Box Turtle Bulletin

Wyoming to ban marriage but pass Civil Unions?

Wyoming has been a bit of a question when it comes to marriage equality. State law did not prohibit recognition of out-of-state same-sex marriages, but no state agency had done so. Today, the House passed a bill to ban recognition of out of state marriage and civil unions by a 32-27 vote.

Considering that the House has 41 Republicans and 19 Democrats, this was a rather close vote. The bill now goes to the State Senate, which has a 23 to 7 Republican majority. (trib)

State Rep. Owen Petersen, R-Mountain View, the bill’s sponsor, said the legislation is needed to resolve a conflict in Wyoming law, which defines marriage as a contract “between a male and a female person” but also recognizes any valid marriage performed outside the state. Other supporters have said the bill will help to hold back government intrusion into Wyoming traditions and culture.

And on Friday, the Senate Judiciary Committee passed a proposed constitutional amendment banning gay marriage by a 3-2 vote. Although an amendment would require support from 20 Senators and 40 House members, and some Republicans are on record as supporting marriage-equality, it has strong support and could pass.

But while this is all troubling news, state legislators may prove unwilling to completely disregard the state’s motto, “Equal Rights,” or its it’s nickname, “The Equality State.” They may instead take a middle position that allows them to be “The (separation but) Equality State”. (trib)

This week, the House Judiciary Committee will take up legislation to establish civil unions in Wyoming that would give same-sex couples in the state the same legal rights and benefits as married couples.

The bill, House Bill 150, appears to have the votes to pass the Judiciary Committee.

State Rep. Cathy Connolly, the Laramie Democrat who’s sponsoring HB150, said she’s “very optimistic” the bill will pass the full House, as many gay marriage opponents have said they support civil unions.

Governor Matt Mead (R) has also indicated that he is open to the idea of civil unions. If House Bill 150 becomes law, it would be the first time that an overwhelmingly Republican state government had supported recognition on this level for same-sex couples.

I strongly believe that civil unions are inferior to marriage and that our community ought to strive for full equality. But absent that political possibility, I consider each small step towards equality to be a victory. And if civil unions is seen as supportable for western-state libertarian-minded Republicans, then our community certainly has something to celebrate.

NOM wages war on New Hampshire Republican leadership

The newly elected Republican supermajority in New Hampshire is interested in the economy and jobs and taxes. And House Republican Leader D.J. Bettencourt has stated that warring over marriage is not one of the party’s immediate priorities.

Well, to National Organization for Marriage, this makes Bettencourt an enemy to be destroyed. So they fired up their attack machine. (Boston.com)

Bettencourt said the National Organization for Marriage sent a direct mailer to his district in Salem saying he doesn’t support traditional family values. He said the mailer was the result of his announcement last week that the House Republican agenda did not include repealing gay marriage.

But it may have backfired. Rather than resulting in marches on his office by outraged citizens waving pitchforks and demanding a witch trial over Teh Gheys getting married, this act or aggression simply pissed off Bettencourt (and probably quite a few other Republicans, as well). So he used it against them.

In a letter to his fellow legislators, he said that NOM’s move proves that marriage is “controversial” and would be a distraction, so it should be put off for another year.

“This assault on our agenda has the potential to take important focus and energy away from our focus on the budget,” Bettencourt wrote O’Brien. “Therefore, it is my belief that the same sex marriage repeal must be retained in the Judiciary Committee this year so that our full and undivided attention is focused on New Hampshire’s outstanding financial issues.”

Maryland’s first step towards marriage equality

The process for enacting marriage equality in Maryland has begun. (Washington Post)

A bill sponsored by Senate Majority Leader Robert J. Garagiola (D-Montgomery) was introduced Friday.

Garagiola’s lead role “shows the very strong support there is within the body, and the Democratic caucus in particular,” said Sen. Richard S. Madaleno Jr. (D-Montgomery), an openly gay lawmaker who has served as lead sponsor of similar bills in previous years.

