MAYOR OF SEATTLE ON HIS DECISION TO RECOGNIZE SAME-SEX MARRIAGES CONDUCTED ELSEWHERE: From the Seattle Times; sorry about clunky locution

The day I announced my executive order recognizing same-sex marriages among city of Seattle employees, I stopped by a local Starbucks to pick up a latte. A woman came up to say thank you for recognizing the validity of same-sex marriages of city employees. We talked a bit and when she left, she was crying. They were tears of joy, not sorrow.

Each day, I appreciate more and more that this issue is about fundamental civil rights. It's not just a philosophical debate. It's about recognizing and valuing real people in real relationships; people who are systematically denied a certain dignity. Americans should be beyond the bias mentality of the mid-1900s. I'm proud that in Seattle, our hearts and minds embrace diversity in every form. We're a richer, fuller, freer community because of it.

If we believe in equal protection, we can't tell some people that their relationship is legitimate and others that theirs aren't just because we don't believe in same-sex unions. ...

It is not the role of government to legislate what constitutes a legally married couple in terms of skin color or sexual orientation. It is the role of government and the Constitution to respect and protect the sanctity of legal unions and ensure that the individuals in those unions are afforded equal protection, regardless of skin color or sexual orientation.

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posted by Eve at 4:31 PM | link 0 comments

SPAIN WILL LEGALIZE GAY UNIONS--ZAPATERO: From Reuters

Spain will legalize gay unions, although it may not call them marriages, incoming prime minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said on Thursday, but he did not set a time-frame for the move.

"We are going to present a bill to set gay unions on the same footing as marriage,'' he said in an interview on Spain's Telecinco television channel. "From a semantic point of view marriage may be a concept that does not cover this type of union, but it will have the same legal effects,'' he
added.

During the outgoing center-right government's two terms in office, opposition politicians in mainly Catholic Spain made several attempts to legalize same-sex marriage. Zapatero, who swept to a surprise victory in general elections on Sunday, made legalizing gay unions one of his campaign pledges.

The Vatican condemns same sex unions.

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posted by Eve at 3:07 PM | link 0 comments

QUEBEC COURT APPROVES SSM IN THIRD CANADIAN PROVINCE: From the Associated Press

Quebec homosexuals have the right to marry, the province's top court said Friday.

The Quebec Court of Appeal upheld a lower-court ruling that the traditional definition of marriage is discriminatory and unjustified. Same-sex marriages also have been declared legal in Ontario and British Columbia.

Canada's Supreme Court has been asked to clarify the constitutionality of gay marriage in a nonbinding ruling due next year, and Prime Minister Paul Martin has promised to introduce a bill to legalize it. The Quebec court case pitted some religious groups against Michael Hendricks and Rene Leboeuf, who want to marry after being together for 30 years.

The religious groups were appealing a September 2002 ruling by Justice Louise Lemelin of Quebec's Superior Court, who said restricting marriage to a union between a man and a woman was unjustified under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In California, San Francisco's mayor, the state's attorney general and two conservative legal organizations have asked the state's highest court to rule on the gay marriage question. But the California Supreme Court last week suggested it would not decide the broad constitutional issue until it matriculated through the lower courts, a process that could take a year or more.

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posted by Eve at 3:05 PM | link 0 comments

MASS. MARRIAGE MEASURE STUFF: From the Boston Globe

...As the convention wound down last Thursday, Senate President Robert E. Travaglini accepted an amendment by state Senator Brian P. Lees, the Senate's Republican leader, that would make only minor changes to the compromise amendment to ban gay marriage and enact civil unions. ...Because the amendment was one of the first in a flurry of last-minute filings, it will be among the first voted on by the House and Senate when lawmakers return March 29. The idea, according to one strategist who spoke on the condition of anonymity, was to force an early vote on the compromise, in the hope of avoiding votes on competing proposals. ...

The proposed amendment, which represents a strategic shift for gay-marriage proponents, also makes it clear that the Legislature has the power to prohibit polygamy and the marriage of close relatives, addressing other concerns that have been raised. And it would allow voters to weigh in on the gay-marriage question, an idea that appears to have widespread support. ...

Two other proposed amendments became public yesterday: One, offered by Representative Paul J.P. Loscocco, a Holliston Republican, would ban same-sex marriage and create civil unions, but would leave it up to the Legislature to define the rights and privileges associated with civil unions. The other, offered by Representative Viriato Maneul deMacedo, a Plymouth Republican, would split the gay-marriage and civil-union questions into two amendments, an idea floated by House Speaker Thomas M. Finneran several weeks ago.

Ronald A. Crews, spokesman for the Coalition for Marriage and a leader in the movement against gay marriage, said his first choice is the Loscocco amendment, but his group could support the deMacedo measure as well.
"To me, that's a much cleaner amendment -- to give the voters a real choice on what to vote on," Crews said. "You can say yes to marriage or no, and you can say yes or no to civil unions."

Arline Isaacson, cochairwoman of the Massachusetts Gay and Lesbian Political Caucus, said gay-marriage supporters are wholeheartedly opposed to the Loscocco and deMacedo amendments. "We oppose bifurcation just as strongly as Loscocco and every other anti-gay amendment," she said. "It is simply and totally unacceptable to take away over 1,000 legal protections from our families and expect us to agree or to like one version of doing that over another version."

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posted by Eve at 6:16 PM | link 0 comments

NEWS FROM OREGON

From the Associated Press: "High court makes move in gay marriage lawsuit": The Oregon Supreme Court took a step toward wading into the state's gay marriage legal thicket.

The court asked lawyers Wednesday to submit written arguments by noon Monday on whether a Portland citizen had adequate grounds to bring a lawsuit asking the state's top court to order Multnomah County to stop issuing same-sex marriage licenses.

The step is preliminary and doesn't mean the Supreme Court will make the unusual move of agreeing to rule on an issue that hasn't been decided by lower courts. ...

In a nonbinding opinion issued last week, Myers said Multnomah County was breaking the state's marriage law by allowing same-sex couples to get marriage licenses. But he also said the state Supreme Court would likely overturn the law as unconstitutional.

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From The Oregonian: "DOMA amendment drive gearing up": A statewide initiative campaign to block same-sex marriages will focus on amending the Oregon Constitution because of recent legal opinions from Attorney General Hardy Myers and others, organizers said Wednesday.

They will withdraw another proposal that would have changed state statutes to specify marriage as being only between a man and a woman. Their reason: Myers and other government lawyers have made clear the critical question is whether blocking same-sex marriages violates the constitution. ...

Changing the constitution would require a statewide vote, and some churches already are starting voter registration drives in preparation for gathering signatures to qualify an initiative for the November general election.

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From KGW Northwest NewsChannel 8: "Recall effort against two Mult. County commissioners gets rolling": Multnomah County organizers of a recall effort to oust county commission chairperson Diane Linn and fellow commissioner Lisa Naito from office say signatures and volunteers are nearly overwhelming their ability to coordinate them all.

...The Christian Coalition of Oregon, the primary organizers of the recall, had to install a second phone line and ask for more volunteers at their office in Oregon City to handle the heavy call volumes and mail requests, said executive director John Belgarde.

"We're just getting an over-the-top response on this--big time," said an exhausted Belgarde, whose cell phone hasn't really stopped ringing since Multnomah County began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples in early March.

