Illinois House Passes Civil Unions Bill 61-52!

The Illinois House of Representatives passed a civil unions bill by a vote of 61-52 on Tuesday afternoon, with swift passage expected in the more liberal Illinois State Senate by the end of the day and SB 1617 ending up on Governor Pat Quinn's desk shortly thereafter.

Chicago Pride covered the story thusly:

Openly gay Rep. Greg Harris (D-Chicago), who co-sponsored SB 1716, started his opening statement at 5:17 p.m on Tuesday. "Once in every generation," he said, "legislatures across the country have a chance to advance the cause of liberty and justice for all."

The Illinois Religious Freedom Protection and Civil Union Act (SB 1716) which passed to cheers in the chamber with a 61-52 majority vote, received support from the Democratic leadership in Springfield, including Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives Michael Madigan (D-Chicago), Senate President John Cullerton (D-Chicago) and Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn, who was present.


[...]


Conservative groups, including the Catholic Conference of Illinois and Washington D.C.-based National Organization for Marriage (NOM), lobbied hard against the bill.

The bill does not recognize same-sex marriages, but will provide the same spousal rights to same-sex partners when it comes to surrogate decision-making for medical treatment, survivorship, adoptions, and accident and health insurance.

California, Nevada, New Jersey, Oregon and Washington have passed laws allowing same sex civil unions. Same-sex couples can marry in Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont, Washington D.C. and Iowa.

Congratulations to Illinois! I think it is quite amusing that heterosexual supremacists are now left making the counterfactual claim that "civil unions are identical to marriage" and are thus opposing measures that many in the LGBT community reject as "separate but unequal."

Prop 8 Federal Appeal Will Be Televised On Dec. 6!

On Monday December 6th at 10am, A 3-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will hear the case of Perry v. Schwarzenegger, also known as the federal Proposition 8 lawsuit. On August 4th, openly gay federal District Court judge Vaughn Walker ruled that Proposition 8 violated the United States Constitution.

These facts have been known for awhile. The new information is that apparently the oral arguments in the Perry appeal will now be televised by C-SPAN and local channel KGO. This is a big deal, because the lower court was intended to be broadcast as well but the heterosexual supremacists defending Proposition 8 objected and appealed all the way to the United States Supreme Court who overruled Judge Walker and banned the broadcasting of the oral arguments just days before the trial was scheduled to begin this past January.

Here are the details of the hearing on Monday, which will be in two 2-hour segments. The first session will be on whether the Proposition 8 propnents have "standing" to actually continue defending the statue, since the official parties to the lawsuit (the Governor and Attorney General) have refused to defend the voter-passed initiative in court. The second hour will be about the constitutionality of Proposition 8 itself.

Filed clerk order (Deputy Clerk:KKW): The Court orders that oral argument in these appeals be conducted in the following manner: The argument shall be divided into two hour-long sessions, with a brief recess in between. In the first hour, the parties shall address each appellant’s standing and any other procedural matters that may properly be raised. In the second hour, the parties shall address the constitutionality of Proposition 8.

During the first hour, the Hollingsworth defendants-intervenors-appellants (“Proponents”) shall first have 15 minutes, and the Imperial County movants-appellants shall next have 15 minutes in which to present their opening arguments regarding standing and other procedural issues. The Perry plaintiffs-appellees shall then have 30 minutes in which to respond. Any time reserved by either appellant may be used for rebuttal, but only one rebuttal argument may be made and that by either appellant.

During the second hour, the Proponents shall first have 30 minutes to present their opening argument on the merits of the constitutional question. The Perry plaintiffs-appellees shall then have 15 minutes, and the plaintiff-intervenor-appellee City and County of San Francisco shall have the next 15 minutes, in which to respond. Any time reserved by the Proponents may be used for rebuttal.

No later than November 24, 2010, the parties shall advise the Court of any objection they have to the allocation of time within each hour or of any reallocation of time within each hour that they wish to propose, by electronically filing letters with the Clerk of the Court. If any party wishes to give its full allotted time within either hour to an amicus curiae, it may request that the Court reallocate that time accordingly. Otherwise, no motions for leave to participate in oral argument by amici curiae will be entertained.. [7545517]

The names of the judges who will hear the appeal have not been released yet. Whoever loses at this level will appeal to the United States Supreme Court, who may or may not accept the case.

Senator DeMint (R-SC) Calls For Employment Discrimination Based On Sex

United States Senator Jim DeMint, Republican of South Carolina, has started taking a more prominent role as the standard bearer for ultra-conservatism in America. Recently, DeMint has called for openly gay or lesbian people and sexually active unmarried women to be barred from working as public teachers.

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) says that even though "no one" came to his defense in 2004 after he said that gay people and unwed mothers should be banned from teaching, "everyone" quietly told him that he shouldn't back down from his position.

He also implied that not banning gay people and women who have sex before marriage from teaching would be an attack on Christians, and defended his position on banning gay teachers because he holds the same position on women who have sex outside of marriage.

"[When I said those things,] no one came to my defense," he said, the Spartanberg Herald-Journal reported. "But everyone would come to me and whisper that I shouldn't back down. They don't want government purging their rights and their freedom to religion."