The bill will next go to the Judicial Proceedings Committee, where it is expected to pass within the next two or three weeks and return to the Senate floor. It is speculated that there are adequate votes in the Senate (35 of the 47 Senators are Democrats) but that is uncertain.

Should it pass the Senate, the House Majority leader will be sponsoring the bill in that body where support appears to be stronger.

Should the marriage bill not pass, Allan Kittleman, Senate Minority Leader, is sponsoring a civil unions bill. This bill has a bit of a twist, it would allow civil unions for both gay and straight couples; it is based on his views that the state should recognize unions (gay and straight) and leave it to churches to assign marriage sacraments.

But Kittleman’s position has come with a cost. The Senate Republican Caucus does not support his civil unions scheme. He has stepped down from the leadership position to allow someone more socially conservative to lead and allow him the freedom to pursue his legislative goals without worrying whether the caucus is behind him.

However, it is fairly certain that before the year is out that Maryland will have either civil unions or marriage equality and the odds are on marriage.

DC marriage appeal rejected by SCOTUS

For a case to be heard by the US Supreme Court, four of the nine justices must have an interest in discussing the constitutionality of the case. The challenge to the District of Columbia’s denial of a referendum on marriage equality did not reach that standard. (AP)

The court did not comment Tuesday in turning away a challenge from a Maryland pastor and others who are trying to get a measure on the ballot to allow Washingtonians to vote on a measure that defines marriage as between a man and a woman.

Bishop Harry Jackson led a lawsuit against the district’s Board of Elections and Ethics after it refused to put that initiative on the ballot. The board ruled that the ballot question would in effect authorize discrimination.

The facts are interesting.

After the DC Council voted to enact marriage equality, Bishop Harry Jackson (a Maryland preacher) got signatures to put a referendum on the ballot. But the District has a provision which disallows referenda on civil rights issues and the Board of Elections and Ethics deemed an anti-gay marriage vote to be just such a vote.

When the courts did not overturn this decision, Jackson appealed to the Supreme Court and asked for a stay. In March, Justice Roberts declined the stay. Now the case is settled.

We cannot extrapolate too much from this decision. However, the following seems to be true:

• There are not four anti-gay activist justices on the Supreme Court who are willing to take whatever steps are necessary to oppose equality.
• The idea that gay marriage is, indeed, a civil rights issue – or can legitimately be seen as such by an Elections Board – is acceptable to at least six of the nine justices.

Ireland formally recognizes same-sex couple

Although civil unions (which became legal at the beginning of the year) require a three month notice period under the laws of the Republic of Ireland, the nation began recognition of same-sex couples married abroad on Thursday. And on that day, officials officially recognized one such couple. (IrishTimes)

The couple, who work at Argos, formed a civil partnership at a ceremony in Northern Ireland last year.

Like other same-sex couples with a previous foreign civil marriage or partnership, their union became recognised under Irish law since last Thursday.

[But in the case of Glenn Cunningham and Adriano Vilar], there was a twist. On that same day, by chance, the pair were on a day off and at the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service offices trying to sort out Vilar’s residency status. He is Brazilian and has been living here on a student visa for the past two years or so.

“At first the officials didn’t know what to do, they’d never dealt with a legally binding civil partnership involving a gay couple,” recalls Mr Cunningham (43). “Eventually, the officials came back and said: ‘Congratulations – you’re the first couple in Ireland to be recognised as civil partners’. We were shocked – we couldn’t believe it!”

Mr Villar (29), adds: “My reaction was like, ‘Wow-wee, yahoo! Really?’ I’ve always felt quite insecure – only living here on a student visa. We went off and got a bottle of champagne to celebrate.”

Congratulations to Glenn and Adriano and to the many other Irish couples who now have, or soon will have, recognition in their homeland.