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posted by Eve at 6:12 PM | link 0 comments

A MORE PERFECT UNION: Jonathan Rauch in the Atlantic Monthly

...But same-sex marriage neither must nor should be treated as an all-or-nothing national decision. Instead individual states should be left to try gay marriage if and when they choose--no national ban, no national mandate. Not only would a decentralized approach be in keeping with the country's most venerable legal traditions; it would also improve, in three ways, the odds of making same-sex marriage work for gay and straight Americans alike.

First, it would give the whole country a chance to learn. Nothing terrible--in fact, nothing even noticeable--seems to have happened to marriage since Vermont began allowing gay civil unions, in 2000. But civil unions are not marriages. The only way to find out what would happen if same-sex couples got marriage certificates is to let some of us do it. Turning marriage into a nationwide experiment might be rash, but trying it in a few states would provide test cases on a smaller scale. Would the divorce rate rise? Would the marriage rate fall? We should get some indications before long. Moreover, states are, as the saying goes, the laboratories of democracy. One state might opt for straightforward legalization. Another might add some special provisions for instance, regarding child custody or adoption). A third might combine same-sex marriage with counseling or other assistance (not out of line with a growing movement to offer social-service support to so-called fragile families). Variety would help answer some important questions: Where would gay marriage work best? What kind of community support would it need? What would be the avoidable pitfalls? Either to forbid same-sex marriage nationwide or to legalize it nation wide would be to throw away a wealth of potential information. ...

Actually, you can usually tell pretty quickly what effects a major policy change is having--at least you can get a general idea. States knew quite soon that welfare reforms were working better than the old program. That's why the idea caught on. If same-sex marriage is going to cause problems, some of them should be apparent within a few years of its legalization.

And notice how the terms of the discussion have shifted. Now the anticipated problem is not sudden, catastrophic social harm but subtle, slow damage. Well, there might be subtle and slow social benefits, too. But more important, there would be one large and immediate benefit: the benefit for gay people of being able to gel married If we are going to exclude a segment of the population from arguably the most important of all civic institutions, we need to be certain that the group's participation would cause severe disruptions. If we are going to put the burden on gay people to prove that same-sex marriage would never cause even any minor difficulty, then we are assuming that any cost to heterosexuals, however small, outweighs every benefit to homosexuals, however large. That gay people's welfare counts should, of course, be obvious and inarguable; but to some it is not.

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posted by Eve at 5:18 PM | link 0 comments

CLERGYWOMEN PLAN TO PERFORM SAME-SEX WEDDINGS IN FRONT OF CITY HALL: From the New York Times

A minister and a rabbi plan to officiate same-sex marriages in front of City Hall in Manhattan today, and are asking other clergy members to attend to show their support.

The event is also a show of solidarity for two Unitarian Universalist ministers who face criminal charges upstate for performing same-sex weddings. ...

Today, Ms. Bumgardner was to marry two couples -- one male and the other female -- who already pledged their commitment in religious ceremonies. The aim is to bond the couples in a civil marriage, although the legality of doing so is being challenged.

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posted by Eve at 4:52 PM | link 0 comments

WHO GOT SAN FRANCISCO MARRIAGES?: From the San Francisco Chronicle

...The 4,037 same-sex couples who obtained marriage licenses in San Francisco hail from 46 states and eight other countries, are highly educated, range in age from 18 to 83 but generally are middle-aged, and represent hundreds of occupations.

That's the picture painted by demographic information released Wednesday by the San Francisco assessor-recorder's office that tracked the licenses issued between Feb. 12, when Mayor Gavin Newsom gave the go-ahead to same-sex nuptials, and March 11, when the state Supreme Court ordered them stopped.

"It really did represent, in its final composition, people from everywhere," said Carole Migden, the lesbian chairwoman of the state Board of Equalization who got married at San Francisco City Hall to her longtime partner and officiated at more than 100 other same-sex weddings. She said she wasn't surprised to find that the majority of the couples were between the ages of 36 and 50, and that 68.8 percent held at least a college degree. ...

Of the couples who obtained marriage licenses, 91.4 percent live in California. Significant numbers also traveled from Washington, Oregon, Nevada, New York and Florida. ...

More women than men tied the knot. ...

Bill Jones, who officiated at 457 same-sex marriages, recalled a lesbian couple from Germany, several deaf couples, two cops from New York and a couple of farm boys from Nebraska.

Most of the couples said they had been together for between two and 37 years, according to Jones.

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posted by Eve at 4:51 PM | link 0 comments

SPOUSAL BENEFITS FOR GAYS AT U.N. CHALLENGED: From the Washington Post

A bloc of more than 50 Islamic states, backed by the Vatican, sought today to halt U.N. efforts to extend spousal benefits to partners of some gay employees.

The initiative came less than two months after U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan moved to award benefits to partners of gay employees who come from countries where such benefits are provided, such as Belgium and the Netherlands.

The same group is also preparing to oppose a resolution, sponsored by Brazil and supported by the European Union, at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in Geneva that calls for nondiscrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, diplomats said. The Vatican and other conservatives maintain that the Brazilian resolution and Annan's new benefits policy would provide gay people with protections never envisioned in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

A U.N. bulletin outlining Annan's new policy says: "A marriage recognized as valid under the law of the country of nationality of a staff member will qualify that staff member to receive the entitlements provided for eligible family members." It also asserts that "a legally recognized domestic partnership" will qualify U.N. staffers for similar benefits.

The United Nations has recognized polygamy, a common practice in the Islamic world, as a legitimate form of marriage and permits employees to divide their benefits among more than one wife. But the decision to expand that right to same-sex partners has fueled intense opposition.

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posted by Eve at 1:57 PM | link 0 comments

PROFILE OF THE NEW PALTZ PROSECUTOR: From the New York Times

TWO stacks of paper in the desk drawers of Donald A. Williams once showed a balance of praise and criticism from a quarter-century of prosecuting crimes in Ulster County.

Thank-you letters from the victims of criminals successfully prosecuted stood in matched measure with letters critical of cases he has prosecuted. Until last week both had easily slid into a single drawer.

But since Mr. Williams, the district attorney of Ulster County, began prosecuting officiators of same-sex marriages in the village of New Paltz, letters have poured in. And hate mail has far outstripped the friendly notes. ...

Critics say Mr. Williams breached the separation of church and state by prosecuting clergy for undertaking a church-sanctioned marriage rite. Mr. Williams says he has merely prosecuted people who illegally and knowingly conducted marriages without proper licenses. They include two Unitarian ministers and Jason West, the 26-year-old mayor of New Paltz. ...

For all the horrors he has prosecuted, however, Mr. Williams said few decisions have been as difficult as prosecuting two clergy on Monday for their involvement in same-sex marriages.

BUT he repeated, as he does at any opportunity, that his prosecution deals with a very narrow issue of law that does not infringe on the separation of church and state.

"The people empowered by the state to solemnize marriages did so knowing that the couples were not licensed," Mr. Williams said. "Regardless of sexual orientation, the state has a legitimate interest in ensuring that marriages are properly licensed."

Robert C. Gottlieb, the lawyer defending the clergy, sees the charges against his clients as an act of selective prosecution.

"He has the discretion to prosecute numerous acts that are considered a crime on the New York State law books," Mr. Gottlieb said. "Adultery is technically still a criminal misdemeanor, but I don't see the district attorney going after anyone in Ulster County on that issue."

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posted by Eve at 1:45 PM | link 0 comments

SSM IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL: From the Associated Press

WILMINGTON, North Carolina (AP) -- The parents of an elementary school pupil are fuming over the book their daughter brought home from the school library: a children's story about a prince whose true love turns out to be another prince.

