Same-Sex Marriage Update

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Is There a Place for Gay People in Conservatism and Conservative Politics?

Featuring Nick Herbert, MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Conservative Party, United Kingdom; Andrew Sullivan, The Daily Dish Blog, The Atlantic; and Maggie Gallagher, President, National Organization for Marriage.


Under the leadership of David Cameron, Britain's Conservative Party has jettisoned much of its former opposition to gay rights. Cameron supported civil unions for gays and appointed a number of openly gay men to his shadow cabinet. Nick Herbert will explain the reasons for those changes and elaborate on the new Conservative social agenda. Will the United States follow the British example? Our distinguished panel will consider the future of gay people's participation in mainstream society and conservative politics on both sides of the Atlantic.

The Cato Institute
1000 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20001

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[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoNiZhAUWcg&feature=player_embedded"]YouTube- What Kind of Planet Are We On?[/ame]

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Olbermann on Miss Beverly Hills

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Prop. 8 suit closing arguments may be televised
Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday, February 26, 2010

(02-25) 14:35 PST SAN FRANCISCO -- Despite a rebuff from the U.S. Supreme Court, the Bay Area's federal judges are again proposing to allow cameras in their courtrooms, a plan that could lead to telecasting of closing arguments in a suit challenging California's ban on same-sex marriage.

The U.S. District Court in San Francisco has posted a rule change on its Web site that would allow its judges to take part in a pilot program of airing selected nonjury civil trials. The public comment period began Feb. 4 and ends Thursday.

The proposal is the same one Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker adopted in January after a week of overwhelmingly favorable public comment. But the Supreme Court intervened when Walker approved camera coverage of the trial over Proposition 8, the November 2008 initiative that outlawed same-sex marriage.

In a 5-4 ruling, the court - which has refused to telecast its own proceedings - rebuked Walker for shortening the usual comment period.

The court said it was not deciding whether federal judges could televise trials. But the conservative majority did not cite any public benefit in trial broadcasts and said any such project should start with a more routine case.

The justices cited statements by Prop. 8's sponsors that telecasting outside the courthouse would intimidate their witnesses. Sponsors withdrew four of their six scheduled witnesses, all academic experts, when the trial started Jan. 11 and did not reinstate them after the court barred cameras.

No federal trial in California has ever been shown on television or the Internet. Walker had proposed live, closed-circuit telecasts of the Prop. 8 trial to a few other federal courthouses and a delayed posting on YouTube.

Testimony in the lawsuit by two same-sex couples and the city of San Francisco ended Jan. 27, but Walker postponed scheduling lawyers' closing arguments until after a final round of briefs, due today.

If his court approves the new rule next week, Walker could allow camera coverage of the arguments along the lines of his previous order, subject to approval by Alex Kozinski, chief judge of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Telecasting lawyers' arguments, without witness testimony, might pass muster with the Supreme Court, which hasn't objected to televised hearings of arguments before the Ninth Circuit.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...BA1D1C76BK.DTL

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Australian Senate Rejects Marriage

In a lopsided vote, yesterday the Australian Senate rejected a marriage equality bill. But the result was closer than it seems.

The bill was introduced by the Greens but was defeated 45-5, just days before the world’s biggest gay celebration, Sydney Mardi Gras. Twenty-six senators were absent from the vote, with some of these choosing to abstain because they disagreed with their parties’ official stances against same-sex marriage. Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young, who introduced the bill, said: ”There may have been a group of senators voting to keep discrimination against same-sex couples being able to marry the one they love, but well over one-third of all senators were absent for the final vote, presumably the only form of protest open to them.” Marriage equality campaigners claim that 60 per cent of Australian citizens support the right of gay couples to marry.

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has been vehement in his opposition to same-sex marriage.

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2 sides file pile of paperwork in Prop. 8 case

Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Sunday, February 28, 2010

Opposing sides in the legal battle over same-sex marriage in California have laid out their cases in writing to a federal judge, disputing the status of gays and lesbians in society, the nature of marriage, and the motives behind the ballot measure that defined marriage as the union of a man and a woman.

"Californians voted for Proposition 8 because they thought it would strengthen the institution of marriage (and) ... because they thought it would benefit children," sponsors of Prop. 8 said Friday night in papers filed in federal court in San Francisco.

Their opponents, representing two same-sex couples and the city of San Francisco, said those purported goals of Prop. 8 were contradicted by overwhelming evidence at a 12-day trial in January that allowing same-sex couples to wed would benefit their children and the institution of marriage. Regardless of the intentions of individual voters, they argued, the Prop. 8 campaign was designed to appeal to fear and deep-seated prejudice.

