Author Archive
Brian Brown gets it right (but does he know it?)
Cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
by Rob Tisinai
I wish NOM president Brian Brown had just a smidge more self-awareness. Because then he’d realize that, in his most recent newsletter, he accidentally presents NOM as a hateful and bigoted organization.
Brian writes this of the Iowa hearings on marriage:
Even I, who’ve heard pretty much everything at this point, was a little shocked to hear one gay marriage supporter say:
“It would be less harmful to me if you would just beat me up in a dark alley. It would be less hurtful to me if you would just spray paint the word f—-t on my garage door. Nothing you could do to me physically would be more hurtful to me than the action you are proposing to take with this resolution.”
If you and I disagree with him about marriage, we are hurting him as much as–more than–if we insulted and beat him?
I know too many of our fellow citizens and neighbors who support gay marriage have reached a similar boiling point of emotion-driven unreasonableness. And I want to, on the one hand, give them a big hug or something to make them feel better.
Emotion-driven unreasonableness? Really? Let’s check this out. (more…)
Utter deception or utter delusion?
Cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
by Rob Tisinai
I can’t believe this. Here’s what NOM wrote on their blog, complaining about Paul Krugman saying that toxic, eliminationist political rhetoric comes overwhelmingly from the right.
By “eliminationist rhetoric,” Paul Krugman means rhetoric which suggests that one’s opponents are not just wrong, they are illegitimate—that in a better world they would not exist.
Well, you and I know a little about rhetoric that sounds like that don’t we?
(He may only be speaking of rhetoric inciting to violence, and I want to be clear that I don’t consider gay-marriage advocates on their worst day to be doing that.)
But for me the worst part of the gay marriage debate is this eliminationist quality coming (in my experience, and of course I’m speaking only about public and visible organizations and spokespeople) almost exclusively from one side: activists who support gay marriage.
“Almost exclusively from one side: activists who support gay marriage.” All I can say is…
Are
You
Kidding?
This is just two days – two days! – after NOM quoted a Catholic Bishop who called same-sex marriage “the modern day evil works of Satan.”
Who distorted the Bible to say God slaughters entire cities for homosexuality.
Who said – one day after the shooting of Rep. Giffords: “In this battle, there is no neutrality, no demilitarized zone.”
Really NOM, you don’t think anti-gay eliminationist rhetoric is coming from the right? Let’s go to Facebook and check out your “Favorite Pages.”
There’s the Family Research Council! Their president thinks gays are in the hands of the Enemy. Their spokesman says the US should be deporting gays. And that homosexuality should be criminalized.
Speaking of throwing gays in prison – the Texas GOP platform also wants to criminalize homosexuality. So does Montana’s. Can you name anything – anything – comparable in a Democratic Party platform?
Yet you stand there and say the eliminationist rhetoric comes “almost exclusively from one side: activists who support gay marriage.” It’s baffling, infuriating, bizarre. Are you lying? Or have you broken with reality? Believe me, if there’s a third option I’d love to hear it.
On the other hand, maybe you’re right. Maybe the eliminationist rhetoric is only on the left. Because what I see when I look at your allies on the right is an eliminationist agenda.
“The Evil Modern Day Works of Satan”
Cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
by Rob Tisinai
NOM’s blog yesterday quotes a sermon from Bishop Robert Evans:
I submit that today, in the State of Rhode Island, we are faced with a challenge to our baptismal promises to renounce the modern day evil works of Satan and confess our belief in Christ and His holy Catholic Church…This challenge takes the form of an attempt to grant to same sex couples that recognition reserved for the oldest and the only institution God created in His own image: Man as male and female united in marriage.
The evil modern day works of Satan.
NOM claims they’re not anti-gay. They’ve complained about unjust accusations of hatred. I have to ask:
If it’s not hatred to say your opponents are working to advance the cause of Satan, then what is?
That’s not a rhetorical question. I really want to know where NOM sees the line between civil discourse and hatred. I want them to make it clear.