Michael Hartsell said he and his wife, Tonya, couldn't believe it when Prince Bertie, the leading character in "King & King," waves off a bevy of eligible princes before falling for Prince Lee.

The book ends with the princes marrying and sharing a kiss.

"I was flabbergasted," Hartsell said. "My child is not old enough to understand something like that, especially when it is not in our beliefs."

The 32-page book by Linda De Haan and Stern Nijland was published in March 2002 by Tricycle Press, the children's division of Ten Speed Press of Berkeley, California. A follow-up, "King & King & Family," was recently published.

The publisher's Web site lists the books as intended for readers age 6 and up.

Barbara Hawley, librarian and media coordinator at Freeman Elementary School, said the book has been on the library's shelves since early last year.

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posted by Eve at 1:42 PM | link 0 comments

SKY FALLEN; FILM AT ELEVEN?: Eve replies to Donald Sensing

Well now, that's a mighty odd article ("Save Marriage? It's Too Late"). Here are five quick thoughts in response.

1) What I said below, and what Elizabeth Marquardt says (better) here: It's just not true that we have "solved the problem" of unplanned pregnancy. Given that fact, Rev. Sensing might want to be slower to give up on the institution that, by his own account, exists preeminently to make the basic biological fact that intercourse makes babies into a source of social stability and personal joy rather than social chaos and personal tragedy. Contraception has not made marriage obsolete.

2) It's also not true that we have lost the societal sense of the purpose of marriage. One of the experiences that led me to write the "When Worlds Collide" post, about the two clashing contemporary understandings of marriage, was working with people involved in the Healthy Marriage Initiative. People who work in poverty reduction, people who work with inner-city fathers and poor mothers, people who mentor teens in communities with high rates of unwed childbearing: To these people, it completely makes sense to think of marriage as a child-centered institution developed to handle the pressures, risks, and potential harms and benefits of intercourse. And I've found, when I discuss marriage in a serious, heartfelt way with unwed mothers, that they get it. Marriage as a way of protecting children and securing men's sexual and economic loyalty is not this bizarre alien concept. It's what these women want. All they need is help getting there. This is a genuine clash of worldviews, not a rout by one and surrender by the other.

3) It is really quite odd to me that Rev. Sensing would state, "Society's stake in marriage as an institution is nothing less than the perpetuation of the society itself, a matter of much greater than merely private concern," at the beginning of his essay, and then just throw up his hands in resignation at the end. Fight harder, man, if you really think civilization is on the line!

4) If I supported SSM I would be pretty p.o.'d at being told that now that heterosexuals have drained it of its meaning (made it "basically symbolic rather than substantive"), I can have the empty shell.

5) And last: If marriage is no longer a pillar of civilization, if it is instead an exchange of love-tokens signaling the existence of a happy personal bond, what'n Ah say what'n is the government doing licensing and regulating it? Sensing's piece is less an argument for SSM than an argument against civil marriage.
posted by Eve at 8:54 PM | link 0 comments

CONSTITUTIONAL RESTRAINT: Matt Taylor replies to Mark Barton

Mark Barton defends the MSJC rejection of the proposed civil union statute on these grounds:

"I would agree that as a political consideration, one should not be quick to reject a solution that provides all the substantive benefits of marriage ... [but] I can't accept that 'civil union' is neutral terminology. It's been chosen very deliberately to be not only different from 'marriage, but less prestigious."

I agree that the mission of the MSJC is to evaluate the civil union proposal on legal, not political grounds. However, the relative prestige of civil union vs. marriage is itself a purely political consideration, unless there is some tangible difference between the two in law. Legally, it doesn't matter what certain legislators say about civil unions in TV interviews, campaign speeches, or even debate on the floor of the legislature, as long as no language that explicitly violates equality makes its way into the law itself. If the statute had read "we hereby relegate same-sex couples to the dishonorable, inferior status of civil union" or for that matter "the archaic, withering institution of marriage is left to opposite-sex couples" or some such, the court might have grounds to strike it down. But neutrally-worded
use of the two terms is not in itself a violation of equality.
posted by Eve at 8:26 PM | link 0 comments

MARRIAGE RIGHTS, JUDGING, AND GENDER: Mark Tardiff replies to Mark Barton

If by "social construct" Mark Barton means "legislatively enacted" then of course civil marriage is a social construct. But that does not answer the philosophical question I raised. The penal system is also a social construct in Mark's sense, but: Is murder wrong because the legislature outlaws it? Or does the legislature outlaw it because it is wrong? Returning to our topic: Has civil marriage been the union of man and woman because the legislature defined it so? Or has the legislature so defined it because marriage is the union of man and woman? The generation that signed the Declaration of Independence and ratified our Constitution would affirm the second view. I deny that the Massachusetts court had the authority to shift to the first view, so I deny that there is a constitutional question, hence I hold that the court violated Article 30.

This exchange gives me a couple of additional reasons to support the Federal Marriage Amendment. If the traditional common law definition of civil marriage does not have the authority of civil rights guarantees because it is not explicitly mentioned in the constitution, then the FMA will remedy the situation. If civil rights are what the constitution says they are, and the FMA becomes part of the constitution, then no civil rights are violated. An appeal to moral rights could be answered by saying that there is no logical connection between moral rights and civil rights beyond the intent of the legislature to have one approximate the other.

A second reason has to do with my civil rights. The Massachusetts court ruled that the traditional common law definition is rooted in prejudice. If that is so, then all opponents of SSM are bigots and their arguments are nothing but hate speech. Given the actions of the MSCJ, I cannot be sure that no justices in the future will rule that free speech does not include hate speech. It seems to me that I have to support the FMA while I still have the freedom to do so. The problem is inherent to a court imposing SSM. A legislature, were it to enact SSM, could do so without passing any judgment on the motivation of the prior laws.
posted by Eve at 8:24 PM | link 0 comments

MALE-MALE COUPLES AND COMMITMENT: Eve replies to Mark Barton

(His post is immediately below mine.)

Three hyperbrief comments: 1) People interested in this discussion should know that we discussed the question, "Why fidelity?" on the blog several months ago. Go here and scroll up, then go here and scroll up. (Sorry about the reverse-o-vision--it's a handicap of blogs.)

2) I can't accept any argument that rests on the premise that we have "cured" the risk of pregnancy. Manifestly we haven't. (I doubt we even, really, want to.) According to NIH, about half of all U.S. pregnancies are unplanned. Mark's argument (like Donald Sensing's) relies on a belief in contraception that is simply not warranted by the facts on the ground. Our bodies still do stuff we don't expect or want them to do. Intercourse still makes babies, even when we don't expect or want it to.

3) Contra Mark's "test-drive the car before you buy her" claim, couples who cohabited before marriage have higher divorce rates than those who don't. Yes yes I know--correlation is not causation etc etc etc--but that certainly isn't the picture that Mark's worldview would lead us to expect, is it? If you have either patience or a printer, you can find a pretty good piece I did on this question (which addresses several possible causal connections) by scrolling to pages 8 and 9 here (PDF).
posted by Eve at 7:58 PM | link 0 comments

MALE-MALE COUPLES AND COMMITMENT: Mark Barton replies to David Benkof

David Benkof: Certainly there are some gay men who are totally faithful to each other. But does it matter that most are not? In deciding whether to change the definition of marriage, I think it does.

