News :: GLBT
Activists Condemn Bush’s Marriage Amendment Support by Peter Cassels
EDGE ContributorTuesday Jun 6, 2006WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Gay rights groups and political organizations sharply criticized President George Bush June 5 for once again voicing his support of a proposed Constitutional amendment that would codify marriage as between one man and one woman.
The U.S. Senate is scheduled to vote this week on the Federal Marriage Amendment. The amendment, which requires a two-thirds majority for passage, is expected to again be defeated. A vote to get the bill passed failed in 2004. Even if there were enough votes, to add such an amendment to the U.S. Constitution would also require a two-thirds vote in the U.S. House of Representatives and ratification by three-quarters of the 50 states, a process that would take years.
Leaders of extremist anti-gay organizations, including the Family Research Council and Focus on the Family, as well as a leader of the so-called "ex-gay" movement, attended the White House event June 5 at which Bush once against endorsed the FMA.
As Bush was speaking at the White House, a group of activists organized by the Human Rights Campaign were at the U.S. Capitol to deliver almost a quarter of a million "Vote No!" postcards.
HRC President Joe Solmonese was scheduled to moderate a news conference on the Capitol grounds the afternoon of June 6 where, among others, Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and Congressman John Lewis, D-Ga., were to speak out against the amendment.
The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force called the president’s FMA endorsement an "immoral attack on gay America."
The Log Cabin Republicans--the gay political group that has not been in lock-step with the White House for some time now--said Bush’s call for "tolerance and civility" while advocating discrimination "rings hollow." The National Stonewall Democrats also condemned his endorsement of the amendment.
"Yes, this is about pandering to his base. Yes, this is about diverting America’s attention from his foreign and domestic failures. But above all, this is an immoral attack on gay people, our families and our fundamental humanity," NGLTF Executive Director Matt Foreman said in a statement. Contending that the anti-gay supporters attending the White House event "make a living out of denigrating, demonizing and defaming gay people and our families," Foreman said it’s hypocritical for Bush to talk about tolerance, respect and dignity "while he cozies up to these bigots."
Speaking at an event on the steps of the U.S. Capitol, Solmonese of the HRC said Bush showed "how enormously out of touch this administration is with the rest of America. Discrimination never belongs in the Constitution. At a time when hard-working Americans are losing sons and daughters in Iraq, struggling to afford health care for their families and worrying about being able to fill their tanks with gas, the discriminatory attack on the U.S. Constitution and American families is shameful politicking."
Log Cabin President Patrick Guerriero called the FMA "an intolerant and uncivil attack on gay and lesbian Americans and our families." Several GLBT rights supporters also spoke at the HRC event, held to counter what was going on simultaneously at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue.
Saying she watched her son graduate from military boot camp last fall, the Rev. Susan Russell of All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, Calif., said she was surprised she would have to defend the Constitution from those willing to exploit it for political gain. "My son and his colleagues preparing to be deployed to Kuwait deserve better than that. America deserves better than that," she said.
LaWana SlackMayfield of North Carolina, a working woman of color, said Bush’s policies "have devastated my community, and I’m here to tell him this amendment is no solution." She added that the FMA would codify discrimination on the Constitution for the first time ever.
Joe and Joann Elder of Wisconsin appeared at the event to support their gay son. Joann called the amendment "divisive," "un-American" and "unnecessary."
Log Cabin President Patrick Guerriero called the FMA "an intolerant and uncivil attack on gay and lesbian Americans and our families."
It "undermines our party’s conservative belief in federalism," Guerriero continued. "States around the nation are working through this issue in different ways. The president and other amendment supporters are trying to short circuit this healthy debate by imposing a federal solution for a problem that doesn’t exist. States remain capable of working through this issue without interference from politically motivated Washington politicians."
The National Stonewall Democrats accused Republicans of preferring to promote "political rhetoric than provide concrete policy that actually strengthens families." Saying Bush knows his support of the FMA won’t prevent it from being voted down by the Senate, NSD Interim Executive Director Jo Wyrick said in a statement, "The only reason he campaigns for this amendment is because it is designed by political operatives to scare up a cheap influx of cash into Republican political campaigns already tainted by corruption. ...It’s not just dirty politics, it’s disgraceful."
Peter Cassels is a recipient of the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association’s Excellence in Journalism award. His e-mail address is pcassels@edgepublications.com.
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