To me, this is hate. I don’t care that it’s based on religious belief — anyone who’s studied history knows that religious passion can inspire hatred, and vice versa. And I don’t even want to shut him down — “hate speech” isn’t a crime in this country and I hope it never is.
But we still need to denounce it when we hear it — shine the light of truth on it and call it out for what it is.
The good and gentle Bishop’s statement has a few more problems: He repeats the lie that God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah for the sin of homosexuality, when every Bible reader knows the prophet Ezekial said:
Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen.
Jesus extends this condemnation of arrogance and inhospitability when he tells his disciples:
Whatever town or village you enter, search for some worthy person there and stay at his house until you leave. As you enter the home, give it your greeting. If the home is deserving, let your peace rest on it; if it is not, let your peace return to you. If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet. Truly I tell you, it will be more bearable for Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for that town.
Anyone who reads the story can tell you it’s not about commited same-sex relationships but about the violent gang rap of two men/angels, which surely we can all oppose. Evans’ lie about this Bible story makes it all the more ironic when he tells his parishoners:
Remember the title Jesus gave Satan: “The father of lies.”
There’s more. Evans tell his flock:
In this battle, there is no neutrality, no demilitarized zone.
Is this just a case of awful timing? I don’t think for one moment he meant this as anything but a metaphor (a literal interpretation would leave him open to charges of incitement to violence, a criminal offense that long predates hate crime legislation). But Evans gave this sermon on two days ago, on Sunday, January 9. Given our current turmoil over the limits of rhetoric, along with the long and very real history of anti-gay violence in America, shouldn’t a spiritual leader be in the vanguard of those pulling back from such speech?
But leave aside his unfortunate phrasing. This man is lying about the Bible and saying that gays are doing the work of Satan. And NOM is spreading the message.
I have to ask again — if that’s not hate, what is?
“That was a stupid lie, easy to expose, not worthy of you.”
Cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
By Rob Tisinai
Maggie Gallagher is savvy. She leads her followers away from the truth, but usually through distortion, misdirection, obscure language, misinterpretation, and sins of omission. It’s rare to catch her in a simple, direct lie. But she be must in a snit , because the Southern Poverty Law Center has added 13 anti-gay organizations to their list of hate groups, and accused 5 more (including Maggie’s National Organization for Marriage) of pushing demonizing propaganda aimed at homosexuals and other sexual minorities – though it stopped short of calling these 5 “hate groups.”
On Sunday, Maggie quoted a Washington Post column by Matthew Franck:
The Southern Poverty Law Center, a once-respected civil rights organization, publishes a “report” identifying a dozen or so “anti-gay hate groups,” some for no apparent reason other than their vocal opposition to same-sex marriage.
This. Is. A. Lie.
Not one of these groups – not one – appeared on the hate-group list merely for opposing marriage equality. The SPLC specifies why it added each one. You’ll find more details at the end of this post, but in short, the organizations were guilty of offenses like:
- Distorting scientific research to demonize gays, even over the original authors objections.
- Calling for the criminalization of homosexuality
- Advocating the death penalty for gays.
- Accusing gay men of recruiting children and being more likely to molest them than straights.
- Holding gays responsible for Nazi Germany and the Holocaust.
Maggie knows this. She includes a link to the SPLC report containing this information! We have no room to give her — or Mr. Franck — the benefit of any conceivable doubt. They may not think these items justify the “hate group” designation, but they’re committing outright deceit in saying that opposing marriage equality was the only “apparent reason.”
Maggie spread this lie in a piece called, “Is the Hate Card the Recourse of Those Unwilling to Engage the Debate?” I happen to agree that some activists play the hate card too readily, but Maggie needs to pick her battles. Death penalties? Pedophilia? Nazi Germany? There is hate here. (She ought to fight those battles more honestly, too, but I doubt that’s a winning strategy for her cause).