Mark B.: First, I can't cooperate with this usage of "faithful." Certainly many gay couples (and of more stable gay couples, probably most) are consensually non-monogamous, but that's a very different thing from being "unfaithful." The primary meaning of "faithful" is not about monogamy, it's about fulfilling commitments. Sleeping around within the terms of a sexual compact is not infidelity.

Second, David seems to be inviting us to conclude that consensual non-monogamy cautions against allowing SSM, but I suggest he needs to spell the argument out because it's by no means obvious. If anything it seems backwards. The claim I keep hearing is that the main goal of marriage is to ensure that parents stick together for long enough to help raise the kids they bear. Gay experience by no means automatically translates, but to the extent it does, it says that a bit of realism about sexual temptation and a bit of communication and negotiation about expectations does wonders for the stability of a relationship. Why is David not jumping at the chance to bring some of these insights inside the tent?

Of course, fifty years ago there was a passable answer to this question: there was no reliable contraception, so the only workable way of ensuring that kids were brought up by their biological parents was to force heterosexual sexual activity to be confined to marriage, and moreover, exactly one marriage per person. Sexual compacts would have run significant risk of producing unwanted children. But that conception of marriage as a licence to have sex is a dead horse, and David certainly doesn't have my support for trying to flog it back to life again.

I don't oppose it because it's stuffy responsibility that unnecessarily spoils people's fun--I oppose it because in the modern world it's actively irresponsible. In this day and age, when couples get married according to the traditional script, with no intimate and domestic experience of one another but an expectation of having kids, they're not being noble, they're being stupid. Precisely because raising kids optimally requires a sustained commitment by two people, I can't support a system that says, even just symbolically or with greatly reduced practical force, that the point of no return is a point of grossly inadequate information.

The proper point of no return is the point of choosing to have kids. After that there's a responsibility to try to make a stable environment for the kids, not at infinite personal cost, but still at significant cost. Therefore, before that point there's a responsibility to be realistic and frank about forces that may arise later and produce intolerable conflict, including sexual and domestic incompatibility, and adultery. Open relationships are by no means for everyone, but they should certainly be a possibility to be considered.
posted by Eve at 6:38 PM | link 0 comments

MARRIAGE & RELIGION: J.A. Browning

[J.A. Browning is "an ex-Roman Catholic, old fashioned grandmother raising six grandchildren, who believes in the rights of all taxpayers in this government."]

If two people want to enter into a business contract there are procedures regarding what is necessary. lf that contract is for a 'civil/state union' of two people there are laws regarding it. However, the term marriage should not be applied to the 'civil/state union contract'. This country is founded on a premise that there is separation of church and state. lf the term marriage is used it implies a religious conotation of a union of two people and the state should not be involved. The terms need to be separated as is the state and the church. Thereby allowing any two people to enter into a 'civil/state union contract' not a marriage, which has absolutly nothing to do with any religious group or church (which often prevent the use of common sense). It is time to completely separate in everyway of any terms or suggestions that link church and state.
posted by Eve at 6:33 PM | link 0 comments

PARODY SITE!

Sincerest form of flattery? We're honored!
posted by Eve at 6:20 PM | link 0 comments

ORE. COUNTY IS BREEDING LAWSUITS: Oregonian editorial

Perhaps Multnomah County commissioners should have led a secession from the rest of Oregon before deciding to treat state statutes as optional. Then county Chairwoman Diane Linn wouldn't be in such a pickle, trying to appear deferential to the governor and attorney general while continuing to make a mockery of Oregon's code of law.

On Friday, Gov. Ted Kulongoski urged the county to stop issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. On Monday, Linn said the county would keep going. This action defies state statutes that limit the granting of a marriage license to one man and one woman. It also ignores the opinion of state Attorney General Hardy Myers, who advised the county against ignoring statutes without a definitive ruling by the Oregon Supreme Court.

No, Multnomah County will keep passing out marriage licenses, based not on state law but on the personal opinions of its elected leaders. Linn's latest decision makes a swift judicial ruling from the Oregon Supreme Court even more vital: It is embarrassing to see the county carrying on like this, increasing its liability and decreasing its credibility every day. ...

We agree with Myers that Oregon's marriage statutes might be unconstitutional, under the provision that grants equal privileges and immunities to all citizens. If the statutes are unconstitutional, they should be thrown out -- and then Oregon can have a civil debate about the role of
government in defining marriage.

But counties can't pick and choose the laws they like. As the governor said Friday, "Until the Supreme Court rules, we should abide by the laws of the state of Oregon -- just as we abide by every other law. Without the rule of law, our system cannot function." It is cruel to leave same-sex couples in limbo, even as they pay for official licenses that may or may not be valid. And it is appalling to have public officials who think their opinions are more important than the law.

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posted by Eve at 6:19 PM | link 0 comments

NEW SSM BLOG

from a professor (and strong supporter of SSM) at CUNY's John Jay College of Criminal Justice.

here
posted by Eve at 12:15 PM | link 0 comments

BABIES, SEX, AND SSM: Fr. Jim Tucker replies to Donald Sensing

[I'm going to reply later today--Eve.]

When I prepare couples for the sacrament of matrimony, I ask them why they think marriage exists. With a bit of pushing and prodding, we usually end up with the double purpose of loving support of each other through life and of bringing children into the world and rearing them. I ask them what characterizes marriage and makes it different from other kinds of relationships, and (with a bit more pushing and prodding) we end up with the three traits: a one-to-one fidelity, a lifelong permanence, and an openness to children. It's important for us to go over this, I think, because society at large no longer shares this vision in its entirety. What a Catholic means by marriage cannot simply be a reflection of what society today means by that same word. ...

The traditional Catholic system of sexual morality comes from natural law reasoning. Although it includes some elements of biblical citation and custom, these are typically mere reinforcements of a line of thinking that is already complete without them. We could state the basic idea in this way: the sexual act has as its fundamental (though not exclusive) purpose the procreation of children; any use of the sexual faculty that deliberately precludes the possibility of children is to some degree contrary to the natural law and, therefore, sinful. There are more modern ways to express that same idea or to frame it in personalist terms (as in the Wojtylan theology of the body), but the traditional argument is a philosophical one from natural law. Because sex between members of the same sex is always ipso facto going to be closed to procreation, Catholic morality prohibits it. And, because procreation is inherently impossible in such cases, the Church does not marry people of the same sex. Again, the argument is from natural law. In fact, the prohibition of same-sex marriages comes from the same principle that prohibits contraception.

So, this brings us to a point that is very problematic for the bulk of people opposing SSM in the United States. On what grounds can one effectively oppose it? ...

It is, I think, legitimate to debate whether same-sex marriage might not further the degeneration and to work against it for that reason. But, at the same time that everyone's pointing fingers, it would be good for us to ask ourselves to what degree we've contributed to the mess in which marriage finds itself. There's more than enough blame to go around.

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posted by Eve at 11:06 AM | link 0 comments

RECONSTRUCTIONIST RABBIS BACK SSM: From the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel

Same-sex marriage got the endorsement of the nation's Reconstructionist rabbis at their annual convention in Deerfield Beach on Tuesday.

In a unanimous vote, the 85 rabbis called for an end to laws that prevent gays from marrying. They also condemned as discriminatory all efforts to bar gays from benefits given other couples, such as health care coverage.

"We're endorsing the same values of stability that Jews have always upheld," said Rabbi Richard Hirsch, executive director of the Philadelphia-based Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association, in a phone interview on Tuesday. "Anything that supports committed relationships is a good thing. What matters is the quality of the relationship and the devotion of the people in it, not their gender."