So, basically Senator DeMint is calling for public employment discrimination on the basis of sex and sexual orientatiom.

Needless to say, he has been roundly criticized for these bigoted beliefs.

"Sexist bigots like Sen. Jim DeMint don't belong in the United States Congress," said National Organization for Women President Terry O'Neill. "He thinks gay women and men and sexually active single women should be banned from teaching, but he said nothing about sexually active, single straight men."

"It is salt in the wound in our community," said Rea Carey, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. "It's irresponsible for Sen. DeMint to reassert this position in this day and age. I would ask him to apologize."

"What matters in the workplace is your ability to do your job, yet you can be fired for your sexual orientation in 29 states and for your gender identity in 38. I can't imagine what people think is 'moral' about job discrimination," said the Human Rights Campaign in a statement.

Beliefs like DeMint (and his people who support him) are exactly why the Employment Non-Discrimination Act needs to become federal law.

Blaming The Victim For Gay Teen Suicide

Rob Tsinai over at Box Turtle Bulletin has created the above graphic to explain how heterosexual supremacists respond to reports of gay teen suicide.

WATCH: Mormon Leader Attempts To Increase Gay Teen Suicides

So much for that public relations makeover for the Mormon Church embrassed by the widespread reaction to their religious-based homophobic actions in the Proposition 8 fight to strip marriage rights from same-sex couples in California!

The leader of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Boyd. K. Packer, issued a sermon on Sunday which will likely lead to more early deaths of LGBT teenagers at their own hands as he reiterated heterosexual supremacist and virulently homophobic church dogma:

Same-sex attraction can be overcome and any type of union other than marriage between a man and a woman is morally wrong [emphasis added], an LDS apostle told millions of Mormons on Sunday.

“There are those today who not only tolerate but advocate voting to change laws that would legalize immorality, as if a vote would somehow alter the designs of God’s laws and nature,” Boyd K. Packer, president of the church’s Quorum of Twelve Apostles, said in a strongly worded sermon about the dangers of pornography and same-sex marriage. “A law against nature would be impossible to enforce. Do you think a vote to repeal the law of gravity would do any good?”

Packer, speaking from his seat because of his frail health, addressed more than 20,000 members gathered in the LDS Conference Center in downtown Salt Lake City and millions more watching the faith’s 180th Semiannual General Conference via satellite.

The senior apostle drew on the church’s 1995 declaration, “The Family: A Proclamation to the World,” to support his view that the power to create offspring “is not an incidental part of the plan of happiness. It is the key — the very key.”

Some argue that “they were pre-set and cannot overcome what they feel are inborn tendencies toward the impure and unnatural,” he said. “Not so! Why would our Heavenly Father do that to anyone? Remember he is our father.”

Alluding to the Utah-based church’s support of laws such as California’s Proposition 8 that would define marriage as exclusively between a man and a woman, Packer said, “Regardless of the opposition, we are determined to stay on course.”

“We cannot change; we will not change,” the senior apostle declared. “We quickly lose our way when we disobey the laws of God. If we do not protect and foster the family, civilization and our liberties must needs perish.”

It should be noted that there is a direct (positive) correlation between the percentage of people who feel that homosexuality is a choice (as declared by Packer) and the percentage who disapprove of same-sex marriage.
Additionally, the notion that homosexuality is a choice and that young people who can not "overcome" their same-sex attraction is a key factor in may teen suicides. It should also be noted that in America, of course, marriage is a civil, legal institution which is open to people of all faiths (and no faith). What one religion believes about marriage should be irrelevant to how the state decides who can get married to whom.

I can honestly say that the widely broadcast words of the Mormon head will lead to more deaths (by suicide) of LGBT kids in America. The blood of those children are on Boyd Packer's hands.

WATCH: Psycho Heterosexual Supremacist Harassing Gay College Student

This is one of the most bizarre stories you will ever see. A public official, a Michigan Assistant Attorney General Tom Shirvell, has been electronically harassing the 21-year-old student body president Chris Armstrong. CNN's Anderson Cooper interviewed Shirvell. Watch what happens.

WATCH Jon Stewart Take Down Republican "Pledge To America"

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Scalia Claims Sex and Sexual Orientation Bias Not Banned By Constitution

Adm Golub / The Chronicle

Antonin Scalia, the 74-year-old Associate Justice of the Supreme Court gave a speech at University of California Hastings on the 24th anniversary of his unanimous approval by the United States Senate on Friday.
Scalia, the notoriously homophobic head of the conservative wing of the Court told the audience that he is convinced that the United States Constitution's 14th Amendment's declaration of "equal protection of the laws" does not apply to women or gays and lesbians.

"If the current society wants to outlaw discrimination by sex, you have legislatures," Scalia said during a 90-minute question-and-answer session with a professor at UC Hastings College of the Law. He said the same was true of discrimination against gays and lesbians.

[...]

The court has ruled since the early 1970s that the 14th Amendment's guarantee of equal protection of the laws applies to sex discrimination, requiring a strong justification for any law that treated the genders differently. That interpretation, Scalia declared Friday, was not intended by the authors of the amendment that was ratified in 1868 in the aftermath of the Civil War.