The rest of the column is mired in contradiction. Click through for more of that in the extended entry. (more…)
This is puzzling
Cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
by Rob Tisinai
Dr. Patrick Fagan writes:
Adoption is life-alteringly beneficial for children. Such is the general conclusion from a review of the literature.
Adoption in the first 12 months of the child’s life produces the best outcomes, but all children will benefit, regardless of their age at placement. Adopted children outperform their non-adopted peers and non-adopted siblings.
What’s so puzzling? Fagan is writing for our opponents, the Family Research Council. And this study is being promoted by The Ruth Institute — NOM’s youth outreach program.
You’ve heard of NOM, right? And its founder, Maggie Gallagher? You know, the lady who misuses research to argue that children do best when raised by both biological parents. Maggie goes on interview after interview claiming traditional marriage must be protected because it’s how children can “love and be loved by their own mother and father” — meaning their biological mother and father.
That’s kind of a shot at adoptive parents, but Maggie needs to take that shot. It’s the only way she can argue against marriage equality. If adoptive parents count as real and valuable parents, then their families deserve the protections and stabilizing effects of marriage, too — and that includes families headed up by gay or lesbian couples.
Yet here we have NOM pushing a study that says adoption is valuable. That adopted children outperform their non-adopted peers and non-adopted siblings. That the sooner kids are adopted the better.
NOM is unintentionally highlighting the danger of letting kids languish foster care or institutions instead being adopted by loving, same-sex parents who enjoy all the family protections that marriage equality makes possible.
A commenter on the Ruth Institute’s website asked about this. I’ll be watching closely to see what they reply.
NOM has questions? We have answers.
Cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
by Rob Tisinai
NOM employee Jennifer Roback Morse has questions for Ted Olson and David Boies, the power attorneys fighting for marriage equality.
Sometimes questions are just a request for information. Sometimes they invite us to think of new things.
And sometimes they’re a clumsy, dishonest rhetorical device. Writers occasionally use them to avoid presenting evidence, to avoid careful reasoning, to avoid having their sloppy thought carefully dismantled.
For instance, simply asking Are you absolutely certain nothing bad will happen? is a lot easier than making a clear case that some specific bad thing is coming.
That’s Morse’s strategy with these questions. The problem, though, is she’s not very good at it. She’s made the mistake of asking questions that are easy to answer. She’s merely shown us the limits of her own thinking. So here are her questions, along with my answers. Feel free to add your own in the comments.
Do you seriously believe it is a “myth” or mere “prejudice” that children need their mothers and fathers?
Research shows that children need their parents. It shows that the gender of those parents matters very little compared to to the benefits of living in a stable, permanent home. So we don’t understand why many on your side would rather keep children in foster care or institutions rather than with permanent same-sex parents.
Do you seriously believe that it is “beyond dispute” that redefining marriage will have no long term social consequences, except for making life better for same sex couples?
Nice framing of the question, Jennifer. No prediction of the future is “beyond dispute.” With criteria like that, we’d never allow change — we’d never have made it out of our ancestors’ caves. I do see long-term benefits, though — more stable homes for children, fewer kids in foster care and institutions, and more hope for gay teens wondering about their future. If you have negative consequences in mind, though, name them and persuade us instead of weaseling the issue with this question.
Do you really believe that mothers and fathers are interchangeable and that gender is irrelevant to parenting? If gender is really irrelevant, why do self-described “gays” insist on having a male sex partner? Why isn’t a really masculine woman just as acceptable as a male sex partner?
Ew.
You’re equating the parenting relationship with a sexual/romantic relationship. That’s creepy. And based on a twisted notion of parenting and sex that few of your followers would endorse. Ew.
If you believe the law should be that “love makes a family,” do you seriously propose to make “love” a legally defined term?
Oh, sure. Just like I think “Home is where the heart is” means architects should be board-certified cardiologists. Come on. Some expressions have emotional meaning. Legally-defined terms have legal meaning. You can’t jump literally back and forth. But really, you’re just being silly now.
