aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
The Massachusetts marriage vote
Massachusetts, the only state where same-sex marriage is legal, took a first step toward banning it today when legislators voted to advance a constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union between a man and a woman.
The amendment still needs to be approved by at least 50 legislators in another vote in the 2007-2008 session. Then it would be placed on the November 2008 ballot as a popular referendum. If it passed, the amendment would not do away with the more than 8,000 same-sex marriages that have taken place since they became legal in May 2004. But it would prevent future marriages of gay men and lesbians.
The swiftness of the vote today surprised people on both sides of the issue, taking place without any prior debate, just minutes after the constitutional convention had been gaveled into session. Proponents of the amendment needed just 50 of the legislature’s 200 lawmakers to support it; the final vote was 61 in favor of the amendment and 132 opposed.
You know, I think we’re going to win this and that the longer it’s kept alive and debated the better our chances, so I don’t look at this as a defeat. It’s the process.
On the other hand, Pam makes an excellent point, “would it have been fine...to let ‘the people’ vote on whether I must sit at the back of the bus or drink from a separate fountain?”