"Nobody thought it was directed against sex discrimination," he said. Although gender bias "shouldn't exist," he said, the idea that it is constitutionally forbidden is "a modern invention."

The court has not applied the same exacting standard to discrimination based on sexual orientation, an issue it could reach in several cases now in lower courts, including the dispute over California's ban on same-sex marriage.

But when the justices overturned laws against gay sex in 2003 as a violation of personal autonomy and due process, Scalia dissented vehemently. He compared the anti-sodomy laws to statutes against incest and bestiality and said many Americans view bans on homosexual conduct as protections for themselves and their families against "a lifestyle that they believe to be immoral and destructive."

It's interesting that Scalia will say in public that "gender bias 'shouldn't exist'" but he is on record in a published opinion of the Court declaring the homosexual "lifestyle" to be "immoral and destructive."

Perhaps he should recuse himself from future cases involving sex discrimination or sexual orientation discrimination before the Court?

WATCH: Stop8.org Dismantles NOM Arguments

Watch Matt Baume of Stop8.org do an excellent job of dismantling  the arguments in a National Organization for Marriage (NOM) radio ad. Baume usess NOM's own words an explains how misleading, wrong and "catty" they are.

Homophobes Sue Schwarzenegger and Brown To Force Prop 8 Appeal

Word comes today that heterosexual supremacist losers in the Perry v Schwarzenegger lawsuit are seriously worried about not having standing to appeal the federal lawsuit, so they have sued the state defendants Attorney General Jerry Brown and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in state court in an attempt to force them to defend Proposition 8.

Brown has said both in legal filings and public statements that he has sworn to uphold the state and federal constitutions and therefore can not defend Proposition 8 because he thinks it is an unconstitutional violation of gay Californians' civil rights.


"The attorney general does not believe that he can be forced to prosecute an appeal of a decision with which he agrees," Brown spokeswoman Christine Gasparac said Tuesday. 

In seeking to make the state file an appeal, Pacific Justice Institute is trying to address the possibility that the case might get short-circuited before the 9th Circuit can consider if Proposition 8 passes constitutional muster.

Most experts think that it is very doubtful that a state court will attempt to compel another branch of government to defend a federal lawsuit.

Equality California's executive director Geoff Kors said:

“This is an outrageous attempt to try and force elected officials who have sworn to uphold the United States Constitution to defend a law that the Federal Court has found to be unconstitutional. It demonstrates their acknowledgement that the proponents of Proposition 8 lack standing to appeal, that the case should be dismissed and loving same-sex couples should be allowed to exercise their constitutional right to marry.”

Interview With Dave Fleischer: Prop 8 Report Author

Dave Fleischer is the author of the 509-page Prop 8 Report which was released publicly on Tuesday. I have known Dave for years and he agreed to this on the record interview with MadProfessah.com.

MadProfessah: What are the main results or ideas you want people to gain from this report?

Dave Fleischer:
* The No on 8 campaign made a smart decision to invest in research. As a result, for the first time ever, in any campaign, the LGBT community has daily tracking polling that measures increases and decreases in our support as voters were being exposed to the anti-gay opposition campaign. This is far superior to episodic polls taken when voters are considering the question out of context and have not recently been exposed to the vile but effective opposition campaign. The No on 8 tracking polling by Lake allows us to correlate voter movement to significant changes in the political environment including but not limited to strategic decisions made by the competing campaigns. That's why this report is the first report ever to seriously evaluate why we struggle to compete in these campaigns. It provides evidence that allows us to consider and evaluate the wide range of competing hypotheses offered by a wide variety of observers. Up until now, we just had the hypotheses, not the data. Now, we have significant data. With the data, we are able to reject some hypotheses, confirm others, and notice areas where we need more information. We are on our way to learning more about the electoral reality in which we are operating.

* Based on the data, we know why we lost. We lost because in the final six weeks, when TV ads from both campaigns saturated the airwaves, almost 700,000 votes switched sides and decided to oppose same-sex marriage. It seems fair to me to conclude that Yes on 8 outcampaigned us in the final six weeks. We went from even to losing in the final six weeks. And it's fair to give Yes on 8 credit for what they accomplished, because we lost the most ground by far among the exact group of voters they targeted: parents.

* No on 8 regained some of the ground we lost, but only when we directly rebutted the opposition fear-mongering. "O'Connell" was No on 8's belated rebuttal of the pernicious Yes on 8 ads that exploited and stimulated anti-gay prejudice by making people fear that kids were in danger. The effectiveness of the "O'Connell" ad, while limited, suggests that we can successfully rebut the longstanding lies, at least among some voters. And the fact that it improved the situation compared to how we were doing when we were avoiding the issue makes it clear that avoidance serves us poorly. When the opposition attacks the character of LGBT people, we have to rebut immediately, directly, and clearly.