The rabbis, who will finish their four-day convention today, represent the smallest and most liberal of the four major American Jewish denominations, including the Orthodox, Conservative and Reform branches. Founded in 1968, the Reconstructionist movement has nearly 60,000 people in 104 synagogues, including three temples in South Florida.

Hirsch said the acceptance of gay marriage is a natural step for the movement's "progressive" direction. Its Reconstructionist Rabbinical College has ordained gay and lesbian rabbis since 1984. The movement expressed support in 1993 for rabbis who preside over same-sex unions. And its rabbinical manual in 1997 was the first to include a ceremony for such weddings.

"Most of our members thought we already had a resolution on same-sex marriage," Hirsch said. "We figured we may as well pass one."

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posted by Eve at 10:38 AM | link 0 comments

SECOND OREGON COUNTY TO MARRY GAYS: From the Associated Press

A second Oregon county has decided to issue marriage licenses to gay couples, a decision legal experts say will likely press the state's highest court to settle the issue soon.

Benton County follows in the steps of Multnomah County, the state's most populous, which has issued over 2,400 licenses to gay couples since March 3.

Benton County is home to Oregon State University and Corvallis, one of the state's most liberal cities about 80 miles south of Portland. It will start issuing licenses March 24, County Commissioner Linda Modrell said Tuesday after three hours of emotional public testimony.

Commissioners passed the measure 2-1 against the advice of County Attorney Vance Croney. ...

Legal observers say the decision by a second county to issue gay marriage licenses likely will press the state's highest court to settle the issue soon and put a stop to independent decisions made in Oregon's 36 counties. ...

San Francisco started issuing same-sex licenses about a month ago, but the California Supreme Court on Thursday ordered a halt. Officials in communities in New York and New Jersey were also ordered to stop.

That has made Portland the last resort for many couples.

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posted by Eve at 10:35 AM | link 0 comments

HOW THE WASHINGTON POST PRESENTS THE SSM DEBATE TO KIDS

[Pretty interesting. From today's "KidsPost" page.]

Interview with a kid being raised by his mother and her lesbian partner: "Sometimes," he said, "I just think maybe people think I'm weird or different because of this."

If his parents and others like them could marry, he thinks, maybe people would see that his family is like any other.

Interview with Maggie Gallagher: Maggie Gallagher, who heads a group called the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy, which studies marriage and society, says that "every child has a birthright to know and be raised by their mother and their father." If same-sex marriages were made legal, kids would be deprived of that right, she said.

"It's important for a girl to have the opportunity to know and learn from a woman in her life. It's important for a boy to have a male figure in his life," Gallagher said.
posted by Eve at 10:32 AM | link 0 comments

MORE ON THE U.U. MINISTERS' ARRESTS: Eugene Volokh

...Clergy are not in fact state officials. They are indeed delegated a certain degree of government power (potentially itself troublesome, though certainly historically well-sanctioned). But here the government's point is that this power doesn't include the power to engage in same-sex marriage. The ministers are therefore not exercising government power. Nor are they likely to dupe anyone (either the parties to the marriage, or bystanders) into thinking that the marriage is valid -- there's no danger that people will wrongly think the ministers have indeed exercised government power. Everyone knows that the ceremony is purely a combination of religious ceremony and political protest, and not the actual creation of a governmentally recognized marriage.

Rather, the ministers are doing two things: (1) speaking certain words, and (2) performing a religious ceremony while doing so. The only thing that makes a minister's conducting a same-sex marriage into purportedly illegal "solemnization" is that it involves words being said by a minister.

...Finally, note that this sort of punishment of clergy for their marriage practices, if accepted, could go both ways. ...

UPDATE: ...If, however, it does turn out that the clergy are being prosecuted solely for signing some government-issued marriage license (presumably one issued during the brief period that a New York official was indeed issuing same-sex licenses), then I'll be much less concerned about the prosecutions.

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posted by Eve at 10:09 AM | link 0 comments

NOT LOVING IT: Matthew J. Franck replies to Lea Brilmayer

...In this age of the hyperpoliticized judiciary, I would not be as confident as [Brilmayer] is that neither federal nor state judges will invent a new full-faith-and-credit doctrine to force the interstate honoring of gay marriages. But even if such fears are unfounded, the same result of nationalized gay marriage is more likely to be reached by another path entirely. For it does not follow at all from Brilmayer's argument, as she asserted, that "the assumption that there must be a single national definition of marriage...is mistaken and pernicious." The ticking bomb--not a "chain reaction" but a single explosion that could easily come on a single day--lies not in the recesses of Article IV but in the equal-protection and due-process clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The precedent to examine is the aptly named Loving v. Virginia, the 1967 Supreme Court ruling that outlawed anti-miscegenation statutes, or laws against interracial marriage. ...

Turning to the claim by Virginia that its law was not so "irrational" in purpose as to merit no deference from the Court, Warren said that "[t]here is patently no legitimate overriding purpose independent of invidious racial discrimination which justifies this classification." All that the law furthered was an ideology of "White Supremacy." And so it did. But this too should sound familiar. In Romer v. Evans (1996), the Court held that there was no rational justification for a Colorado state constitutional amendment, adopted by referendum, that barred the passage of any statutes or local ordinances recognizing discrimination against gays as any kind of offense. Justice Kennedy, for the Court in Romer, held that there was no way to view that amendment except to say that "the disadvantage imposed is born of animosity toward the class of persons affected." No argument of "rational basis" was given any credence in Romer, any more than it had been in Loving. It's fair to say that Justice Kennedy condemned an ideology of "Heterosexual Supremacy" in terms strikingly similar to those used by Chief Justice Warren. ...

Now do a quick head count. Surely Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer would all see the analogy of a gay-marriage case to Loving. They cannot be trusted to notice that "sexuality" and race are hardly in comparable categories of human attributes, and that only one of them has any connection to the historic purposes of the Fourteenth Amendment. American society's legal abandonment of marriage as we have always known it depends on the vote of Justice Kennedy and/or Justice O'Connor. I wouldn't bet against either of them joining the four just mentioned. After all, they were in the majorities in Romer and Lawrence, and Kennedy wrote the incompetent, overreaching opinions in both cases.

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posted by Eve at 1:47 PM | link 0 comments

TWO MINISTERS CHARGED IN GAY NUPTIALS: From the New York Times

The Ulster County district attorney filed criminal charges yesterday against two Unitarian ministers who performed same-sex marriage ceremonies in New Paltz, N.Y., after a court barred the mayor from doing so.

Many who have closely followed the national debate about same-sex marriage said yesterday that this was the first time clergy members have faced prosecution for conducting rites sanctioned by their church.

The district attorney, Donald A. Williams, said in a statement that the misdemeanor charges did not violate the constitutional separation of church and state. "It is not our intention to interfere with anyone's right to express their religious beliefs," Mr. Williams said, "including the right of members of the clergy to perform ceremonies where couples are united solely in the eyes of the church or any other faith."

But he said that the ceremonies on March 6 by the two ministers, the Rev. Kay A. Greenleaf and the Rev. Dawn Sangrey, also had a legal significance. He said that the ministers "have publicly proclaimed their intent to perform civil marriages under the authority vested in them by New York state law, rather than performing purely religious ceremonies."

The issue at hand, the prosecutor added, is the narrow question of whether the ministers had confirmed that the couples had marriage licenses. It is a misdemeanor punishable by up to $500 or one year in jail for a member of the clergy or a government official to solemnize an unlicensed marriage.

