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California pols overrule citizen vote on gay marriage

terpfan1980

Join Date 08/2004

+13

California pols overrule citizen vote on gay marriage

You have to love politicians that consistently try to over-rule the votes of the citizenry.

California citizens passed Proposition 22 (which says only marriages that involve one man and one woman are valid in California), but of course the California Assembly is sure that they know better, and instead they will vote on their own bill to legalize same-sex "marriage." A bill, by the way, that has already passed in the state Senate (so it is clear that both California Senators and California Assemblymen/women are all equally to blame for ignoring the will of the citizenry, who passed Prop 22 of their own accord).

In anycase, enjoy the clips from the following article from The Washington Times. Headline is linked.

California to vote on marriage

By Cheryl Wetzstein
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

A bill legalizing homosexual "marriage" in California is scheduled to go up for its second vote in the state Assembly this week, amid vigorous lobbying.
"We intend to keep the Assembly members' feet to the fire," said Benjamin Lopez, a leader of the Traditional Values Coalition. "If they support marriage for one man and one woman, like their constituents voted, they will vote against AB 849."
Mr. Lopez and his allies think California lawmakers legally cannot enact same-sex "marriage" because voters approved Proposition 22, which says only marriages involving one man and one woman are valid in California.
Homosexual rights supporters, however, think their message is the right one.
"We are so very close," Assemblyman Mark Leno said last week after his bill to legalize same-sex "marriage" passed the state Senate.
"It would be very disappointing for [the Assembly] not to be able to stand up for civil rights," he said.
In June, the Assembly rejected Mr. Leno's bill by four votes.
Meanwhile, two same-sex "marriage"-related decisions are expected in Massachusetts this month.
Either today or tomorrow, Massachusetts Attorney General Tom Reilly is expected to issue his decision on whether to certify a constitutional marriage amendment filed by a citizens' group called VoteOnMarriage.org.
Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a Republican, supports the amendment, which must garner nearly 66,000 certified signatures and two legislative approvals before it can get on a 2008 ballot.
However, dozens of homosexual rights groups and lawyers have urged Mr. Reilly not to certify the amendment. They say it is unconstitutional in light of the 2003 Goodridge decision, which legalized same-sex "marriage" in Massachusetts, the groups say.
Meanwhile, on Sept. 14, the Massachusetts legislature is scheduled to meet in a constitutional convention to offer a second vote on a marriage amendment that passed last year.

... more at linked article

Issues, issues every where. Not just California, but in Massachusetts as well.

Keep tuned to the news folks, the future of the country is at stake.

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You toss around this term activist, attribute it to liberals, thereby making it some kind of dirty word. It's the conservative judges who are the activists, the ones who would actively amend the Constitution to fit into their small minded and bigoted mindset. All you're doing is turning the tables to badmouth liberals. I don't care whether you agree with the decision or not. That's your business and your right.

See, here's something that tends to get my goat. Some ranting and raving about people trying to AMEND the Consitution to get it to say what they think it should say. If they can get 2/3 of the Congresscritters to agree (and that's 2/3 of the House and 2/3 of the Senate) and then get 3/4 of the state legislatures (by simple majority) or 3/4 of the state Constitutional Conventions (again, by simple majority) to agree, then it's great! That's how the Constitution was written!!! (See Article V at http://www.house.gov/Constitution/Constitution.html)

Somehow, seeing the Constitution (and the indicated processes) work as they were designed, is supposed to be worse than judges (from all parts of the spectrum) dictate legislation based on something that the Constitution doesn't say (and hasn't said).

Me? I'd rather watch a Constitutional Amendment be introduced in Congress (and voted on) and then passed to the states so that the people (through the individual state legislatures) can state whether or not they agree.

It sickens me when I see judges dictate laws that affect everyone without Congress. It violates the Constitional seperation of the branches of government. A classic example of the Court's (SCOTUS in this case) overstepping their boundaries was Roe v. Wade. Certain groups couldn't get something like this through Congress (and rightfully so, it was a state issue, not a Federal issue), so they used the court system to legislate what can/cannot be done.