* As we prepare to go back to the ballot, we have to commit ourselves to gaining insight into how to rebut those attacks effectively. We still have so much to learn; after all, does "O'Connell" represent the best we can do? We simply don't yet know. We need to try out, in real world circumstances that simulate the campaign, what rebuttals help us most with most of the voters who are susceptible to the opposition fear-mongering. Luckily, we have a great immediate opportunity to enlarge our learning, when we canvass. From my point of view, when we are canvassing, this leads to a practical imperative: we should talk about kids to as many voters as we can; test different messages to see what works; and consider the canvass an investment in qualitative research, the largest, longest focus group in social science history. My concern is that if we don't do this -- if we don't talk about kids now, when the stakes are low -- we will be tempted once again to avoid the issue in an campaign, when the stakes are so high. Then history will repeat itself, to our detriment.

MP: How long did the report take to research and write and who paid for it?

DF: 18 months. Paid for by the LGBT Mentoring Project. No money solicited from nor did any come from CA individuals or organizations or the No on 8 campaign on anyone evaluated in the report.

MP: When do you think we should return to the ballot to overturn Proposition 8?

DF: We should return to the ballot when we have a decent chance to win. So we have homework to do. Should only choose the year when we have finished the homework. That could be 2012, or a different year. To me, what's relevant is: have we done our homework?

MP: One of the key findings is in wrong-way voting. Apparently there were 6% of voters who voted No who opposed marriage equality as opposed to 4% of Yes voters who supported marriage equality. Thus there's a net gain of 2 percentage points for the No side. Can you explain how confident you are of this result?

DF: Very confident. The Lake polling data and our methodology to interpret it are all laid in out detail in the report in a special appendix. [Appendix K]

We acknowledge all of the limitations of the data. But here's what we calculate:

* approx 1.525 million people were wrong-way voters

* of those, 875,000 voted No and opposed same-sex marriage

* and 650,000 voted Yes though they favored same-sex marriage

* the difference, 225,000 voters, made the margin closer by approx. 450,000 votes

FYI, David Binder's polling during the No on 8 campaign, commissioned by the No on 8 campaign, corroborated Lake. In the one poll where he asked questions you could use to gauge wrong-way voting, conducted Sept. 2-4, he found that

* 13% of the voters who found same-sex marriage acceptable said they'd vote Yes, and

* 19% of the voters who found same-sex marriage unacceptable said they'd vote No.

This is a less reliable measure of wrong-way voting than because a) it was further in advance of election day, and some voters self-correct; and b) Binder's question gave three options to respondents, so the middle group is sizeable and there's no way to tell if any of them were likely to wrong-way vote. But Binder's finding here is consistent with the idea that our side was the likely net beneficiary of wrong-way voting.

And of course Binder's May 2009 attempt to gauge wrong-way voting is very unlikely to be of any value. Polls are best at detecting wrong-way voting as or before people vote, not afterwards, especially not six months afterwards, when accurate recollection of their confusion is unlikely.

You will also enjoy looking at Lewis & Gossett, cited in the Prop 8 Report. Their excellent paper analyzing the Field and PPIC data uses regression analysis to compare the plausibility of four competing hypotheses to explain the failure of the two polls to gauge what was happening. They make a compelling case for wrong-way voting as the most probable explanation.

MP: What do you say to people that your source of daily tracking poll data by Celinda Lake ends 5 days before the election and the election could have been decided in that time frame?

DF: The Lake data is the best data we have on Prop 8, and the best data set our community has ever had on any of these ballot measures. That said, it is imperfect in a variety of ways, including the one you mention. There could have been significant changes in voter opinion in those final days. The Lake data would of necessity not reveal that. However, to the extent that the Binder tracking polling data in the final days tell us anything, they do not suggest massive voter movement or anything other than trivial voter movement. See the charts in the report with Binder data and Lake data side by side and you'll see what I mean. Binder tracked until election day (but he didn't start until much much later than Lake, when most of the big movement had long occurred).

Thanks, Dave!

Field Poll Confirms Majority Support for Marriage Equality

New polling from the Field Poll confirms that a majority of Californians support marriage equality, 51% to 42%.

DC High Court Rejects Marriage Referendum By 5-4 Vote

The nation's capital's highest court, the D.C. Court of Appeals rejected (by a frighteningly close) 5-4 vote an effort by the National Organization for Marriage and other heterosexual supremacists to force a vote on that jurisdiction's recently enacted marriage law.

Law Dork Chris Geidner has the best coverage:

The D.C. Court of Appeals issued its awaited decision in Bishop Harry Jackson's appeal of the D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics's decision that his proposed marriage initiative was an improper subject of an initiative. In a 5-4 decision, the court held that the Human Rights Act limitation in District law, which prohibits initiatives or referendums that would violation the Human Rights Act, is permissible. In light of that ruling, all 9 judges agreed that the proposed marriage initiative would violate the Human Rights Act and is, thus, not permitted.

In the absence of a successful appeal, then, D.C. marriage equality, which went into effect earlier this year, cannot be subject to an iniative.

He also quotes from the decision itself (Jackson v. D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics):

In the most important conclusion to be made by the court, it held:

The Charter amendment that established the right to initiative must be read in conjunction with the Home Rule Act, which, although conferring on the Council broad legislative authority, makes clear that the legislative authority is subject to limits implied by the United States Constitution and to the enumerated limits [set out by Congress.] Since [the section defining the initiative right in the District] obviously could not and did not remove those limits, it cannot be read as expressing the entire scope of restrictions on the initiative right. Rather, [the section] does not purport to address, and is ambiguous as to, whether there are other limitations on the right to initiative (and referendum). The Human Rights Act safeguard[, which prohibits initiatives that would violate the Human Rights Act] is not inconsistent with that ambiguous language.