Some newly elected NH Republicans may vote against marriage repeal

When November’s election revealed that Republicans had achieved a super-majority (enough to overturn a veto) in New Hampshire, the National Organization for Marriage and other anti-gay activist groups gloated. Assuming that Republican registration equals anti-gay, they announced that they would immediately reverse New Hampshire’s marriage equality laws and override Governor Lynch’s veto to do so.

But the incoming Republican leadership isn’t interested in battling over marriage rights. It wants, instead, to deal with budget, taxes, regulation, business environment, and other fiscal matters. Anti-gay marriage is not on the leadership’s agenda.

Individual Republicans, however, have introduced language to reverse last year’s law. And social conservatives are assuming that when it comes time to vote they will have adequate power to overturn Lynch’s veto.

I’m not so sure. And neither are some in the Republican Caucus (The Dartmouth)

State Rep. Steven Cunningham, R-Sullivan, said that the newly elected Republicans may vote against a repeal of the same-sex marriage law due to their different ideologies regarding civil liberties and constitutional issues.

“It is a possibility it will pass, but I’m not convinced that such an effort will be as popular amongst Republicans as some of the other conservative issues facing the Republican Party,” Cunningham said. “I believe this year included a very large number of constitutional-oriented and libertarian individuals who chose to run under the Republican banner, embracing 80 percent of the Republican platform, but differ in areas of individual rights and issues enumerated in the constitution.”

Some Republicans told their peers in the state House that they would not be comfortable voting for a repeal after they had already granted same-sex couples marriage equality, according to Nordgren.
…
State Sen. Nancy Stiles, R-Hampton, who originally voted against the legislation to legalize same-sex marriage in New Hampshire, said she has since seen no problem with the legislation and plans to vote against the repeal if it reaches the Senate.

All in all, I think that it is unlikely that marriage equality will be reversed in New Hampshire. But it is too soon to be certain.

NOM’s rather deceptive anti-Chafee ad

The battle for marriage in Rhode Island has begun and the National Organization for Marriage has rolled out their first ad. Well, the rolled it out and then had to roll it back in because they misspelled Chafee’s name, but it’s back out there again with the correction.

The problem, of course, is that NOM is just about as honest as they ever are. Which is to say, not at all.

They tell us that Chafee only got 36% of the vote and imply that this means that only 36% of Rhode Islanders support marriage equality. But let’s look at the vote totals:

Lincoln D. CHAFEE (IND)…..123,571 36.1%
John F. ROBITAILLE (REP)..114,911 33.6%
Frank T. CAPRIO (DEM)……….78,896 23.0%
Kenneth J. BLOCK (MOD)…….22,146 6.5%
Three Others…………………………..2,799 0.8%

But what NOM doesn’t tell you is that Caprio and Block also ran on a pro-marriage-equality platform and one of t. In fact, two-thirds of Rhode Islanders voted for a candidate that pledged to support same-sex marriage.

They then do something that – if they had the ability to feel shame – would surely give them trouble sleeping. They compare Chafee’s percentage of an three-credible-person race to the results from an entirely different race. To understand how dishonest they are being, you have to have some background.

In the race for Lieutenant Governor (in which Chafee was not a candidate), the Republican nominee pulled out and threw her support to perennial candidate Robert J. Healey, JR., the founder of the Cool Moose Party (a riff on Theodore Roosevelt’s Bull Moose Party). She said that Healey agreed with her views on smaller government; and indeed Healey ran on a platform of eliminating the office of Lieutenant Governor. While NOM pretends that the Cool Moose is oh-so-amusing, it was actually the not-a-Democrat choice.

In a two-credible-person race with the Democratic candidate Elizabeth Roberts (and one minor party candidate), Republican-endorsed Healey got 39.2% of the vote. And it is that 39% that NOM compares to Chafee’s 36%.

But NOM doesn’t tell you that Liz Roberts, who got 54.5% of the Lieutenant Governor’s vote has endorsed marriage equality and supports Chafee’s efforts.