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(I'd really love to know why JoeUser keeps switching between displaying my name as "Leauki" and "Andrew J. Brehm".)

Probably from where you post from. You can post to these articles from WinCustomize, Joe User, the Forums, and Political Machine. Might want to ask Karma tho.

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"be fruitfull {not fruits} and multiply.

MM, I am not going to restate my argument. But this statement is from a religious document, correct. then, it would seem to me that the legislature is trying to impose religious beliefs into our laws, which per the constitution, is not acceptable.

As for legislating from the bench, helloooooooo, MM. Amending the constitution to deny rights is, as in IS legislating from the bench. And, the liberals are not doing it. Calling liberal judges "activist" is so specious, and so disingenuous, and an outright lie. In this particular case, it prevented the conservative "activist" judges from changing the articles of the constitution based on religious beliefs. Good for him/her.

I refuse to live with "it", as "it" is an attempt to infringe on people's lives and beliefs, based on some religious concept of tradition, which I refuse to accept. For that, I will fight it whereever and whenever I encounter it. It's that simple.

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So you believe that gay marriage activists are somehow obligated to advocate other people's causes as well?

Why?

If they are merely advocating gay marriage, no. Hoever, if they use "equal rights", "civil rights" or any other "equality" based argument, then yes.

Gay marriage advocates throw around the arguments of the civil rights movement, but Rosa Parks didn't say, "I should be able to sit where I want, but keep them Jews, Irish and Chinese in the back where they belong!" She fought for everyone (regardless of whether they were part of her agenda or not) to be able to sit, eat, swim, and drink anywhere they chose.

If they are going to cry "equality", but then say, "oh but we don't mean 'those other'", they don't have much respect for "equality" in the first place.

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"Probably from where you post from. You can post to these articles from WinCustomize, Joe User, the Forums, and Political Machine."

I always post from joeuser.com and the forums. Wincustomize and Political Machine are more sites for Windows users, I expect.

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I believe it will change unless somebody can give a good reason for why it should not change.

There will be a line drawn somewhere, but it will be at a point for which somebody can give a good reason.

Well, right now we have a Supreme Court Justice who once argued that adults and 12 year olds should be able to marry (The pedophile lover Ruth "buzzie" Ginsberg), and in Washington State, beastiality is only illegal if the animal didn't enjoy it... So, do youbeleive that pedophilia and beastiality are defendable?

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Zoomba

Join Date 11/2002

+114

I am strongly pro-gay marraige... I personally believe that if we extend a government service, tax considerations, rules of inheritance etc for heterosexual couples we should offer them to homosexual couples as well. It's an issue of equal enforcement of law/equal and fair application of services and privledges.

That said, if the population of a state clearly votes their mind AGAINST gay marraiges, then that is completely their right. While I disagree with the end-result, I fully agree with and support the process that reached that conclusion. We are a democracy, when the people vote for something, that's what they should get. If they want to revisit the issue later and cast another vote, that's cool. It's not cool to have a bunch of yahoos go in and decide that the people are too dumb to know what they really want and reverse the vote.

To those who say this is an issue that should be handled like this to protect the minority, think about the can of worms this opens up. If a liberal state government decides to overturn a public vote against gay marraige, what's to stop a conservative state government from overturning hate crime legislation, or maybe affirmative action? If they are allowed the power to do one, they can certainly do the other and this sets up a bad precedent.

I still think the solution to this whole mess is to just grant civil unions with the EXACT same privledges as marraige today. Everyone is legally recognized as being in a civil union, if you want to get married, you go to a church. Everyone gets equal protection/privledges. Churches keep the institution of marraige. Everyone goes home happy.

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I always post from joeuser.com and the forums. Wincustomize and Political Machine are more sites for Windows users, I expect.

All the sites are linked, so anything posted in Politics on JU gets posted to Political Machine as well (it is actually a game that Stardock created). Anything on Computers or computing goes to Win Customize (I have had Mac and Linux Articles posted over there as well).

But check out Karma's blog on Site problems. WHile not exactly a site Problem, I would like to know the answer to (Just curious).