Id. at 21. Four of the judges of the court disagreed with this conclusion, in an opinion written by Judge John Fisher. He was joined by Chief Judge Eric Washington and Judges Stephen Glickman and Kathryn Oberly.

It should be noted that all 9 judges agreed that the proposed marriage referendum (limiting marriage to between one man and one woman), like Proposition 8, would violate the D.C. Human Rights Act.

Suck it, NOM!

An Insider's Report From Argentina on Marriage Equality Debate

A friend of mine who lives in both Argentina and the United States but who is in Buenos Aires right now sent this extensive analysis of what is going on in the country as the Senate prepares to consider marriage equality legislation:

The final debate on the same-sex marriage bill will start at 12:30 today

(8:30 am LA time), with a vote coming in the early evening.

The Argentine Senate has 72 members but 4 will be absent: 2 are in

China with the president, 1 is sick, and 1 is on leave. It's

interesting that the 2 who are with the president are both opposed to

gay marriage, while the president and her husband are the leading

proponents of gay marriage. So the president may have invited the 2

anti senators to accompany her to keep them away from the vote, or the

pro senators decided to take advantage of the 2 anti senators' absence

by calling for the vote before the party returns from China. Also, the

tie-breaking vote belongs to the VP, who is also in China with the

president, and the VP is against whatever the president is for. That

acting president of the senate is pro gay marriage. In sum, by holding

the vote while the president's party is in China, pro forces managed to

reduce the number of votes needed for passage from 37 (to avoid a tie

that would be broken in the other direction) to 34 (to achieve a tie

that would be broken in favor of gay marriage).

The pro forces claim they have 35 votes lined up, but independent

journalists count 33 in favor and 33 opposed to gay marriage, with 2

undecided or undeclared. So the pro forces need just 1 of those 2, plus

the tie-breaking vote of the acting president of the senate.

Before the vote, there will be a proposal to change the language in the

bill from "marriage" to "egalitarian family union". It's their attempt

to have it both ways. They don't want to use the word "marriage" for

fear of offending the anti forces, but they call that the "family union"

they propose "egalitarian" in order to assure the pro forces that it is

not a second-class form of marriage, and to avoid having the president

of the senate rule the proposed "invalid". That's what he did yesterday

when he ruled that the senate would not vote on the civil union bill

because it was invalid on constitutional grounds.

Another parliamentary move by the anti forces will be to try to persuade

32 senators to walk out in order to deny the pro forces the quorum

needed to have a vote. Also, the anti forces have announced that if the

same-sex marriage is defeated, they will immediately reintroduce the

civil union bill. They argue that once gay marriage is off the table,

the acting president of the senate will allow a vote to go forward on

civil unions. In sum, the opposition forces calculate that some

senators will vote against same-sex marriage if they are they have the

option of voting for same-sex civil unions or "egalitarian family

unions". And the pro forces calculate that the same senators will vote

for same-sex marriage if they do not have a weasel-ish alternative.

You can watch the live feed of the Argentine Senate debate here and here.

HI Gov Lingle (R) Vetoes Civil Unions Bill

I just got back in the country and one of the first news stories I hear is that Republican Governor of Linda Lingle of Hawaii, who has been divorced twice, has vetoed her state's civil union bill.

Joe.My.God has posted the video of Lingle's statement and also has great coverage of reactions from LGBT organizations.

Here is the full text of her statement:

After months of listening to Hawaii’s citizens express to me in writing and in person their deeply held beliefs and heartfelt reasons for supporting or opposing the Civil Unions Bill, I have made the decision to veto HB 444.

I have been open and consistent in my opposition to same gender marriage and find that HB 444 is essentially marriage by another name. However, I want to be clear that my personal opinion is not the basis for my decision against allowing this legislation to become law. Neither is my veto based on my religious beliefs or on the political impact it might have on me or anyone else of either political party in some future election.

I am vetoing this bill because I have become convinced that this issue is of such significant societal importance that it deserves to be decided directly by all the people of Hawaii.

The subject of this legislation has touched the hearts and minds of our citizens as no other social issue of our day. It would be a mistake to allow a decision of this magnitude to be made by one individual or a small group of elected officials. And while ours is a system of representative government it also is one that recognizes that, from time to time, there are issues that require the reflection, collective wisdom and consent of the people and reserves to them the right to directly decide those matters. This is one such issue.

The legislative maneuvering that brought HB 444 to an 11th hour vote, on the final day of the session, via a suspension of the rules, after legislators lead the public to believe that the bill was dead, was wrong and unfair to the public they represent. After eight years of observing members of the Majority Party manipulate the legislative process when it suits them, I initially accepted their actions as business as usual. That was wrong too.

There has not been a bill I have contemplated more or an issue I have thought more deeply about during my nearly eight years as governor than HB 444 and the institution of marriage. After listening to those both for and against HB 444 I have gained a new appreciation for just how deeply people of all ages and backgrounds feel on this matter, and how significantly they believe the issue will affect their lives.

