july 2 0 .2 0 0 1 » J u s t o u t
nTÏTTFn'TÎTI news
ocial conservatives formally trotted
out their latest stunt to “save” mar
riage— an amendment to the U.S.
C onstitution— during a news con-
ference July 12 at the N ational Press
Club in Washington, D.C. They tried to wrap
it in language of moderation and “letting the
people decide,” but opponents call it “a
nuclear bomb.”
T he effort is being led by the Alliance for
Marriage, ostensibly a diverse coalition of
individuals. But behind it are ties to James
Dobson, his Focus on the Family and other
socially conservative organizations. T he exec
utive director is M att Daniels, formally associ
ated with the Massachusetts Family Institute,
which is preoccupied with the homosexual
“threat” to marriage.
The amendment is simple enough: “Mar
riage in the United States shall consist only of
the union of a man and a woman. Neither this
constitution or the constitution of any state, nor
state or federal law, shall he construed to require
that marital status or the legal incidents thereof
he conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.”
It mirrors anti-gay marriage amendments to
state constitutions that conservatives have
pushed in several states. Even though the
amendment would inject the federal govern
ment into an area that heretofore has been
exclusively a state matter, Daniels claimed,
“The traditional autonomy of state legislatures
on family law matters is preserved by the text of
the amendment.”
He said the alliance is protecting U.S. citi
zens from activist courts that are “distorting”
existing law in order to promote a gay marriage
agenda. The amendment would return power to
the people to decide this issue.
“Our nation cannot go forward unless our
laws send a positive message to children about
marriage, family and their future,” Daniels said.
The amendment, he added, would help solve
the problems of divorce, abuse, drug use and
others that wrack U.S. families.
Walter Fauntroy, a Baptist minister and for
mer congressional representative for the District
of Columbia, said the worst thing besetting peo
ple of African descent throughout the world is
“the pandemic of fatherless families that is
sweeping our nation today. If we don’t do some
thing about it, we will soon be back to slavery,”
which was “based upon the destruction of the
nuclear family.”
Fauntroy called marriage “an institution
which defines sexual activity as having a dual
purpose, procreation and recreation, and not
recreation alone.” Presumably, he would deny
marriage to all post-menopausal women.
Fauntroy claimed, “I am by no means aban
doning my lifelong commitment to protecting the
S
A M ore P erfect U n io n ?
Conservatives push constitutional amendment to "protect" marriage
by Bob Roehr
The Alliance for Marriage announces its remedy for to the destruction of the nuclear family
civil rights of all citizens, gay an j straight, and of news conference across the lobby of the press
every race, creed and color on this planet.” He said club to respond to the earlier gathering.
sexual minorities could “enter into binding con Spokesman David Smith said the alliance “is
tracts. But that right does not extend to the right
intending to write out gay and lesbian families
to redefine the institution of marriage for the pur from the U.S. Constitution.”
pose of legalizing a lifestyle that one has chosen.”
Donna Payne, an HRC field organizer,
In 1983, Fauntroy opposed letting a gay acknowledged the problems facing U.S. fami
person speak at an anniversary celebration of lies. “W hat is needed is solutions, not scape
the 1963 civil rights March on Washington.
goats,” she said. “They mistakenly think that
‘pro-family’ is a syn
He equated gay
onym for ‘a n ti
rights with “pen
"W hat is needed
guin rights.”
gay.’ ” She said the
is solutions, not scapegoats.
amendment “would
Alliance mem
bers were not will They m istakenly think that 'pro-fam ily' create a co n stitu
tionally m andated
ing to talk about
is a synonym fo r 'anti-gay. ' "
second class of A m
when the amend
erican citizens” and
ment might be in
urged a celebration
troduced in Con
gress or by whom. And despite all of the talk, of families in all of their diversity.
“1 just don’t understand the reason for all of
none seemed to be able to answer a basic ques
tion from reporters: How would this amendment the sound and fury,” said Elder Michael Van
Zant of Faith Temple Evangelical Church. “It is
help heterosexual marriages?
Perhaps that is why the event got so little obvious that these threats to heterosexual mar
ink. As CBS Radio commentator Dave Ross riage and family are not homosexual unions but
said, the amendment seems to come down to, rather the conduct and behavior of heterosexu
“We don’t care who you marry or how long it als in and out of their heterosexual unions.”
Leslie Watson, Equal Partners in Faith inter
lasts, so long as the sexes are opposite.”
im
director, added, “As people of faith, we
The Human Rights Campaign organized a
Q rive w ith Pride
B o b ROEHR is a free-lance reporter based m
Washington, D . C .
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actively oppose the manipulation of religion to
promote inequality and exclusion.” She evoked
the language of the Declaration of Indepen
dence calling for “life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness” for all U.S. citizens. She said each
religion should be free to decide what consti
tutes marriage within its own tradition.
“Most of the anti-gay attacks in Congress are
legal equivalents of sticks and stones,” said
Christopher Anders of the American Civil Lib
erties Union. “This amendment is the legal
equivalent of a nuclear bomb. It will wipe every
single line protecting gay and lesbian families
and other unmarried couples.”
He said it would “invalidate all state and
local domestic partnership laws,” even in those
states that have passed a gay civil rights bill. It
would prohibit state and local governments
from offering domestic partner benefits to em
ployees and “undermine” adoption and guard
ianship laws, including hospital visitation and
decision making.
Anders turned to last fall’s vice presidential
debate in which Dick Cheney said, “People
should be free to enter into any kind of rela
tionship they want to enter into.” He continued
by noting that marriage is an issue where states
might come to “different conclusions.. .1 don’t
think that there should necessarily be a federal
policy in this area...I think we ought to do
everything we can to tolerate and accommodate
whatever kind of relationships people want to
enter into.”
The alliance claimed the amendment would
not affect the gay civil unions enacted in Ver
mont or domestic partner laws. “I don’t know
whether that is a purposeful misstatement or
they don’t understand the language that they’re
putting forward,” Anders said, but “the legal in
cidents of marriage” include benefits that have
been conferred through domestic partnership
and other laws.
Anders called the amendment “a more ex
treme measure than the Defense of Marriage
Act,” which sailed through Congress in 1996.
He is afraid politicians might sign on before they
realize how extreme it is, thus making it more
difficult to change their minds later on.
Passage would “deprive states of having that
traditional role” of being a laboratory for family
law and civil rights issues, he said. “Every single
federal civil rights law has always allowed the
states to develop stronger civil rights laws. But
this takes states out of the picture entirely.”
Smith said HRC has not seen “any evidence
that this is a viable effort” in Congress, al
though the organization will continue to moni
tor things closely. J H
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