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I still think the solution to this whole mess is to just grant civil unions with the EXACT same privledges as marraige today. Everyone is legally recognized as being in a civil union, if you want to get married, you go to a church.

That makes 3 of us who basically have said the same thing. And I thought I was just crying in the wind when I made that statement long ago.

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dabe... the people of california VOTED that the definition of marraige is between one man and one woman. that is the poeples will, One judge overturned the vote.

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Zoomba:

That said, if the population of a state clearly votes their mind AGAINST gay marraiges, then that is completely their right.

But that right doesn't exist. If California allows gay marriages, then under the U.S. Constitution, all states must recognize their marriages. For that matter, beastiality is legal in the state of Washington... if they were to pass a law allowing "interspecies marriage", then all other states would have to extend marital benefits to the people and animals involved in those marriages. Interesting little twist, isn't it.

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"So, do you beleive that pedophilia and beastiality are defendable?"

Well, since I argue that any position for or against a specific type of marriage must be supported by an argument other than "traditional values", this is exactly the kind of question I would ask you.

For me it's easy enough to find arguments against pedophilia and bestiality. But then I always focused on only accepting reasonable arguments in the discussion as opposed to "tradition".

The question is, would you support pedophilia if it was traditional (it was once) or do you reject it for reasons unrelated to its traditional values?

And if the second, why do you not have such arguments against gay marriage?

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"the people of california VOTED that the definition of marraige is between one man and one woman. that is the poeples will,"

Isn't the idea of the separation of church and state that the people cannot impose that will on others?

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"the people of california VOTED that the definition of marraige is between one man and one woman. that is the poeples will,"Isn't the idea of the separation of church and state that the people cannot impose that will on others?

THERE IS NO CHURCH AND STATE IN AN ELECTION, that passed in a state that is know for its liberal behavior, the bill was simply a definition of the word marraige.

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Isn't the idea of the separation of church and state that the people cannot impose that will on others?

It would if it was a religious issue. It is not. It is an issue really concerning property ownership.

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the state has no business deciding to whom the benefit of a religious service should be granted or denied. if they did, they woulda long ago started charging heavy-duty sinners some sorta penalties and begun licensing wafer inspectors.

See this right here is what started the whole mess. The gays started screaming about this because the "churches" decided they would not give religous blessing to a gay marriage. So then they forced the state into legislating that the religous community should.

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Sorry, but one has no bearing on the other.

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Leauki:

For me it's easy enough to find arguments against pedophilia and bestiality. But then I always focused on only accepting reasonable arguments in the discussion as opposed to "tradition".

The question is, would you support pedophilia if it was traditional (it was once) or do you reject it for reasons unrelated to its traditional values?

I object to pedophilia because I have seen the problems it can cause in a child's life (even when the child "consented" to the abuse). I am against gay marriage because I don't agree that it is good for society, our culture, the institution of family or marriage. I am also against many things that heterosexual couples do that are destroying the institution of family and marriage also (most of which are illegal)... so yes, I am consistant between the two.

Don't be so quick to discount all "Traditional values" arguments though, the only reason beating wives is a crime in our society is our "traditional values"... in many societies it is not only acceptable, it is required if the family and authorities feel "she needed beating".

I noticed though, you didn't actually answer the question youself.. you merely said you find it easy to find arguments. So, if Washington State were to legalize interspecies marriage (since beastiality is only illegal if the animal didn't enjoy it), leaving out "traditional values", what are your arguements against it?

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No, the 1st Amendment ban on a national religion has absolutely no bearing on inidividuals and how we vote. I can use any religious (or non religious) reasoning I want to vote the way I do. I can even use religious arguments to back by position. You have the freedom to accept or reject my religious arguments as you please... and vote however you want, for whatever reason you want.

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Traditional western values are not the reason beating your wife is illegal. It was changes to the traditional values that are.

Animals are not a part of society, so I cannot see an advantage for society if a member of society marries one. There is thus no particular reason for a law to specifically acknowledge such a union. That is, in the context of this discussion, a reason for rejecting animal marriages of that kind.