Do children have any rights that adults are bound to respect? Not just the right to not be injured, but positive rights to care and relationship with particular adults, namely their parents?
Of course. What on earth does this have to do with same-sex marriage? Oh, wait, you’re doing that thing NOM loves to do — equating “parent” with “biological parent,” and excluding “adoptive parent.” But it’s a surprise coming from you, Jennifer, because you’re an adoptive parent. You’d never tell your adoptive child, “I’m not your Mom and don’t start thinking I am.” No, your adopted child is in a relationship with his (her?) parent — you.
What do you think is the essential public purpose of marriage? We think the essential public purpose of marriage is to attach mothers and fathers to their children and to one another.
So many things wrong with this question. I’ll have to number them:
- What do you mean by “public purpose”? Also, what do you mean by “essential.” Please define.
- If that’s your “essential public purpose,” then why do you permit the elderly to marry?
- What’s with “the essential public purpose”? Are you saying there’s only one? That marriage cannot have more than one purpose?
- If raising children is the essential public purpose of marriage, it’s odd that most traditional wedding vows don’t mention kids at all.
- More to the point, the goal of attaching mothers and fathers to their children and to one another does not exclude same-sex couples. Marriage will still serve the purpose of uniting parents to each other and to their children, assuming you believe (unlike some of your colleagues) that mothers and fathers can view an adopted child as their child.
When you have reduced marriage to nothing but a government registry of friendships, how exactly do you think children will be attached to their mothers and fathers?
We’re not planning to reduce marriage to nothing but a government registry of friendships. Stop pretending you’re asking these things to find out the answers — you’re just flinging accusations and ending them with question marks.
These are just my own answers, of course, and I’m a poor substitute for Olson and Boies. But Jennifer, I’ll tell you this: I’d loooove to get you in a room face-to-face with our attorneys and watch you ask them these questions directly.
I’d buy tickets.
Is NOM lying to you (again?)
Cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
by Rob Tisinai
NOM isn’t the most truthful bunch on the planet. And it’s almost sad, because their lapses are so damn easy to spot. Here’s their expert Jennifer Roback Morse, blogging just before the appeal hearing started. She’s saying our star attorneys, Olson and Boies, had a responsibility during the trial to explain why previous federal precedents (against marriage equality) didn’t apply to their case:
Olsen and Boies didn’t do that. Judge Walker didn’t do that. They didn’t even mention Baker v Nelson, Adams v Howerton and a host of state and district court rulings around the country.
Baker v Nelson is a case from 1972: the Supreme Court left in place a lower-court verdict denying same-sex marriage rights. Our opponents invoke Baker to say Judge Walker had no business taking the current case in the first place, and his disregard for Baker is proof of his pro-gay bias.
Now here’s Morse advancing that claim, saying Walker, Olson, and Boise didn’t even mention Baker.
True?
Actually, no. I knew Morse was wrong, so I Googled Baker Nelson Judge Walker. Here’s what I found in Judge Walker’s ruling against our opponents’ motion for summary judgment:
| Page | Reference to Baker v Nelson |
| 7 – 8 | Judge Walker brings up Baker, and Cooper (the other side’s attorney) acknowledges this is the only case that might offer complete grounds for dismissing the complaint |
| 9 | Cooper starts talking about Baker but get sidetracked. |
| 17 | Judge Walker brings the court’s attention back to Baker. And Cooper gets sidetracked again. |
| 34 – 38 | Judge Walker brings the court’s attention back to Baker again. Cooper finally stays on track and makes his points. |
| 40 – 43 | Judge Walker asks Olson (one of our attorneys) to address Baker. Olson does so. |
| 59 | Olson addresses Baker again without being prompted. |
| 73 | Judge Walker mentions Baker in his decision not to dismiss the case in summary judgment. |
| 75 – 79 | Judge Walker explains why he does not find Baker to be binding in this case. |
| 90 | Judge Walker officially declares Baker to be insufficient grounds to dismiss the case. |
Not only does Judge Walker mention Baker, he repeatedly brings it up and asks both sides to comment on it. Baker comes up in the closing arguments, too (page 2986), when Walker asks Olson about Baker and Olson responds.
