Yes.
It’s just a matter of time until other states follow lead and allow unions.
By Michael J. Wilson
New York’s enactment of marriage equality not only doubled the number of citizens living in jurisdictions that permit same sex marriage, it points out what has become increasingly clear.
Whether it is state-by-state, federal legislation, court decisions or, more likely, a combination of all three, marriage equality is coming to the United States of America.
It’s just a matter of time.
If you really, really don’t support marriage equality, then living in the past is your best option. That’s because all of the trends — political, social and legal — are moving in the direction that seems as inevitable as the tides.
The facts are indisputable.
New York was the first time that a Republican legislative body — the state Senate — approved marriage equality.
The federal revocation of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and adding sexual orientation, perceived gender and gender identity to the hate crimes law are tangible examples that the Congress is willing to consider civil rights for gays and lesbians in federal legislation.
In August 2010, a federal District Court decision overturned California’s Proposition 8, which had banned gay marriage by referendum.
But the changed public polling on the issue is absolutely stunning.
In 1996, Gallup polling showed only 27 percent of Americans supported gay marriage rights.
Last May — for the first time — Gallup polling showed a majority in favor.
Most other polls reflect the same stunningly rapid reversal of opinion.
In just the past year, Gallup polling showed:
Of those 55 and over, 39 percent favored legalization, up 6 percent.
Of those 35 to 54, support grew by 3 percent to 53 percent.
But the most revealing numbers belong to those 18 to 34, whose support leaped by 16 percent to 70 percent.
Opponents of marriage equality have points on their side as well — they are just all in the past.
They point out that every time marriage equality has appeared on the ballot, they have defeated it. And they are right — so far.
But it was so close in the last vote in Maine and California where the opposition won with 53 and 52 percent, that proponents are talking about rerunning that 2009 campaign.
They can point to the numerous initiatives passed in states defining marriage as between a man and a woman.
Here again, the past is prologue. The constitutionality of such initiatives are legally suspect.
Much like earlier times in our nation’s history, state laws and court decisions have been overtaken by changing perspectives.
For example, Pace v. Alabama, which in 1883 upheld anti-miscegenation laws that banned interracial marriage across most of the country.
It took decades for a new court to reverse — by unanimous vote — this ruling. Beginning in 1948, some 16 states overturned their anti-miscegenation laws.
In 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court in the Loving v. Virginia decision struck down those laws that remained in 14 states; laws that had been legally enacted, but were, according to the Supreme Court, unconstitutional.
The case involved Mildred Jeter, a black woman, and Richard Loving, a white man, who got married in Washington, D.C., and went to home to Virginia, where they were arrested and found guilty of miscegenation.
Ultimately, an enlightened Supreme Court decision will strike down bigoted marriage laws in the remaining recalcitrant states, just as it did with its Loving decision.
It’s just a matter of time.
Michael J. Wilson is the national director of Americans for Democratic Action.
No.
‘Movement’ a ploy by activist judges against the will of the people.
By Andrea Lafferty
Proponents of homosexual marriage are trying to pretend that New York’s recent enactment of a pro-same-sex marriage law is just one more step in the inevitable march of history to establish yet another new civil right.
This could be a trend, but it is not about any increase in acceptance of same-sex marriage. The trend is the continuing injustice of activist judges trying to thwart legitimate legislation and the will of the citizenry.
Remember, it was the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court that imposed same-sex marriage there even as liberal Massachusetts House Speaker Tom Birmingham refused to allow a vote on the issue in spite of a huge and successful petition drive by Massachusetts opponents to same-sex marriage.
Birmingham’s refusal to allow the issue to be listed on the ballot triggered massive protests at the Capitol in Boston and made him second only to Whitey Bulger as the greatest disappearing act in the commonwealth. Birmingham’s short-lived campaign for governor vanished and so did he. He has not been seen on the political landscape since.
What same-sex marriage proponents strain to portray as a wave of enlightenment is just smoke-and-mirrors trickery employed to disguise a grand scam in the public square.
The truth is that this is not really a movement but a ploy accomplished mostly by judges with a heavy-handed assist from the media. It looks as if judges will do everything within their power, and then some things beyond their legal power, to promote homosexual marriage and trample on the rights of those who oppose such same-sex unions.
The only genuine momentum in this fight is the long string of successes in state legislatures and the Congress by those opposing same-sex marriage.
Starting in 1996, Congress approved and President Bill Clinton signed into law the Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA. Starting with Alaska, Nebraska and Nevada, 42 states enacted similar statutes. Three of those have been overturned by judges but that means a majority of 39 states still have these state laws in effect. After the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court action, voters in 23 states amended their state constitutions to limit marriage to “a man and a woman.”
Same-sex marriage proponents have written off any chance of rolling back the wave of pro-marriage legislation and have begun a desperate campaign to repeal DOMA.
Attorney General Eric Holder has abandoned the government’s responsibility to defend the duly enacted DOMA. In February, Holder announced the Justice Department would no longer defend the constitutionality of the law.
It looks like a game of musical chairs in executive and judicial branches of government with judges pushing aside the legislatures and enacting laws while the Justice Department discards its responsibility to enforce and defend laws by rendering decisions on what its or is not constitutional.
Washington’s power knows neither checks nor balances. It is improvisational government with no traceable connection to the Constitution.
Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, said at a recent hearing on a bill that would repeal DOMA, “It is not the role of the executive branch to determine what is and is not constitutional.” The role of the executive branch, he concluded, “is to execute and uphold the laws that Congress enacts.”
As Washington political observers note, the growing desperation and frustration of the administration in addressing problems, large and small, it is important to watch the feverish attempts to rush the approval of the pet projects of the liberal agenda.
The more desperate the left appears in flailing to get its way and get it now, the louder the bell seems to be tolling for the once-promising Obama presidency.
Andrea Lafferty is president of the Traditional Values Coalition.