"The evidence demonstrates that Proposition 8's actual motivation was moral disapproval of gay and lesbian individuals," said the measure's opponents, plaintiffs in the federal court case. They said the ballot measure "sends a message to gay and lesbian individuals that they are not welcome in California."

The two sides filed hundreds of pages shortly before a midnight deadline, containing sharply contrasting summaries of the evidence presented at last month's trial, the first ever held in federal court on same-sex marriage.

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker, presiding over the nonjury trial, plans to review the material before hearing lawyers' final arguments, which have not yet been scheduled. Walker has indicated that his ruling will include detailed findings on the purposes and effects of Prop. 8, assessments that could hold the key to the measure's fate in appeals likely to reach the U.S. Supreme Court.

Prop. 8, approved by 52 percent of the voters in November 2008, amended the California Constitution to prohibit same-sex marriage, overturning a May 2008 state Supreme Court ruling that extended marital rights to gays and lesbians. The state court upheld the initiative last May while also upholding 18,000 same-sex marriages performed in the state before Prop. 8 passed.

Because Prop. 8 eliminated rights that the California court had granted, plaintiffs in the federal suit want Walker to put it in the same category as a 1992 Colorado initiative that overturned local gay-rights laws and prohibited future anti-discrimination measures. The U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Colorado initiative in 1996 and said its sole purpose was to harm a disfavored minority.

Prop. 8's "express and stated purpose ... was to strip gay and lesbian individuals of constitutional rights" they had won in the state court, plaintiffs' lawyers said. They said Yes on 8 campaign messages "echoed fears that children must be 'protected' from gay and lesbian people."

Imbalance of evidence

The measure's sponsors, a conservative religious coalition called Protect Marriage, argued that subjective purposes were irrelevant and that Prop. 8 should be judged by its text: "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California." They also invoked President Obama - who said he opposes same-sex marriage for religious reasons, while also opposing Prop. 8 - as evidence that support for traditional marriage is not based in bigotry.

Friday's filings reflected, to some degree, the imbalance of evidence at the trial. Opponents of Prop. 8 presented 16 witnesses, including the individual plaintiffs - two gay men from Burbank and two lesbians from Berkeley - and a procession of university researchers to make the case that marriage is a historically evolving institution, that anti-gay discrimination is persistent and same-sex marriage would not affect heterosexuals.

Extending marital rights to gays and lesbians "strengthens the institution of marriage for both same-sex couples and opposite-sex couples," plaintiffs' lawyers declared, citing their witnesses' testimony. Despite some recent progress, they said, gays and lesbians "lack political power to defend their basic rights," are not protected from discrimination by federal laws or the laws of most states, and are the disproportionate targets of hate crimes and of ballot initiatives like Prop. 8.

Witnesses withdrawn

Protect Marriage withdrew four of its six scheduled witnesses at the start of the trial - saying they feared television coverage, which the Supreme Court had blocked - and presented two witnesses, political science Professor Kenneth Miller and the president of the Institute for American Values, David Blankenhorn.

The Prop. 8 sponsors cited research works, but no witness testimony, for one of their central assertions Friday: that "extending marriage to same-sex couples would result in a profound change to the definition, structure, and public meaning of marriage." Their opponents urged Walker to disregard such assertions, saying they contradict most academic studies and were never tested in court.

Citing Miller's testimony, Prop. 8's backers said gays and lesbians have strong political allies, particularly in California, and "have achieved the power they need to effectively pursue their goals through democratic institutions" without judicial intervention.

They cited Blankenhorn and the writings of conservative scholars for the conclusion that marriage is universally defined by "maleness and femaleness" and that one of its central purposes is "the encouragement of procreation under specific conditions" - a purpose best served, they argued, by limiting marriage to a man and a woman.

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TURIN, ITALY MAYOR 'MARRIES' LESBIAN COUPLE IN SYMBOLIC CEREMONY

Sergio Chiamparino, the mayor of Turin, Italy, 'married' a lesbian couple who have been together for nine years in a symbolic ceremony at the Rotonda de Valentino on Saturday.

Italian paper La Stampa reported that the couple had turned to him in an effort to institutionalize their love, and he agreed to serve at the ceremony. Same-sex marriage is not legal in Italy.

Said Chiamparino: "I cannot marry you because Italian law does not allow it. But I wanted to attend this beautiful ceremony in the hope that my presence would serve to tell everyone that you are first-class citizens, like all of us...I'm here to put a symbolic seal on this union. It's a moment that sends a powerful message of happiness and suffering. Happiness because it is obvious that you love one another so much — suffering, because you cannot fully recognize that love."