Here’s a word of advice for Morse, though: when you falsely accuse someone of egregious misdeeds, you only end up convicting yourself.
One last note: I merely wondered whether Morse is lying because there is another explanation. Perhaps she merely devoted a blog entry to something so untrue — not just untrue, but easy to check on, as well — because she lacks basic knowledge and research skills. I wouldn’t be surprised. Apart from Maggie Gallagher herself, the NOM team strikes me a bunch of Keystone Kops. When she reviews the troops, I imagine poor Maggie spends a lot of her time doing face palms — do you think?
Image from dancerher at deviantart.com.
NOM’s Rhode Island strategy: Incoherence
Cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
by Rob Tisinai
Christopher Plante, who heads up NOM’s Rhode Island franchise, says:
The National Organization for Marriage- Rhode Island is disappointed that Governor-elect Chafee… refuses to listen to the voice of over 80% of Rhode Islanders who want the right to vote on marriage. It is clear that Governor-elect Chafee intends to put fringe issues and radical politics over saving Rhode Islanders jobs and securing a prosperous future for our State. NOM – Rhode Island will work with Rhode Islanders to demand their right to vote on marriage, and demand that the Governor-elect sticks to the business of getting Rhode Island back on the right economic track. We are confident that the majority of Assembly-women and men know there are more important things to deal with and we will support their efforts to push for a referendum. [emphasis added]
Wait — did NOM just call same-sex marriage a fringe issue? Does that mean NOM considers itself a fringe group?
NOM-RI’s blog offers this:
Rhode Island’s recovery from its economic disaster is forecast to lag well behind the rest of the country. In these dire fiscal conditions Governor-elect Chafee and the new Rhode Island Assembly must focus all of their energy on saving our State’s economy. Gridlock inducing social experiments such as homosexual-marriage will only bog down our government and take away from the energy and ideas needed to bring Rhode Island and Rhode Islanders back to prosperity.
…
This is particularly crucial given the economic morass that Rhode Island still faces; this is no time to bog down our State government with an issue that impacts less than 5 percent of the population.
Let me see if I can sum up NOM’s position:
Same-sex marriage is a fringe issue affecting only a tiny fraction of Rhode Island’s population, so instead of having the State Assembly deal with it we’ll open it up for a vote by the entire population of the state, because a state-wide ballot with campaigns and stump speeches and television commercials and millions of dollars in fundraising is the best way to direct energy and ideas away from same-sex marriage and toward creating jobs in Rhode Island.
That’s utterly incoherent. Given the history of such initiatives, it makes no sense to argue that —
Oh. Wait. Did I just mention something about “millions of dollars in fundraising”?
Suddenly NOM’s Rhode Island strategy makes a bunch more sen$e.
NOM (accidentally) argues for same-sex marriage
A different version of this was cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
by Rob Tisinai
The Ruth Institute (NOM’s youth group) has a new money making scheme outreach project called, “”77 Non-religious Reasons to Support Man/Woman Marriage”:
This pamphlet offers 77 incontrovertible statements in support of Natural Marriage, all of which defend the premise without delving into ‘religious’ themes.
What a ludicrous straw-man title. By definition, people who believe in marriage equality support “Man/Woman” marriage exactly as much as same-sex marriage. What part of “marriage equality” does NOM not understand?
The Ruth Institute is offering 25 of these pamphlets for just $20, plus $5 shipping and handling. I have opted not to take advantage of this deal.
But I have looked at their promotional excerpt: based on reason 60 – By the time the activists are finished, there will be nothing left of marriage but a government registry of friendships – I do not believe the word incontrovertible means what they think it means.
Reasons 61 through 65, though, caught my eye because every one of them could be used to advocate banning adoption.