Few could be unmoved by the poignant story told to me in my office by a young, Big Island man who recounted the journey he had taken to bring himself to tell his very traditional parents that he was gay. I was similarly touched by the mother who in the same office expressed anguish at the prospect of the public schools teaching her children that a same gender marriage was equivalent to their mother and father’s marriage.

In addition to meeting in person with citizens of differing opinions, I have read legal memos on both sides of the issue, some urging me to veto the bill because of unintended consequences and guaranteed years of court battles while others urged support for what they consider a legally sound bill that grants long overdue civil rights. But in the end, it wasn’t the persuasiveness of public debates, the soundness of legal arguments, or the volume of letters and emails that convinced me to reach this decision. It was the depth of emotion felt by those on both sides of the issue that revealed to me how fundamental the institution of marriage is to our community. It is as fundamental to those who support marriage between two people of the same gender as it is to those who support marriage only between one man and one woman.

This is a decision that should not be made by one person sitting in her office or by members of the Majority Party behind closed doors in a legislative caucus, but by all the people of Hawaii behind the curtain of the voting booth.

As difficult as the past few weeks have been, I am comfortable with my decision while knowing full well that many will be disappointed by it. And while some will disagree with my decision to veto this bill, I hope most will agree that the flawed process legislators used does not reflect the dignity this issue deserves, and that a vote by all the people of Hawaii is the best and fairest way to address an issue that elicits such deeply felt emotion by those both for and against.

I have done my very best to reach a reasoned decision in a manner that brings honor to the political process and that I hope a majority of people believe reflects the values of Hawaii.

Evan Wolfson, executive director of Freedom To Marry and previoulsyco-counsel in the landmark 1993 Hawaii marriage case Baehr v. Lewin called Lingle's statement "profoundly disingenuous" and called for the state legislature to over-ride the veto of HB444. Other groups announced plans to sue Hawaii (again).

SCOTUS Rules Against Christian Legal Society

In the second most important case of the 2009-2010 Supreme Court term for LGBT people (last Thursday's Doe v. Reed 8-1 ruling that ballot proposition signers have no implicit right to anonymity was probably the most important) the court has ruled 5-4 in favor of the University of California Hastings Law School and against the Christian Legal Society to preserve the principle that a public university's discrimination policy that includes sexual orientation, gender identity and religion can compel any student group that wants official recognition and funding to abide by that nondiscrimination policy.

The Chronicle of Higher Education wrote:

The Supreme Court's decision, by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, found that the law school's policy was "a reasonable, viewpoint-neutral condition on access" that did not raise First Amendment issues in the way the Christian Legal Society argued.

The opinion explicitly rejects the argument of the Christian Legal Society that a public university has no business limiting its ability to be recognized and to apply its own rules to membership. "CLS’s analytical error lies in focusing on the benefits it must forgo while ignoring the interests of those it seeks to fence out: Exclusion, after all, has two sides," the decision says. "Hastings, caught in the crossfire between a group’s desire to exclude and students’ demand for equal access, may reasonably draw a line in the sand permitting all organizations to express what they wish but no groupto discriminate in membership."

A dissent, by Justice Samuel Alito, blasted the decision, saying that it set principle of "no freedom for expression that offends prevailing standards of political correctness in our country’s institutions of higher learning."

Many public colleges and universities have anti-bias policies similar to those of Hastings, so a ruling for the Christian Legal Society would have forced changes at many institutions. The issue has been particularly intense at public law schools (where the Christian Legal Society has sought recognition) and at undergraduate institutions with Greek systems (when Christian fraternities have sought recognition). Some public colleges and universities – faced with legal threats by supporters of the Christian Legal Society – have changed their policies to exempt religious groups, and those institutions could conceivably now reconsider.

This case has been closely watched by law professor friends of mine like Nan Hunter of Georgetown Law School and Art Leonard of New York Law School.

Human Rights Campaign issued a statement:

“Today, the Court upheld an important principle for all Americans, that government should not be forced to subsidize discrimination,” said HRC President Joe Solmonese. “UC Hastings and schools like it all over the country have worked hard to create welcoming spaces for all students, including those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender. Today’s decision bolsters those efforts, while recognizing that Christian Legal Society, and groups like it, are free exclude whomever they want – without the financial support of their fellow students or taxpayers.”

Amazingly, Justice Ginsburg, who wrote the majority opinion (joined by Stevens, Kennedy, Sotomayor and Breyer), read parts of her opinion before the Court aloud, the day after her husband of 56 years(!) died. Thank you Justice Ginsburg for your service to our country. May you enjoy serving on a supreme court (for at least one year) that is one-third female!

