Well, folks. Here we are again.
Election Day. Our rights, on the ballot. (If you’ve not voted, stop reading this post and go vote now!)
In Maine and Washington, voters across the state will decide whether marriage equality and domestic partnerships, respectively, will be allowed to continue following a legislature’s vote to implement them. In Kalamazoo, Michigan, voters are deciding whether to allow the city’s nondiscrimination ordinance to stay in effect.
These days feel weird because they’re days in which, come poll closing time, we await word from the populace about whether we are accepted in the places we call home.
But — as word came in that a legal challenge from the far Right to Cleveland’s domestic-partner registry was rejected by a judge today — I was reminded that we are on a path toward equality. We are progressing.
Keep fighting the good fight. Keep telling our stories. Keep talking with our families and neighbors and co-workers.
Equality will win out.
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For those on Twitter, I’ve created a “list” people can follow that is focused on Election ‘09 LGBT Issues. Marc Ambinder’s all-purpose Election ‘09 list can be found here. And, if you’ve not yet, check out my “Ten Races to Watch.”
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Chris Geidner is the senior political writer at D.C.'s Metro Weekly and has written for The Atlantic Online, Advocate.com, Salon and other publications, as well as at his blog, Law Dork. Prior to moving to D.C. in 2009, he served as an attorney on the senior staff at the Ohio Attorney General's Office and had earlier worked for a leading Columbus law firm. An extended biography can be found
Do you really believe that we will allow a bunch of religious lunatics to dictate who we can, or can’t marry? I expect legislative action, or federal court action, from the state of Maine to fight for marriage rights.
FlexSF,
What can legislative action do? The legislature and executive already did their bit: they drafted, debated, passed and signed a law to recognize same-sex marriage in Maine. A referendum in an odd-year election (when senior citizens vote but young people don’t) rejected the law. The legislature and executive (representative democracy) cannot override a referendum (direct democracy). Unless a Maine court finds that this is somehow the kind of matter that cannot go onto a referendum — a question that should have been litigated well before the election — there’s no basis for court action, and particularly no basis for federal court action.
What I’m wondering is whether the old Bradley/Wilder effect has actually become a SSM effect: people tell pollsters that they won’t vote against equality, but in the privacy of the voting booth, they do.