Just look. I’ve got the Ruth Institute’s language in the left column, and I’ve adapted it ever so slightly on the right.
| Ban SSM | Ban Adoption |
| Man/woman marriage is the institution that attaches mothers and fathers to their children. Same sex marriage transforms marriage into an institution that separates children from at least one of their parents | Man/woman marriage is the institution that attaches mothers and fathers to their children. Adoption transforms marriage into an institution that separates children from at least one of their parents |
| Same sex marriage opens the door to children having more than 2 legal parents, as it has in Canada. | Adoption opens the door to children having more than 2 legal parents, as it has in Canada. |
| Same sex marriage routinely places biological parents on the same legal footing with adults who have no genetic relationship to the child. | Adoption routinely places biological parents on the same legal footing with adults who have no genetic relationship to the child. |
| Same sex marriage eliminates the legal principle that biology is the primary means of establishing parental rights and responsibilities. | Adoption eliminates the legal principle that biology is the primary means of establishing parental rights and responsibilities. |
| Some other principle must take the place the biological principle. That principle will be the state assignment of parental rights and responsibilities. | Some other principle must take the place the biological principle. That principle will be the state assignment of parental rights and responsibilities. |
Actually, the Ban Adoption column rings truer than the Ban SSM column, to my ears at least.
Of course, NOM doesn’t want to ban adoption. In fact, the pamphlet’s author, Jennifer Roback Morse, has an adopted child. One possible explanation for this seeming hypocrisy is that Morse so needs to discriminate against us that she’s simply blind to the implications of her own thinking. I wish we could do two things:
Point out that reality does not validate her thinking: These warnings about same-sex marriage apply equally to adoption, yet adoption hasn’t destroyed the American family – so your warnings have no real-world support.
Demand some intellectual integrity: Given the similarities to adoption in your SSM analysis, why do you support one and oppose the other?
Actually, as far as NOM’s attitude toward adoptive parents is concerned, I’m giving them way too much credit. They have a long and offensive history of denigrating such families. It turns out that this “77 Reasons” pamphlet continues that tradition. Look at the other excerpt they have online.
The only way this makes sense – to the extent it makes sense at all – is if NOM’s definition of “parent” means “biological parent only.” What happens to this piece when we acknowledge that adoptive parents count as parents, too? Break it down:
| Jennifer Roback Morse says… | An adoptive parent would reply… |
| Look at marriage from the child’s point of view. Not every marriage produces children. But every child has parents. | Tell that to children in foster care and institutions. |
| Every child is entitled to a relationship with both parents. | Then let’s make sure children have parents, be they biological or adoptive. |
| Every child is entitled to know and be known by both parents. | Um, that’s just a weaker version of your previous statement. |
| No child can possibly protect these entitlements on his or her own. | Okay… |
| Adult society must protect the child’s right to affiliation with both parents. | Okay… |
| Adult society must protect these rights through prevention of harm, not through restitution after the fact. | Okay…what does this have to do with same-sex marriage? |
| Man/woman marriage is the institution adult society uses to proactively protect the rights of all children to affiliation with both parents. | NO! Marriage – opposite sex and same-sex – is the institution society uses to create stable and safe families for kids. |
| Same sex marriage changes marriage from a child-centered institution to an adult-centered institution. | Huh? Didn’t you mean: Same-sex marriage allows more children to enjoy the benefits of having two loving parents. |
See? Once you acknowledge that adoptive parents are real parents, the whole line of reasoning turns into an argument for marriage equality.
Here’s the funny thing: NOM/Ruth is using these excerpts to show how fabulous the pamphlet is. You can only wonder what a mess they made of the rest of it.
NOM: The people your (Founding) Fathers warned you about
Cross-posted at Waking Up Now.
by Rob Tisinai
NOM has defeated all three of the valiant Iowa State Supreme Court justices up for retention, justices who voted to uphold basic rights for all citizens regardless of popular sentiment.