And they don’t tell you that truthful people, honest people, don’t try to fool you by comparing apples to pineapples. And, if they do, you don’t get to distort the numbers by using big bold completely-bogus graphics.

Because not only can you not compare different races involving different numbers of contestants, but the number of voters who cast a ballot in the Governor’s race was not the same as the number that voted in the Lieutenant Governor’s race. 39% of the Governor’s race is not 39% of the Lieutenant Governor’s race.

In his two-person race, Healey the Cool Moose, got slightly more votes than did Chafee in his three-person race that night; 2,492 to be exact. But that isn’t 3% of the vote like NOM’s graphic pretends.

Now graphics representing the real numbers between the two would have not illustrated NOM’s point very well, so they just used whatever they wanted. In other words, NOM behaved in a completely dishonest manner.

Why are we not surprised?

So here is my challenge to Maggie Gallagher in 2011: Maggie, I’m not going to ask you to stop lying. I’m not going to request that you take up honesty as way of life. All I ask of you now is that you stop pretending that you are on the side of God and righteousness and morality; it offends my Christian faith.

Marriage repeal not on New Hampshire GOP agenda

The AP is reporting

The House Republican’s legislative agenda will not include repealing gay marriage.

House Republican Leader D.J. Bettencourt confirmed to The Associated Press on Wednesday that jobs and the economy will be the top priorities that Republicans will use as their scorecard to measure themselves by for the next two years.

Bettencourt said social issues will take a back seat. He said one abortion initiative will be on the agenda but he declined to say what it is.

Perhaps at 27, Bettencourt represents a younger generation Republican Party.

Courage overseer assigned to be Catholic anti-gay point man

Last week I predicted that change will be coming to the Catholic ex-gay group Courage, a change that will likely turn this support group into an anti-gay advocacy group using their own choices as “evidence” against the civil rights and equalities of their Protestant and non-Christian neighbors. Further witness to the likelihood of such change has come this week. (Catholic News Agency)

The new president of the U.S. Catholic bishops’ conference, Archbishop Timothy Dolan, announced Jan. 5 that he appointed Bishop Salvatore Cordileone of Oakland, California as chairman of the conference’s Ad Hoc Committee for the Defense of Marriage.

Both Dolan and Cordileone sit on something called the Body of Members, who “provide governance and impart ecclesial authority” to Courage.

Texas lesbians still divorced

Texans Angelique Naylor and Sabina Daly met and fell in love back around 2002. In 2004 they married in Massachusetts and soon after adopted a child. But things did not work out so last year Angelique and Sabina went their separate ways.

Separation being a difficult process, mediation failed the ladies leaving them desperate for final legal determination of their assets and parental rights. But they had a problem; although they married in Massachusetts, they were not residents of the state and could not divorce there.

So they thought they’d do the rational thing: ask the state that they lived in to put legal sanction on the terms of their division and enforce them. And, perhaps to everyone’s surprise, a Texas judge agreed, and their divorce was finalized on March 31, 2010.

But Greg Abbott, the state’s Attorney General, was having none of it. The constitution bans gay marriage and thus there can be no gay divorce he decreed.

Abbott had no empathy or even the slightest concern with the plight of the women who were in legal limbo. He was interested only in making his point, in fighting ‘the homosexual agenda’ and if he destroyed lives in the process that is of absolutely no concern to him whatsoever. (What a peculiar way of thinking, to be so opposed to some ‘social harm’ that you are willing to wreak havoc on your constituents – who are harming no one – in order to hold up your notion. The social good is subservient to getting your way. Can you imagine intervening to demand that these two women not be able to resolve their property issues because you don’t like gay couples?)

But even the Attorney General isn’t entitled to butt into every case he so desires. And the appellate court ruled that Abbott didn’t have jurisdiction to appeal the case because his assistants did not file a motion to intervene until after state District Judge Scott Jenkins orally granted the divorce.

So for now, the Angelique and Sabina are still divorced.