A much larger issue has been broached, said Robert C. Gottlieb, the lawyer for the ministers. "This district attorney used his discretion to prosecute and bring the issue to a whole new level," he said. "By pulling the trigger, he has now said he will criminalize any clergy who enter Ulster County and conduct same-sex marriage ceremonies."

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posted by Eve at 1:26 PM | link 0 comments

BUSH HAS WRONG REMEDY TO COURT-IMPOSED GAY MARRIAGE: Stuart Taylor, Jr.

...In that spirit, I prophesy that Kennedy, his four more-liberal colleagues, and possibly Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, will seek to promote gay marriage but will proceed cautiously, with their fingers to the winds of public opinion. They may begin by issuing narrowly drawn decisions enforcing state court judgments -- which other states have almost always been required to honor -- such as judicially approved property settlements in divorce decrees growing out of Massachusetts gay marriages. And when these justices sense that the time is ripe -- assuming that those who remain on the Court have the votes -- they will apply the full-faith-and-credit two-step to ban states from discriminating against other states' gay marriages in any way.

This prospect leaves me quite conflicted. While I strongly support gay marriage, I oppose its imposition by judicial fiat. And while judicial activism at its best can build public consensus for long-overdue reforms, I am concerned that the courts have increasingly crossed the line from exercising healthy activism into usurping legislative powers, disdaining representative government, and casually casting aside tradition in the guise of interpreting the Constitution.

So I have some sympathy for the idea of amending the Constitution to prohibit any judicial decision construing that document to require recognition of any gay marriage. ...

By no stretch of the imagination, however, is the proposed amendment behind which Bush has placed his prestige an appropriate way to protect representative government. Quite the contrary. The first clause of the so-called Musgrave amendment (sponsored by Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, R-Colo.) would impose a uniform federal definition of marriage upon the whole country: "Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman." This amounts to an anti-democratic, anti-federalist effort to ban all state legislatures, for all time, from experimenting with gay marriage -- even if and when most voters in most states come to support gays' right to wed. And public opinion appears to be headed in that direction: Although polls still show voters opposing gay marriage by a ratio of about 2-to-1, the numbers appear to be softening over time. Especially significant is that young voters are far more open to gay marriage than old ones.

In this sense, the president's position on gay marriage has something in common with that of the Massachusetts court: Neither is willing to defer to democratic governance. While the court has imposed its definition of marriage on today's voters, Bush seeks to impose his own definition on their children and grandchildren.

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posted by Eve at 6:41 PM | link 0 comments

GAY MARRIAGE DEBATE INCLUDES QUESTIONS OF RELIGIOUS LIBERTY: From the Christian Science Monitor

...In Massachusetts, the only state where the court has already mandated same-sex marriage, the deliberations have a particular urgency: Lawmakers last week cobbled together a compromise amendment designed to provide an alternative to the court ruling by banning gay marriage but establishing same-sex civil unions with the same legal rights.

To many, it's a compromise--albeit a shaky one that pleases neither side and may ultimately not pass--designed to shelter an institution that has strong religious significance.

But in practice, some legal scholars warn that the compromise could itself pose a threat to religious liberty, by putting state pressure on churches to accept the concept of civil unions to some degree.

The amendment "may do ... more serious and permanent harm than [the court ruling] itself from the standpoint of protecting the religious liberty of individuals, churches, and other religious organizations," a group of experts from Harvard and other law schools told the Massachusetts Catholic Conference, the church's public policy arm.

The scholars' key concern: introducing "civil unions" into the constitutional lexicon. "It gives wide-ranging license to judges to enforce a new social norm on organizations touched by the law," they said. "Precedent from our own history and that of other nations suggests that religious institutions could even be at risk of losing tax-exempt status, academic accreditation, and media licenses, and could face charges of violating human rights codes or hate speech laws."

Some experts express similar concerns, while others dismiss them as without merit, given constitutional guarantees of religious liberty.

John Witte, professor at Emory University Law School in Atlanta, sees the possibility of an eventual collision between religious liberty and sexual liberty norms, with religious bodies finding it "much more difficult to opt out of recognizing a constitutionally mandated form of alternative union." Eventually, gay couples might also seek "protection against church bodies in employment or enrollment decisions, in clerical appointment decisions, associational decisions with schools, charities, etc.," he adds.

There is wide agreement that a minister, priest, or rabbi has the discretion to decide whom they will marry, and cannot be forced to perform any service. ...

Bill Duncan, visiting law professor at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, sees other scenarios where a problem could arise. "A church itself may not be required to give benefits, but other church operations--charities, bookstores, parachurch groups--might be asked to."

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posted by Eve at 6:37 PM | link 0 comments

WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT THE EFFECTS OF SAME-SEX PARENTING?: Ann Hulbert

...What's surprising is that both camps have converged lately on a very basic point: The existing science is methodologically flawed and ideologically skewed. Don't count on that consensus, however, to dampen the feud.

You wouldn't guess from the current "expert" position on homosexual child-rearing that the data are in any doubt. Two years ago, the American Academy of Pediatrics put its imprimatur on the stance adopted by the American Psychiatric Association in 2000. An article in Pediatrics pronounced that "a growing body of scientific literature demonstrates that children who grow up with 1 or 2 gay and/or lesbian parents fare as well in emotional, cognitive, social, and sexual functioning as do children whose parents are heterosexual."

But behind the scenes, skeptics have emerged--and from an unexpected quarter. ...Who would have predicted this camp would come up with the most incisive critique of the claim that research has proved there are no differences between kids raised by gay and straight parents?

Whenever advocates shoot down findings that work in their favor, the result carries extra credibility. In this case it helps, too, that the professor stepping forth to do so, Judith Stacey, is a well-known sociologist whose strident advocacy of "alternative" families has made her a nemesis of traditionalists. Stacey's stringent assessment of 21 of the better studies on gay child-rearing, in an article titled "(How) Does the Sexual Orientation of Parents Matter?" cut through the ideological static that such a charged area of research almost inevitably generates. (Co-authored with Timothy J. Biblarz, it appeared in the American Sociological Review in 2001.) ...

But wait: All the evidence--as both sides acknowledge--is seriously flawed and doesn't begin to supply anything like solid support for either the hopes of gay family harmony or the fears about scarred children and skewed parenting. And until gay couples are allowed to marry, there can't possibly be decent studies of whether the honorable estate confers the same benefits on kids whose parents are the same sex as it does on those who have a mom and a dad. In the meantime, it's quite clear that the absence of good science won't--and shouldn't--settle a fraught debate. What will help clarify it are experiences like mine, watching my sister and her partner sharing the hard work and the happiness of raising their daughter. I can't think of a better argument for gay marriage than that.

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[Elizabeth Marquardt has a brief response here.]
posted by Eve at 6:33 PM | link 0 comments

SAVE MARRIAGE? It's too late: Donald Sensing

...When society decided--and we have decided, this fight is over--that society would no longer decide the legitimacy of sexual relations between particular men and women, weddings became basically symbolic rather than substantive, and have come for most couples the shortcut way to make the legal compact regarding property rights, inheritance and certain other regulatory benefits. But what weddings do not do any longer is give to a man and a woman society's permission to have sex and procreate.

Sex, childbearing and marriage now have no necessary connection to one another, because the biological connection between sex and childbearing is controllable. The fundamental basis for marriage has thus been technologically obviated. Pair that development with rampant, easy divorce without social stigma, and talk in 2004 of "saving marriage" is pretty specious. There's little there left to save. Men and women today who have successful, enduring marriages till death do them part do so in spite of society, not because of it.