It’s a big win for NOM. It’s a huge blow to the Constitution and the form of government created by our Founding Fathers.
Maggie Gallagher wouldn’t say so, of course.
Here we have an openly gay (according to the San Francisco Chronicle) federal judge substituting his views for those of the American people and of our Founding Fathers, who I promise you, would be shocked by courts that imagine they have the right to put gay marriage in our Constitution.
Conservatives (and Tea Partiers in particular) constantly invoke the Federalist Papers to explain the government our Founders intended. So let’s look at #78, which sets out the philosophy behind an independent judiciary. We’ll find three points that NOM would rather keep hidden [emphasis added in all quotes below].
1. Judges have a duty to declare laws invalid if they violate the Constitution
A constitution is, in fact, and must be regarded by the judges, as a fundamental law. It therefore belongs to them to ascertain its meaning, as well as the meaning of any particular act proceeding from the legislative body. If there should happen to be an irreconcilable variance between the two, that which has the superior obligation and validity ought, of course, to be preferred; or, in other words, the Constitution ought to be preferred to the statute, the intention of the people to the intention of their agents.
2. Judges have a duty to protect the rights of minorities
But it is not with a view to infractions of the Constitution only, that the independence of the judges may be an essential safeguard against the effects of occasional ill humors in the society. These sometimes extend no farther than to the injury of the private rights of particular classes of citizens, by unjust and partial laws. Here also the firmness of the judicial magistracy is of vast importance in mitigating the severity and confining the operation of such laws. It not only serves to moderate the immediate mischiefs of those which may have been passed, but it operates as a check upon the legislative body in passing them; who, perceiving that obstacles to the success of iniquitous intention are to be expected from the scruples of the courts, are in a manner compelled, by the very motives of the injustice they meditate, to qualify their attempts.
3. Judges (especially at the highest levels) should not be subject to a vote by the people
That inflexible and uniform adherence to the rights of the Constitution, and of individuals, which we perceive to be indispensable in the courts of justice, can certainly not be expected from judges who hold their offices by a temporary commission. Periodical appointments, however regulated, or by whomsoever made, would, in some way or other, be fatal to their necessary independence. If the power of making them was committed either to the Executive or legislature, there would be danger of an improper complaisance to the branch which possessed it; if to both, there would be an unwillingness to hazard the displeasure of either; if to the people, or to persons chosen by them for the special purpose, there would be too great a disposition to consult popularity, to justify a reliance that nothing would be consulted but the Constitution and the laws.
Let’s be very clear on that last point: When the people can vote on a judge’s tenure, judges will be so tempted to base their decisions on popularity that they can’t be counted on to uphold the Constitution.
Compare that to the strategy laid out by NOM’s Brian Brown:
Many people that have commented on what we’re going through right now, especially with the Proposition 8 case in California, are looking at the Iowa judicial retention election – and even though there are many important elections about the country – they’re actually saying this is the most important election because it will send a clear signal to the Supreme Court and other judges that they don’t have the right to make up the law out of thin air. Their job is to interpret the law, it is not to be out robed masters and judicial activists imposing their will on the rest of us. And so if the people of Iowa do what I think they’ll do and stand up and remove these judges, there will be reverberations throughout the country all the way to the United States Supreme Court.
The National Organization for Marriage is exactly what the Founding Fathers warned us against.
- NOM is a radical organization, not a conservative one.
- NOM wants to butcher the balance of power set up by our Founding Fathers, not restore it.
- NOM wants to subvert the Constitution, not uphold it.
NOM’s actions constantly violate their rhetoric. They claim they’re protecting children, but deny family protections to the children of same-sex couples. They claim marriage law should be up to a vote by the citizens of each state, but push a federal marriage amendment that would deny citizens that vote. And now, while invoking the Founding Fathers, they pursue a political strategy in exact opposition to what the Founders intended.
Is there any principle avowed by NOM that they won’t violate, as long as it hurts the gays?
Prop 8 Trial Tracker 
Recent Comments