But what is the argument against gay marriages? Both individuals are members of our society, so presumably they would enjoy the same advantages as mixed couples. And for the rest of society it wouldn't make a difference, since they still enjoy the privileges they used to enjoy.

If marriage is a win for society, then why would a gay marriage be a loss?

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Age of consent is a social value. It even varies from state to state, which denies individuals rights on one state they enjoy in another. If male-female marriage is a made-up social value, which I agree it is, then so are age limitations. They've changed over time as well.

The problem here seems to be that some people believe we can't just "make up" rules. Of course we can. If you think every law against an act is invalid if there is no harm done by the act, then you have a long list of battles, far beyond marriage.

In reality, laws are just mandated social values. "Harm" is relative. To someone in NAMBLA there is no harm in their perversion. We don't give them the benefit of the doubt, we decide based upon our cultural values. To polygamists, there is no harm in polygamy. Again, we differ.

To be even more crass, you can kill a sheep, skin it, eat it, make clothes from it's skin and decorate your house with its skull, but you aren't allowed to have sex with it. More social values. Without them, we'd have nothing.

So, God help us if the courts decide "Well, that shouldn't be illegal; I don't see any harm in it." That would leave us at the mercy of only a few people's values, instead of society as a whole.

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It is a fact of nature that children are unable to function as adults. They have to learn about the world first. The social value is the definition of what makes them adults. Commonly the rule is that when they reach 16, 18, or 21 (depending on the society), they are considered adults.

There is no such fact of nature at the bottom of the social value that restricts marriage to straight couples.

I agree that laws are mandated social values. But social values surely must have a better explanation than "it's traditional". The social value "no one must marry a child" is society's response to an actual fact of nature. What is the fact that the social value "no gay marriages" is a response to?

I'm not saying that there must be gay marriages, I am saying that if it is so clear that they must not, there surely must be a better argument than tradition and the pretending that this is the same kind of argument as the one used against paedophilia.

What IS the argument against gay marriage?

Tradition is no argument. We have seen many changes where traditional values have been replaced by new ones.

The fact that all laws are mandated social values does not explain why this specific law must be mandated by this specific social value.

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" It is a fact of nature that children are unable to function as adults. "

Oh? Oddly enough it was common practice not many generations ago for people to get married at 16, or even 14. Regardless the fact that you have to say "16, 18, or 21" shows there is no universal truth to it. It is a social value, and not not based upon any objective idea of "harm".

"But social values surely must have a better explanation than "it's traditional"."

Urm... why? Seriously, who made that rule, you? If we wanted to make it illegal to, say, walk backwards, why couldn't we? Would Zeus come down and stop us? You have to have a reason for your "musts" too, right? Why must we have a better explaination? What enforces that "must"?

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Oh? Oddly enough it was common practice not many generations ago for people to get married at 16, or even 14.

Or 12. Check out the latest in Kansas.

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Animals are not a part of society, so I cannot see an advantage for society if a member of society marries one. There is thus no particular reason for a law to specifically acknowledge such a union. That is, in the context of this discussion, a reason for rejecting animal marriages of that kind.

Your idea of whether there is an advantage to society for interspecies marriages is irrelevant. Right now there are farms run in the state of Washington for the specific purpose of inviting customers to have sex with their animals. Wastes of human flesh travel from all over the country to add a few new species to their list of animals they've molested. That means that there is a segment of our society that is not only pro beastiality, but spend hundreds (or even thousands depending on air fare) of dollars to screw a pig. That being a fact, you are in complete denial if you think we (as a society) are that far away from defending a person's "right" to marry the animal they love. We're even closter (as a society) to accepting pedophilia as merely an "alternative lifestyle". Don't believe me? How horrified were you with the Mary Kay Latourneau case? NABLA is already pushing for repealing of the age of consent laws so their members can legally molest your son... and we have law makers and at least 1 Supreme Court Justice who are all for the sick idea.

How convenient for you to think that, just because YOU don't see a benefit to society, there isn't people making headway in legalizing any sick idea that enters their diseased head!!!!

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