It was all there: the supposed ill effects on children; the dangers of judicial overreach; the undermining of civilization's defining pillar.

Yet more than a month since the first gay marriages, and after thousands of same-sex couples have committed their lives to one another, Romney couldn't point to any concrete damage to the Commonwealth or its institutions, and he was honest enough to tell the committee that "same-sex marriage doesn't hurt my marriage, or yours."

Romney does worry about harm to children, however, which is puzzling since Massachusetts has allowed unmarried same-sex couples to adopt and raise children for over a decade. Would he want to tear these children from loving homes?

Yesterday, Romney tried to say that the constitutional gay-marriage ban under consideration in Washington is not more restrictive than the Massachusetts amendment the Legislature narrowly advanced in March. But the Massachusetts amendment would explicitly establish civil unions, while the federal amendment says no state constitution can be construed as conferring marriage rights "or the legal incidents thereof" upon any union other than a heterosexual one. ...

Romney argued against bigotry yesterday but fretted over a society "indifferent about having fathers and mothers." Only when society indeed becomes indifferent to the everyday reality of gay couples living among us will Romney's call for "tolerance and understanding" be realized.

more
posted by Eve at 12:27 PM | Link |

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home