UPDATED 06/28/2010 11:38AM PDT

MadProfessah friend and openly gay USC Law Professor David Cruz weighs in with his thoughts on CLS v. Martinez, and Lambda Legal releases a statement:

"We're extremely pleased the Court has found that discrimination is discrimination, however you try to package it," said Jon Davidson, Legal Director of Lambda Legal. "CLS was attempting to draw a distinction between status and conduct. But when an organization has a membership requirement that one must believe conduct central to one's identity is immoral, that's the same thing as excluding people for who they are. It's wrong of CLS to expect students to fund a group that wouldn't have them as a member. The Court wisely rejected CLS's attempt to obtain what the Court recognized as 'preferential, not equal treatment' under the school's rules applicable to all other recognized clubs." Registration as a student organization at Hastings gives groups the right to use Hastings' name and logo, access to a university email address, limited use of facilities, and modest university funds for travel and other expenses. CLS sued in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, arguing that, by not allowing it to become a supported student group, Hastings had violated CLS's rights of free speech, association and religious freedom under the U.S. Constitution. The group maintained it did not bar membership to gays, but rather to those who engaged in homosexual conduct. The District Court rejected these claims and found in Hastings' favor, as did the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals last year.

The Task Force's Rea Carey said:

“The Supreme Court ruled correctly in rejecting the challenge from the Christian Legal Society, which sought school funding and recognition despite being in clear violation of the college’s nondiscrimination policy. The court rightly found that the First Amendment rights of association, free speech and free exercise were not violated by Hastings’ decision. It simply said the college did not have to fund a group that violated the school policy requiring all recognized student groups to be open to every student. Schools all across the country are working to create welcoming environments for all students. This ruling supports that important effort. No school group or organization should be given public money to discriminate against other students.”

SCOTUS Rules 8-1 To Support R-71 Names Disclosure

The Supreme Court has ruled 8-1 in the case of Doe v. Reed that heterosexual supremacist petition signers in Washington who placed Referendum 71 (which would have repealed a comprehensive domestic partnership statute) on the ballot have no implicit First Amendment expectation of privacy, affirming last year's excellent 9th Circuit appellate decision.

Washington Families Standing Together, the organization that managed the campaign to defend the domestic partnership law by approving Referendum 71 issued a statement:

The Court has made clear today that public disclosure requirements are an important means of making sure measures are not put on the ballot by fraudulent means or mistake.

“Public disclosure thus helps ensure that the only signatures counted are those that should be, and that the only referenda placed on the ballot are those that garner enough valid signatures. Public disclosure also promotes transparency and accountability in the electoral process to an extent other measures cannot. In light of the foregoing, we reject plaintiffs’ argument and conclude that public disclosure of referendum petitions in general is substantially related to the important interest of preserving the integrity of the electoral process.”

This 8- 1 ruling by the highest court in the land is a significant defeat for those who have sought to enshrine discrimination into law at the ballot box. Nowhere is the integrity and transparency of elections more important than where the ballot box is being used in an attempt to take away fundamental rights. Nowhere is it more important for the public to know that attempts to affect the lives of their fellow citizens by promoting ballot measures are free from fraud and error. Perhaps no other group has witnessed its rights put up for public vote more than LGBT Americans. Social conservatives have used ballot measures in state after state, over more than 30 years, to keep LGBT Americans from being able to adopt children, to marry and even to be protected from discrimination in housing and employment.

This is the third loss for these groups in our state over the past year as they tried to repeal legislation ensuring that all families are treated equally under Washington State law. First the State PDC said no when these same groups tried to hide their donors. Then voters approved Referendum 71, retaining the law, by more than 53%. Now the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled against the proponents’ attempt to undermine disclosure laws.

With regard to the assertion by the anti-gay groups that they would be harmed if petition signatures were subject to public disclosure, as Justice Stevens said in his concurring opinion,

“Any burden on speech that petitioners posit is speculative as well as indirect. For an as-applied challenge to a law such as the PRA to succeed, there would have to be a significant threat of harassment directed at those who sign the petition that cannot be mitigated by law enforcement measures.”

The Supreme Court has in the past allowed narrow exemptions to public disclosure where there’s a clear minority party that has suffered both official and societal retaliation by the majority and where there is strong evidence that such disclosure presents a serious threat. With regard to Referendum 71, however, the groups making this claim were not the minority, but to the contrary, were the ones trying to diminish the rights of the minority. They will be hard pressed to convince a judge the record here is otherwise.

In an amicus brief provided to the Supreme Court in Doe v. Reed, a group of political scientists reported that not only was the assertion of alleged harassment unsubstantiated in Washington State, but the plaintiffs did not present a single verified threat to any signer of a ballot measure petition in any state in any election. As their brief said, “More than a million names of signers of petitions for referenda and initiatives opposing gay marriage have been posted on the Internet, yet there is no evidence that any of these signers has faced any threat of retaliation or harassment by reason of that disclosure.”

WAFST applauds today’s decision and thanks all those who filed briefs and supported our collective efforts as we fought over the last year to protect the rights of all Washingtonians.

Congratulations to Washington State, this is a big loss for the heterosexual supremacist haters like National Organization for Marriage.

Prop 8 Supporters Ask Federal Judge To End 18,000 Marriages

Wow. The uber heterosexual supremacist Charles Cooper, the attorney for the defendants in the federal Proposition 8 trial Perry v. Schwarzenegger, has taken one more egregious shot at LGBT people: he asked the federal judge to not only uphold the state constitutional ban on marriage equality but apply it retroactively to strip state recognition of the estimate 18,000 same-sex couples who got married between June 15, 2008 and November 5, 2008.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports:

As the trial over California's prohibition on same-sex marriage enters its final stage today, the ban's sponsors are urging the judge to go a step further and revoke state recognition of the marriages of 18,000 gay and lesbian couples who wed before voters passed Proposition 8.