If society has abandoned regulating heterosexual conduct of men and women, what right does it have to regulate homosexual conduct, including the regulation of their legal and property relationship with one another to mirror exactly that of hetero, married couples?

I believe that this state of affairs is contrary to the will of God. But traditionalists, especially Christian traditionalists (in whose ranks I include myself) need to get a clue about what has really been going on and face the fact that same-sex marriage, if it comes about, will not cause the degeneration of the institution of marriage; it is the result of it.

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posted by Eve at 6:27 PM | link 0 comments

FAMILY MATTERS: Douglas Kmiec

Neither law nor politics provides a readily accessible vocabulary on the question of same-sex marriage. For example, the legal concept of equal protection of the law is not self-defining. To know whether it applies to same-sex marriage, it's first necessary to know whether gays and nongays can similarly produce the individual and social good associated with marriage. ...

Gay couples tend to be childless, and even when surrogacy or adoption provides children, they are deprived of the mutually supportive and complementary perspectives of mother and father. Although it isn't required of every husband and wife, marriage cannot be separated from procreation and the development of a child's character within a stable family. The prosperity of the American republic, and civilizations before it, has depended on families for this vital instruction. It is irreplaceable. ...

More than a century ago, the U.S. Supreme Court declared that "certainly no legislation can be supposed more wholesome and necessary in the founding of a free, self-governing commonwealth than that which seeks to establish it on the basis of the idea of family, as consisting in and springing from the union for life of one man and one woman in the holy estate of matrimony." The court has never wavered from this definition even in its modern jurisprudence. Yes, the court, in Lawrence vs. Texas (2003), did invalidate a criminal prohibition of homosexual sodomy. But that ruling in no way endorsed the practice or same-sex marriage; rather, it simply recognized privacy and the limits of the law.

Principles anchored in privacy are insufficient to determine the public and consequential legal definition of marriage. Marriage at its best is both self- and other-regarding, considerate toward family and the civic community of which it is a part. By comparison, same-sex relationships are largely self-regarding. Gay partners may derive pleasure from such relationships. But because they are not open to new life, they cannot fulfill the duties and obligations long expected of marriage.

Before the mayor of San Francisco illegally issued same-sex marriage licenses, only four judges on the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court had the temerity to assert that the possibility of begetting children was not at the heart of the marital estate. These activist judges not only defied millenniums of history but also ignored the words of the Supreme Court in Lawrence, that it would "demean a married couple were it to be said marriage is simply about the right to have sexual intercourse."

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posted by Eve at 6:24 PM | link 0 comments

STANLEY KURTZ ON HATCH FMA

Senator Orrin Hatch may soon propose a constitutional amendment that would permit a state-by-state patchwork definition of marriage. (National Review has endorsed the Hatch alternative.) Some see this proposal as an embodiment of federalist principles; it is not. The notion that federalism permits or demands a hodgepodge definition of marriage fundamentally misunderstands the family's place in the structure of American democracy. This nation must have--and will have--a uniform definition of marriage.

It is true that, in our federal system, the states have a responsibility to regulate marriage. In accordance with the principles of federalism, the states can and should be permitted to regulate such matters as degree of consanguinity, age of consent, and the rules of divorce. Yet it is a categorical error to subject the essential definition of marriage to state regulation. The Founders did not understand either federalism or the family in this way. ...

Consider that the state of Utah was only admitted to the union on the condition that it would abandon polygamy. That precedent clearly shows that, when the fundamental definition of marriage was at stake, a uniform, national solution was deemed necessary and proper. To understand the place of marriage and family in American democracy, we must return to Tocqueville. Tocqueville saw marriage and family as one of several extra-political institutions on which healthy democracy rested: These extra-political institutions had the effect of countering dangerous trends toward excessive individualism, materialism, and state centralization.

We can see the truth of Tocqueville's insight when considering Scandinavia. The Scandinavian family has collapsed--and has been replaced by a massive, centralized welfare state. If the American family is dissolved by social redefinition of marriage, then just as Tocqueville predicted, we shall be subject to the "soft despotism" of a centralized bureaucracy. In Scandinavia, this has already happened. ...

As I showed some years ago in "The Right Balance," this country has never truly experienced a situation in which a substantial number of marriages were valid in only some states. Despite legal technicalities that may permit a state-by-state hodgepodge, in practical terms, states virtually never refuse to recognize marriages performed in other states. The reason is that, although technically permissible, a refusal of recognition would create an intolerable rift within the body politic, and would force intolerable injustices on individuals. What our history (from the Utah question, to the miscegenation issue, to the "public-policy exception") actually proves is that, even when legal technicalities might theoretically permit a patchwork definition of marriage, marriage continually shows itself to require national uniformity.

Yet even this does not fully describe what's at stake. In Tocqueville's terms, this is an issue of public mores. And on the most fundamental questions, public mores in the United States are shaped at the national level. ...There is simply no way, in the modern age, to confine the fundamental cultural meaning of marriage within the borders of one or a few states.

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posted by Eve at 6:20 PM | link 0 comments

OREGON HIGH COURT HISTORY FAVORS GAY MARRIAGE: From The Oregonian

...The chief lawyers for the Oregon Legislature and Multnomah County have come to roughly the same conclusion: Oregon almost certainly will become the third state in the country to provide constitutional equal protection to gays and lesbians.

Yet, these opinions are not based on a series of court rulings that, over time, seem to point to an inevitable conclusion. Instead, Myers relied heavily on a single state Supreme Court case, which is more than two decades old and addressed gender, not sexual orientation.

So how is it that in less than two weeks Oregon's top government lawyers all agree on such a dramatic result despite a stunning lack of case law to back them up?

A broader view of the Oregon Supreme Court provides the answer, experts say. In the past 25 years, the state's highest court has repeatedly interpreted the constitution to provide far greater rights than the federal Constitution does.

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posted by Eve at 6:13 PM | link 0 comments

MASS. GOVERNOR MAY CHALLENGE GAY MARRIAGE: From the Los Angeles Times

Gov. Mitt Romney said Friday that he might turn to the courts in his fight to keep Massachusetts from issuing same-sex marriage licenses starting in May.

That is when an order from the state's highest court takes effect, making Massachusetts the first state to legalize marriage for gay and lesbian couples. State legislators have twice voted to pass an amendment that would ban same-sex marriage, but the measure requires additional approval before it becomes law.

Romney also has discussed taking some form of executive action to block town clerks from issuing marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples beginning May 17. It was not clear whether such action would be enforceable.

"I would consider, after the Legislature has completed its work, what legal options are available to me, if any," said the Republican governor, who repeatedly has stated his belief that marriage should be limited to a union between a man and a woman.

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posted by Eve at 6:09 PM | link 0 comments

GAY PAIRS SUE FOR THE RIGHT TO MARRY: From the San Francisco Chronicle

The legal battle over same-sex marriage in San Francisco moved into a new phase Friday as couples who were left stranded at City Hall by a court order halting same-sex weddings, and others who were awaiting wedding dates, sued to overturn the state laws that prohibit them from marrying.

The hastily drafted lawsuit was filed in San Francisco Superior Court less than a day after the California Supreme Court ordered city officials to stop issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, at least for now. The court is expected to rule sometime this summer on whether Mayor Gavin Newsom had the authority to defy the state's marriage law because he considers it unconstitutional.