WaPo predicts Maryland marriage this year

From the Washington Post:

Miller has given his blessing to a committee realignment that all but ensures that a gay-marriage measure will make it to the Senate floor during this year’s session, which starts Wednesday – and presumably onto the desk of Gov. Martin O’Malley (D), who pledged last year to sign it.

I have been frustrated with Maryland politics for years, but it does look like this year may be the year in which the Democratic Party in Maryland places equality for gay citizens as a higher priority than the religious beliefs of specific individual legislators. I will be delighted to joyously let bygones be bygones if they come through for our community.

My only complaint with the WaPo article is that they speak of “a coterie of moderate Democrats and vocal Republicans opposing any endorsement of gay rights.” But these opponents are not “moderate Democrats” at all and it is unfair to moderate Democrats around the nation to describe them thusly.

These Democrats aren’t “moderate” on any issues other than their opposition to equality under the law for gay people. They are liberal Democrats who, due to their religious adherence, hold deep animus to gay people and who use the position of authority to which they have been entrusted as a tool to harm gay men and women in their state. And there’s nothing “moderate” (or “liberal”) about that.

Interestingly, the Republican Minority Leader response is one that I often see championed in the comments at BTB. While he proposes a civil unions alternative, it doesn’t go as far as he would like in reducing marriage recognition for all:

“My goal is to have complete equality,” Sen. Allan H. Kittleman (R-Howard) said. In a sense.

If he had his druthers, Kittleman would do away with civil marriage altogether, he said, making it a purely religious institution. But that would have left straight couples high and dry vis-a-vis the federal government, which wouldn’t extend the benefits of marriage to those who are merely united civilly.

So he’ll opt that gay couples just be left high and dry instead. Yet he made comments that leave the possibility that Maryland may get bipartisan support when the marriage bill is passed.

NOH8 achieves celebrity symbol status

In the early 90’s a simple red ribbon, folded and pinned, was introduced as a symbol of concern and awareness for HIV/AIDS. In a short time the image was picked up by Hollywood and other celebrities as a way to identify with the cause without having to make speeches, a silent statement that could be present while receiving awards or gossiping with a tabloid reporter. And it has served as a powerful reminder since that time, visible from churches to hospices to testing centers and present on lapels of liberal activists and the portico of a Republican White House.

Few images so readily identify a specific message, but a new one does seem to be developing. After Proposition 8 banned same-sex marriage in California, celebrity photographer Adam Bouska took a picture of himself with his mouth covered by masking tape with the letters NO H8 printed in black and red. Soon others wanted their picture taken with this imagery and a symbol was born.

NOH8, an image that stands for gay equality, marriage equality in particular, has picked up a number of supporters, expected and surprising. Musicians and actors, sports personalities and cultural trendsetters, and perhaps most surprisingly Cindy McCain, the wife of failed Republican presidential candidate John McCain. But while NO H8 is readily recognized within the gay community, it had not crossed the divide to immediate public recognition.

Until this week. Last night Pauley Perrette, star of NCIS, took the image to the People’s Choice Awards, front and center. Literally. (stylebistro)

On the red carpet at the 2011 award show, Pauley stepped out in a corseted, asymmetric wedding gown emblazoned with a familiar logo: NOH8, the emblem of the LA-based NOH8 Campaign that works to bring celebrity support of marriage equality into the public eye.

When asked about the PC look, the 41-year-old actress, who incidentally married boyfriend Michael Bosman last Valentine’s Day, said she had the idea and immediately phone her stylist, Teri King. She paired the thought-provoking gown with her signature bangs, a bright red pucker and, as she said, her heart on her sleeve. Props, Pauley! You officially rock.

Although NCIS did not win Favorite TV Crime Drama, Pauley’s stance has, I’m sure, led the way for significantly more prominent visibility of this image in the future. I doubt many more dresses will take such a visible interpretation, but NO H8 will likely soon be assured a comfortable lapel home on many a talk show or interview.