Such an order would honor "the expressed will of the people," backers of the November 2008 ballot measure said Tuesday in their final written filing before Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker.

Andrew Pugno, an attorney for Prop. 8's backers, said in an interview that the sponsors aren't asking Walker to nullify the 18,000 marriages, but only to rule that government agencies, courts and businesses no longer have to recognize the couples as married.

So, they are basically asking the courts to divorce me and my husband in the eyes of the state of California. That's pretty deep.

You can follow coverage of the final day of this historic trial at multiple locations:

FireDogLake

Pam's House Blend

The Advocate

Judge Walker Issues Questions In Prop 8 Trial

Judge Vaughn Walker has issued questions for the litigants in Perry v. Schwazenegger to answer during closing arguments which are scheduled for tomorrow, Wednesday June 16th. Some of the questions are fascinating:

What empirical data, if any, supports a finding that legal recognition of same-sex marriage reduces discrimination against gays and lesbians?

What are the consequences of a permanent injunction against enforcement of Proposition 8? What remedies do plaintiffs propose?

If the evidence of the involvement of the LDS and Roman Catholic churches and evangelical ministers supports a finding that Proposition 8 was an attempt to enforce private morality, what is the import of that finding?

The court has reserved ruling on plaintiffs' motion to exclude Mr Blankenhorn's testimony. If the motion is granted, is there any other evidence to support a finding that Proposition 8 advances a legitimate governmental interest?

Why is legislating based on moral disapproval of homosexuality not tantamount to discrimination? See Doc #605 at 11 ("But sincerely held moral or religious views that require acceptance and love of gay people, while disapproving certain aspects of their conduct, are not tantamount to discrimination."). What evidence in the record shows that a belief based in morality cannot also be discriminatory? If that moral point of view is not held and is disputed by a small but significant minority of the community, should not an effort to enact that moral point of view into a state constitution be deemed a violation of equal protection?

What does it mean to have a "choice" in one's sexual orientation? See e g Tr 2032:17-22; PX 928 at 37

Very interesting questions, eh? I believe the Williams Institute could provide data which answers the first question. The answer to #2 should be very, very important. If the judge wants to know the answer to #3, he should watch 8: The Mormon Proposition, the documentary on the LDS church's involvement in the Proposition 8 electoral battle. I believe it's irrelevant whether some people claim to have a choice in their sexual orientation. Most people clearly do NOT choose their sexual orientation, and obviously constitutional rights do not go away because the issue in question is a choice, since most people's religion is a choice.

A full list of the Judge's questions can be seen here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/32724803/Doc-677

Libertarian and Liberal Think Tank Heads Support Marriage

There's an interesting editorial in today's Washington Post from John Podesta, former Clinton Whote House Chief of Staff and head of the prominent liberal think tank the Center for American Progress and Robert Levy, head of the pre-eminent Libertarian think tank the Cato Institute announcing their support for marriage equality and the American Foundation for Equal Rights lawsuit to overturn California's Proposition 8. They have joined AFER's board of directors as co-chairs.

From the Post's "marriage equality for all couples":

The plaintiffs' legal team, headed by former Bush v. Gore antagonists Theodore Olson and David Boies, has demonstrated that no good reason exists for the denial of fundamental civil rights under Proposition 8. We support that position.

Although we serve, respectively, as president of a progressive and chairman of a libertarian think tank, we are not joining the foundation's advisory board to present a "bipartisan" front. Rather, we have come together in a nonpartisan fashion because the principle of equality before the law transcends the left-right divide and cuts to the core of our nation's character. This is not about politics; it's about an indispensable right vested in all Americans.

[...]

Thanks to the genius of our Framers, who separated power among three branches of government, our courts have been able to take the lead -- standing up to enforce equal protection, as demanded by the Constitution -- even when the executive and legislative branches, and often the public as well, were unwilling to confront wrongful discrimination.

Indeed, the Supreme Court issued its Loving ruling in the face of widespread opposition. A Gallup poll taken within months of the decision found that 74 percent of the American public "disapproved" of interracial marriage. Nevertheless, the court vindicated those constitutional rights to which every American is entitled. As we look back, the Loving decision is hailed as an example of the best in American jurisprudence.

In terms of public opinion, courts addressing marriage equality have less of a hill to climb. Opposition to same-sex marriage pales next to the intense hostility the court faced before its ruling in Loving. A February Post poll showed 47 percent support for same-sex marriage (up from 37 percent support in the same poll in 2003). The Post poll also showed that the younger an individual is, the more likely he or she is to favor marriage equality, regardless of political persuasion. Among individuals ages 18 to 29, an estimated 65 percent support marriage equality.

It is precisely this generation gap which animates the heterosexual supremacists now to attempt to get as many constitutional bans on marriage now while they can because they know that the ans will fall in the future as the 18-29 cohort ages (and browns).