True Intentions
Mar 26th, 2009 by David Anderson
There are two bills stirring some measure of controversy in the General Assembly right now. One shouldn’t be controversial at all, Senate Bill 27 which is the Marriage Protection Act. The other is House Bill 5 which is the non discrimination based on Sexual Orientation. Both bills seem to be on the fast track for votes today in their respective house. Both bills seem to have majority support.
The Marriage Protection Act has been an amendment attached which will clarifies the language so that no confusion would exist regarding civil unions (which don’t exist). The true intentions of the sponsors and supporters like myself are clear with the amendment–it is about marriage. There is now no excuse for those who say that they oppose same sex marriage. I say to those Senators you either support the bill or you are disconnected from your words and the reality of your actions. Now your true intentions will be on display and we shall ensure they are known. This is a defining issue. Opposition to it is a game changer. It could inspire primaries and flip voters in a general election like nothing else. Combine that with unpopular tax hikes, table gaming votes, and other unpopular budget votes then a safe seat could become a swing seat. The only safe choice is the right one, support the status quo.
HB5 is tricky. It is a bill with the finest of intentions which some good people have worked to pass for 10 years. The unfortunate truth is that the bill has terrible flaws. I proposed some changes in the legislation during my testimony. Some of those changes will be offered today as an amendment They too will show the true intentions of the supporters. Supporting or opposing HB 5 is going to make someone mad on either side. I am not sure that it is a game changer either way in most districts. Voting down religious freedom would be. If the supporters of HB 5 are interested in protecting rights then they should support expanding the religious exemption already in the bill to cover all parts of it and be more broadly defined. If they do not, then we know that there is another agenda.
HB 5 will still be a flawed bill. It’s creation of a new protected class has been abused in most of the other 15 states which have passed it. Some people have been helped, but there is no widespread discrimination based upon sexual orientation in Delaware. In fact statistics show gay couples more affluent than their heterosexual counterparts. The question is whether or not benefits will exceed the costs. It will still have the effect of potentially opening up Grandma and Grandpa to a lawsuit which could wipe out their life savings because they decided to not to rent the garage apartment out to two guys whose lifestyle may impinge on their own. It would still open up small businesses to lawsuits based on a claim which is hard to disprove. It could still potentially criminalize disagreements such as a restaurant owner who may not want to host a gay party. These are all problems which can solved in the marketplace. The question is whether or not the infringement on the rights of some people will be outweighed by the good of legislation. I personally cannot support the any provision which could allow some personally ambitious Deputy AG to persecute people with whom he/she disagrees. The criminalizing of cultural dissent seems contrary to our traditions.
I wonder if the sponsors will adjust their bill to gain a broader popular support or will they be soldiers in a needless “culture war”. I think a sincere effort to bring more people together will benefit everyone gay and straight alike. Mr. Majority Leader, the ball is in your court.
David, do you honestly think letting people discriminate against people they don’t like for one reason or another is a good idea? What if that same little old couple doesn’t like black men, they are scared of them (the media told them they are all criminals, etc). Should they have the right to refuse to rent an apartment to them, or to let them have a party, or consider them for a job? (remember this was legal up until less then 60 years ago) What you are advocating for is the same thing the African American community and every other minority group has fought against for the last 150 years. Even better, what if a gay owned business refused to hire strait people, or rent them apartments? What if there were gay only communities? Would you be up in arms saying they were discriminating against strait people. Or what if Jewish businesses refused to hire Christians, or Muslim owners refused to rent their apartments to baptists? You would be up in arms about religious discrimination (and religion is certainly a lifestyle choice).
Your argument isn’t based on rational thought, its based on irrational fears, which are bad for our state. We should be embracing the gay community. You said it yourself, they tend to have higher incomes, they also tend to spend more money in restaurants and on vacation (hello tourism dollars), they give more to charity and the arts, and a host of other things that make them they group of people I would want to encourage to move to our state, not push away to our neighbors. Not only is your argument based on dubious logic, it is economically backwards. You are not what Delaware needs…
Why do we need a constitutional amendment to disallow something that is already disallowed by law? Seriously, are Venables and his cronies that worried that someone in the future would want to marry his toaster that they feel SB27 is necessary?
The vote was 9 for and 11 against SB 27. To pass, and move forward to a second vote next year, a two thirds majority was needed this year, which would be 14 for and 6 against. So it wasn’t even close.
The Senate did the right thing, in my view!
Now the next step is to pass an anti-discrimination law to protect the civil rights of gay folks.