Rhode Island marriage bill introduced

A bill to enact marriage equality in the State of Rhode Island was introduced today in both the House and Senate. (Providence Journal)

In the House, Rep. Arthur Handy, D-Cranston introduced his annual bill to legalize same-sex marriage in Rhode Island. The 29 lawmakers co-signing the bill include House Speaker Gordon D. Fox.

As she introduced similar legislation in the Senate, Sen. Rhoda Perry, D-Providence, said she hoped it would get a hearing and vote early in the legislative session.

A mirror of Handy’s bill, it legalizes “civil marriage” between people of the same gender to marry, while specifying that no religious institution would be required to marry same-sex couples if that would go against their teachings.

As the House speaker is gay and the governor called for marriage equality in his inaugural address, there is hope that this bill will have adequate support for success. The Senate Majority Leader is opposed to marriage equality, but she has stated that she will not stand in the bill’s way.

The Republican minority has pledged to support civil unions but any legislation allowing the term “marriage” to apply to same-sex unions should be put before the people as a referendum.

Reinhardt to NOMmies: women have their own minds

The National Organization for Marriage’s Maggie Gallagher was not happy when Justice Reinhardt was selected as part of the panel to hear the Perry v. Schwarzenegger appeal. She insisted that he recuse himself because his wife, Ramona Ripston, heads the ACLU in Southern California and supports marriage equality:

The entity that Ripston heads took part as counsel to an amicus in this very case in the district court.
According to media reports including those in the Los Angeles Times and respected legal blog Volokh.com, Reinhardt has a policy of recusing himself from cases involving the ACLU of Southern California.

In addition to the clear legal reasons that Judge Reinhardt is required to disqualify himself from this case, there are other circumstances that clearly call his impartiality into question:

· Ripston, Reinhardt’s wife, contributed money to the NO on Proposition 8 campaign. It is not known if these funds were joint or separate funds.
· Ripston publicly cheered the decision by the District Court to declare Proposition 8 unconstitutional. In a media statement, she said, “We rejoice at today’s decision but there’s a long road ahead toward establishing true marriage equality for same-sex couples.”

Reinhardt declined. And yesterday he clarified his reasoning:

My wife’s views, public or private, as to any issues that may come before this court, constitutional or otherwise, are of no consequence. She is a strong, independent woman who has long fought for the principle, among others, that women should be evaluated on their own merits and not judged in any way by the deeds or position in life of their husbands (and vice versa). I share that view and, in my opinion, it reflects the status of the law generally, as well as the law of recusal, regardless of whether the spouse or the judge is the male or the female.

Gosh, I guess the Little Lady has views of her own.

Naturally, conservatives like Ed Whelan don’t find Reinhardt’s explanations to be adequate. For me, I’ll wait until the case reaches the Supreme Court to judge the integrity of Whelan’s complaint. Should he demand that Scalia recuse himself due to his son’s advocacy on this issue then I’ll believe that Whelan is a man of integrity; otherwise this is but more results-driven posturing masquerading as principle.

AG: Marriage recognized in New Mexico

There are a small handful of states in which there is some question as to whether same-sex marriages conducted where legal are recognized within the state. The Attorney General of New Mexico has now issued an opinion that New Mexico law affords such recognition.

QUESTION:

Are same-sex marriages performed in other jurisdictions valid in New Mexico?

CONCLUSION:

While we cannot predict how a New Mexico court would rule on this issue, after review of the law in this area, it is our opinion that a same-sex marriage that is valid under the laws of the country or state where it was consummated would likewise be found valid in New Mexico.

AG Gary King was elected in 2006, and won reelection in November. He is the son of Bruce King, who served three non-consecutive terms as Governor of the state, and served 12 years in the NM House of Representatives.

It will remain to be seen what the outcome will be should any same-sex New Mexican couple challenge the state for recognition, but for now we will move New Mexico into the column of “marriages recognized here.”