Until now, the conflict over the weddings authorized by Newsom a month ago has been fought by the city, the state and opponents of same-sex marriage -- parties affected indirectly, at most, by the California law defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman. On Friday, the battle was joined by six couples with something much more personal at stake.

"This case puts a face on the discrimination,'' American Civil Liberties Union lawyer Tamara Lange said at a news conference announcing the suit.

The faces in the suit include those of Pali Cooper, 48, and her partner Jeanne Rizzo, 57, of Tiburon, who were on the steps of City Hall on Thursday preparing to tie the knot after 15 years together when they learned their wedding was off.

Myra Beals, 61, and Ida Matson, 68, of Mendocino, also are plaintiffs. The couple, together for 27 years, planned to be married Friday. They say in the suit that they have had to buy expensive insurance policies to make up for Beals' ineligibility for Matson's health coverage and retirement benefits, a consequence of their inability to marry legally.

A third couple, Jewelle Gomez, 55, and Diane Sabin, 51, of San Francisco, partners for 11 years, have had to pay thousands of dollars for estate planning to make sure each would be protected if the other died. They've also had difficulty with hospital visitation during Gomez's recent surgery, the suit says. ...

Friday's suit claiming that the ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional was the second filed against the state since the Supreme Court's order Thursday afternoon. The first came from San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera, who filed shortly after the court intervened.

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posted by Eve at 6:05 PM | link 0 comments

MANY FAITHS OPPOSE SSM: This article is less boring than its headline...

[...because there's a strong, unacknowledged "recent immigrants vs. SSM" storyline. I wish the reporter had drawn out that aspect, rather than focusing on the dog-bites-man fact that hey, whaddya know, Catholic bishops and evangelical Christians don't like same-sex marriage. Anyway, the piece is here.]
posted by Eve at 6:03 PM | link 0 comments

MASS. MARRIAGE MEASURE A SHAKY SOLUTION: From the Boston Globe

...But inside the House chamber, the tedious legislative process had ground the drama into a mushy compromise that no one loves.

Lawmakers appeared reluctant to embrace the measure, which would ban gay marriage and create civil unions for gay couples. The key interest groups, whose participation would probably be crucial to a ballot fight in November 2006, are adamantly opposed to the proposed constitutional amendment.

"I'm not sure there's going to be anybody behind it," said Chip Ford, director of operations for Citizens for Limited Taxation, a statewide advocacy group that has fought for and against ballot measures in Massachusetts for decades. "It's a compromise, but everybody's going away unhappy."

The most influential and best-funded groups on both sides of the gay-marriage debate now stand ready to campaign against the proposed amendment if it reaches the statewide ballot in 2006. They are devising various scenarios to scuttle the measure before it gets there, either when the convention reconvenes March 29 or in the 2005-2006 legislative session, when it must be approved again. "It will more than likely draw opposition from two opposing camps, both operating under the theory that half a loaf is worse than none," said state Representative Robert S. Hargraves, a Groton Republican who opposes gay marriage and civil unions.

The result: a compromise without a constituency that, even if it clears the Legislature, could have difficulty attracting major political backing for a ballot fight.

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posted by Eve at 5:53 PM | link 0 comments

UNIFORMS MIX WITH WEDDING FINERY AT SAME-SEX NUPTIALS: From the New York Times

The groom wore black and so did his groom.

The police officers also wore black, except for the chief, who wore gray and served a written warning to the officiating clergy, and a plainclothes detective, who wore blue and took notes during the ceremonies.

"I wanted to go in white, but Richard said it was unbecoming," said Kevin J. Hammonds of Brooklyn, shortly after he exchanged wedding vows with his partner of 11 years, Richard L. Schwartz, before a Unitarian minister.

Referring to the presence of 18 police officers, he said, "When people talk about the legal aspects of marriage they usually don't mean police at the altar."

Welcome to the world of weddings in New Paltz, the small upstate village where, three weeks ago, the 26-year-old mayor first challenged the State of New York to jail him for performing same-sex marriages. That mayor, Jason West, was charged with 19 counts of a criminal misdemeanor for solemnizing unlicensed marriages and was served with an injunction, which he has obeyed, to stop conducting the ceremonies.

In his place, an ad hoc group of residents and clergy who call themselves the New Paltz Equality Initiative have set to the task of organizing weekly marriage ceremonies along the banks of the Wallkill River. ...

The legality of the marriages in New Paltz will likely be determined by the courts, and those officiating--all of them Unitarian clergywomen--may face the same misdemeanor charges as the mayor.

As the couples prepared to be married, the New Paltz police chief, Raymond K. Zappone, delivered warning letters to the clergywomen from the Ulster County district attorney, Donald A. Williams.

The letters, similar to one delivered to Mayor West several days before he received his criminal summons, warned that a member of the clergy who solemnized an unlicensed marriage might be charged with a misdemeanor.

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posted by Eve at 5:49 PM | link 0 comments

FRIEND OF THE BRIDES: Profile of SF mayor, from the Washington Post

Before Gavin Newsom opened the doors of City Hall to same-sex couples seeking marriage licenses, the young mayor with the movie star smile made a few discreet cell phone calls to his elders.

Almost to a person, Newsom says, his kitchen cabinet of old-line liberal Bay Area Democrats like Rep. Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Dianne Feinstein warned the new mayor that he was committing political hara-kiri.

"Few folks said this is great politics," Newsom recalls. "Quite the contrary. Everyone was warning me: It's the right thing to do, but you don't need to do it. Why do you want to do it? Why? It was surprising how many people said that." ...

Newsom's popularity in San Francisco has only soared. "His actions put him in the pantheon of civil rights trailblazers." This is Ross Mirkarimi, a veteran Green Party strategist, talking. Just a few months ago, Mirkarimi was working round-the-clock for Newsom's mayoral opponent. Now, it's only love. "He's done something marvelous and he's made us proud," Mirkarimi says. ...

"The mayor has just surprised us all," says Tom Ammiano, a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.

Ammiano says he thinks Newsom's circle has been hyping, a bit, the political courage it took to grant gay marriages licenses in a city filled with same-sex couples.

"It was actually rather astute," says Ammiano, himself a gay man and gay rights crusader. "He benefits politically. This buys him a lot of goodwill. He preempts a progressive cause. He puts himself in a national spotlight."

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posted by Eve at 5:45 PM | link 0 comments

LEADING FOE OF GAY MARRIAGE SHOWS METTLE: From the Los Angeles Times

The conservative activists who traveled to Loveland, Colo., last summer to meet Rep. Marilyn N. Musgrave had their doubts that the soft-spoken onetime housewife was the ideal flag carrier for the national campaign against gay marriage.

A Republican from rural eastern Colorado, Musgrave had proposed a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage just six months into her first term in Washington. It was an issue that social conservatives hoped might become key in the presidential campaign, and they fretted that the woman whose name was on the bill was untested in the national culture wars. But the group came away reassured. ...

In interviews and debates, Musgrave avoids expressing opinions on homosexuality. Instead, she frames the need for a constitutional amendment defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman as part of the urgency to defend marriage as an institution. She says "activist judges," such as those on the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court who ordered the state Legislature to recognize gay marriage, are forcing Congress to protect marriage by taking the drastic step of amending the Constitution. ...

But she has displayed a political toughness and ambition rare in a freshman. She stood up to conservative groups that pushed her hard to tighten the language of the amendment to specifically ban civil unions. And when Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R-Colo.) announced this month that he would not seek reelection in November, Musgrave seriously considered running for his seat before deciding instead to seek reelection to the House.

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posted by Eve at 5:38 PM | link 0 comments