We should also repeal the law that makes it against the law for gay couples to have a legal civil union.
The answer is if a Jewish organization refuses to hire me to teach their children in the traditions of Judaism because I am not one of them, that is fine. It would affect what the organization believes is its core mission.
If a gay person is uncomfortable with straight living in their own personal house, that is okay. The market place is about options not conformity.
Now if I own an apartment building, I have a different obligation. I am not forced to deal with people on a highly personal level. They don’t potentially live me. That is why the federal civil rights laws has exemptions based personal house apartments and rooming and even hiring for micro businesses even though some states did not follow suit.
You have to understand that a lifestyle has a different burden than being. What distinguishes this particular minority group in public is the lifestyle not the innate characteristics of this group. Those are not determinable.
Another Mike, that has already been answered. Read the previous post. 30 plus states have done this because of issues arising from the need for constitutional guidance for the courts. People in California believed that their law was adequate. They were wrong. This is especially important with some of the legislation we may pass in the near future. It would keep clear our intention.
The fact is you would want to raise to Constitutional law principles that you recognize not ones which you don’t. Read our state Constitution. This would not be unique. There are scores of principles such as banning gambling except for the state lottery and certain charitable games in it. That was already the law before it passed. What the amendment did was take full scale legalization off the table (pun intended).
What you apparently don’t understand is Constitutional law does not restrict the citizen directly. It restricts the government. Marriage already exists. What this amendment would do is prevent the government from changing it. It would say the government will only recognize marriage as it has always existed in this state.
HA HA HA
David, your position on this gay marriage issue just astounds me. Of all people you, an African American, after all you and your ancestors have been through. And it is not just your position, David, it is the position of the 30 or so other states that have an anti-gay marriage laws on their books. I thought this nation was moving beyond this sort of bigotry. At least DE has opted not to join this outrage of the masses. Hooray!!!
I will never, never understand how married gays threaten my marriage or the marriage of any other heterosexual pair, yet that is the argument you, and all like you, use.
Like I said, it is astounding! All of you folks ought to be ashamed for your exaggerations, your insensitivity, and your penchant for wishing to impose your narrow-minded will onto the rest of us.
All that said, I do respect your right to have your opinion, but I object to your attempts to impose it on the rest of us.
That is fair enough. I quite frankly respect your opinion. I think there is room for accommodation in the future, but the current environment in which an extreme faction is pushing an agenda over advancing the interests of their peers is poisoning the well. People on my side would be scared of a bill like HB 10 for good reason. It can be used subtlety lay the ground work for civil unions. I don’t like the wording of the bill. I would accept it and vote for it if I couldn’t broaden it to generally accept property rights transfer because it is basically right. I see HB 10 as a property rights bill. If I earned a benefit such as a pension, I have a right to transfer that survivor benefit to anyone I like. It is my money. A spouse gets that right, but is a spouse the only one entitled to it if I don’t have one? If someone else is sharing in a household and would be harmed by the passing of someone, why can’t that person be designated? That is especially incumbent upon me to be open to it if I say that gay people can’t marry their partner. Even though I am sure that a few will use it as a stepping stone, the bill has to be judged on its own merit. It is a trap for pro-family forces to focus so much on the agenda of the few that they could get set up to focus efforts on a bill which is basically just and popular on its surface. It could squander both momentum and resources in a doomed and pointless effort and give cover to those who view social conservatives as oppressive bigots. I am sure my friends won’t fall for that trap.
I think there are many areas of agreement possible agreement, but there is no effort to reach out by those who proclaim tolerance. Everyone knows that once HB 10 comes down they will be back to mandate it for all employers not just government employment. Next will come a push for Civil Unions. There will be a push for radical education curriculum changes. There will be a push for hate speech laws. Then will come a push just to go ahead and have same sex marriage. You can’t blame people for being gun shy. It is a precedent when combined with HB 5 that some people will use to push their agenda on organizations.
Fortunately, most gays and lesbians are just work a day people who want to live their lives in peace. My hope is that one day they will take back their movement. They want to know that they are free to do so without harassment. That is fair. What I hope they do is gain control of their activist fringe which is using them as a divisive wedge for its own power.
There is no reason to pick a fight on marriage as even some gays have written. It makes reasonable accommodations like HB 10 harder. That could have been done 10 years ago and still isn’t done. It is the bitter, inflexible tail that is wagging the dog in the gay movement. That is something only the movement can change. I can’t.