Constitutional Amendment: Them’s Fightin’ Words
by Colin Murphy
03-08-2004
Well, talk about getting the proverbial ball rolling! It’s on folks. The war is here, the lines have been drawn and we are at the dawn of the fight of our generation.
As of press time, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom’s Valentine’s Day decision that the "City by the Bay" should not deprive gays of the right to marry has not only garnered over 3,000 same sex nuptials, but has also brought forth the true colors of the self-proclaimed "compassionate conservative," President George W. Bush.
"After more than two centuries of American jurisprudence and millennia of human experience, a few judges and local authorities are presuming to change the most fundamental institution of civilization," the president said in urging Congress to approve a federal constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. "Their action has created confusion on an issue that requires clarity."
Bush called on Congress to "promptly pass and send to the states for ratification" an amendment that would specifically define marriage as the union of a "husband and a wife." But he also said state legislatures should be left to define "legal arrangements other than marriage," suggesting that such an amendment would do nothing to stop states from allowing civil unions for same-sex couples — a suggestion not yet supported by any proposed language for the amendment and strongly opposed by the Religious Right.
Of course, this all comes on the heels of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court clarifying its landmark decision in saying that only allowing gays to legally marry will satisfy its earlier ruling. Same-sex couples in Massachusetts will be able to legally wed as early as May.
Top Democrats and many gay civil rights groups said Bush's support of an amendment was designed to draw attention from his record as president. Republican leaders said an amendment was needed to protect the foundation of American society.
Admittedly, amending the Constitution is difficult, requiring a two-thirds majority in each house of Congress to pass an amendment. Then it must be ratified by three-fourths, or 38, of the 50 states.
Nonetheless, we knew this was coming. When the president failed to produce weapons of mass destruction, the economy was still in the toilet and his State of the Union address flopped, he had little choice but to wrap himself in the American flag and run to his pitchfork-wielding, conservative base.
There’s nothing compassionate about George W. Bush’s conservatism — he was only able to sell it to the country when things were going his way. For when push comes to shove, he’s more conservative than Reagan, more secretive than Nixon and as off-the-beam as Perot.
And yes, I’m fully aware that in this day and age — post 9/11 and Patriot Act and such —that our civil liberties are being reined in by this president and Attorney General John Ashcroft. But I’m not afraid. It is my duty as an American to criticize my government when I think it’s doing wrong and the direction that the gay marriage debate has taken gives me little choice. This is democracy run amuck.
Not since prohibition, which was readily repealed, has the Constitution been used to prohibit rights. Rather, the masterpiece of Madison has since been used only to expand rights. So, #1: Why are Bush and the Radical Right doing this? And, #2: Why do they think they can get away with it?
Why they’re doing it is twofold: Half of them don’t really care but are doing it for votes to make sure they get the conservative base to the polls — the other half are fundamentally afraid and honestly believe that this is the end of the institution of marriage. The latter you can chalk up to religious mores and ignorance, the former is a bit harder to swallow — it’s apathy.
But it’s how they think they’ll get away with it where they’re mistaken. Throughout the modern gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender rights movement there have been only a handful of times when our community has truly coalesced and fought as one: post-Stonewall in the early 1970s when we fought for our foot in the door, 1978 when Anita Bryant led a national campaign to repeal the rights that we’d won over the decade and the AIDS epidemic when it decimated the gay community in the 1980s and 90s. But if those three moments in time taught us anything, it is that when we unite, we can win, prevail and survive. And that, my friends, is what the proponents of this constitutional amendment underestimate: The power of us.
This is the most important fight of our generation. This is our Stonewall — history will judge how we react to this challenge. Yeah, gay is glorious and fun and we’ve got it pretty good but mind you, it can all be taken away if we don’t take notice. Indeed, this will be a test of our generation’s mettle. The gauntlet has been thrown down. We know what we must do. We must organize, politicize, protest, and write our families, our friends, and our politicians. We must blog and sing and scream our right to have our love recognized. We must rail against the conservative tide that wishes to enshrine a second class citizenship upon us in the Constitution of this great land.
I know that marriage isn’t for everyone. But shouldn’t we all fight for the right for those of us who want it? And if we fail and are amended into the Constitution — where will it end?
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