PROP 8 AND THE RULE OF FACTS: Robert K. Vischer

in Commonweal:

One of the many ways the Constitution’s framers showed their collective wisdom was by embedding the rule of law into the very framework of our system of government. Judicial review of popularly enacted laws keeps the majority accountable to underlying constitutional principles. Of course, one person’s core constitutional safeguard is another’s judicial activism run amok. And so, in a range of hot-button “culture war” cases, lower courts have tried to steer clear of the dreaded “judicial activist” label by shifting their analysis from the constitutional principles themselves to the facts through which the principles may be invoked. At times these days, the rule of law looks more like the rule of facts.

Facts were certainly the unmistakable focus of Judge Vaughn Walker’s recent ruling in Perry v. Schwarzenegger. In striking down Proposition 8, the California law limiting valid marriage to that between “a man and a woman,” Walker’s 136-page opinion devoted a mere 26 pages to legal analysis, while 100 were spent reciting and evaluating the evidence presented at trial. For a judge looking to transcend the ideological labels that often attach to high-profile cases, this is an understandable strategy. And indeed, Judge Walker’s work was quickly praised by many as “a very careful analysis,” “meticulously crafted,” a “comprehensive, detailed decision.” Yet a constitutional analysis of same-sex marriage is not an obvious fit for an evidentiary trial, which is more generally associated with such questions as whether driver error or brake failure caused a traffic accident.

Consider the eighty findings of fact made by Judge Walker, many of them far more speculative than the usual “plaintiff drove his car too fast on wet pavement” variety. Given the court’s eventual conclusion that a ban on same-sex marriage lacks a rational basis, the factual findings needed to show that same-sex marriage harms no legitimate state interest. This was a tall order, and Walker marshaled the facts aggressively—and, critics say, overconfidently. Some of his fact findings come across as premature, portraying contested and unverified issues as conclusively settled. See, for example, no. 55 ("Permitting same-sex couples to marry will not affect the number of opposite-sex couples who marry, divorce, cohabit, have children outside of marriage, or otherwise affect the stability of opposite-sex marriages"); no. 70 ("The gender of a child's parent is not a factor in a child's adjustment"); and no. 71 ("Having both a male and a female parent does not increase the likelihood that a child will be well-adjusted").

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Labels: gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Eve at 8:05 PM VOTE

IS GOD YOUR DADDY? DOES THAT SHAPE YOUR VIEWS ON GAY MARRIAGE?: USA Today

"Faith and Reason" blog:

Is God your Daddy? Your mother, judge or liberator? Would that make a difference when you consider whether gay marriage should be legal?

Those are the kinds of questions threaded through a new survey looking at Californian's views on Proposition 8, two years after the controversial referendum overturned the legalization of gay marriage.

Any day now, a judge is expected to rule on whether Prop 8 will be overturned. And who will cheer about that? Possibly the 29% of Californians who say Prop. 8 was "bad for California" according to the survey of 3,351 adults released today by the Public Religion Research Institute. ...

Other key findings in the survey released today:

* If a referendum "similar to Proposition 8" were held tomorrow, it would be defeated by a narrow margin (51%), riding on votes from younger people, those who claim no religious affiliation, Latino Catholics and while Mainline Protestants, and Democrats. And (45%), white evangelicals, Latino Protestants, and African American Protestants say they would approve it, again.
* One key to moving voters from support of civil unions to support of same-sex marriage appears to be adding a "religious liberty reassurance that the law would guarantee that no congregation would be forced to conduct same sex marriages against its beliefs."
* People are beginning to lock in to their positions. While 25% reported that they have shifted to become more supportive of gay rights over the last five years, 8 % are more opposed but a strong majority, 66%, held their ground. ...

The survey also asked people their perspective on God. Sure, 82% of Californians see God as "father" and 70% call God "judge" but the survey also added some less traditional choices and found 65% think of God as "liberator" and 39% see God as "mother." (Yes, these correlate as you would expect to views on gay marriage, although the results from the Mother God view are mixed.)

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Labels: California, culture, gay marriage, Proposition 8, religion

posted by Eve at 5:28 PM VOTE

Cardinal George Urges Catholics and Mormons to Defend Religious Freedom: Catholic News Agency

reports:

On Tuesday, Cardinal Francis George, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, gave a talk to nearly 12,000 students and faculty at Brigham Young University in Utah. The cardinal dedicated his speech to exhorting the two faiths to defend religious freedom and their place in the public square.

“In recent years, Catholics and members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have stood more frequently side by side in the public square to defend human life and dignity,” said Cardinal George on Tuesday morning.

The cardinal gave his presentation, “Catholics and Latter-day Saints: Partners in the Defense of Religious Freedom,” at a BYU forum on Feb. 23, at the school's Marriott Center. Receiving a standing ovation at the end of his address, Cardinal George is believed to be the highest ranking Catholic official to ever speak at the Mormon university. ...

Cardinal George also addressed the opposition that Catholics and Mormons have faced for their joint advocacy of human rights and dignity, citing the response from Proposition 8 opponents in California as an example.

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Labels: Catholic Church, LDS, Proposition 8, religion, religious liberty

posted by Imapp Staff at 4:29 PM VOTE

The Price of Prop 8: Heritage Foundation

backgrounder:

Abstract: Supporters of Proposition 8 in California have been subjected to harassment, intimidation, vandalism, racial scapegoating, blacklisting, loss of employment, economic hardships, angry protests, violence, at least one death threat, and gross expressions of anti-religious bigotry. Arguments for same-sex marriage are based fundamentally on the idea that limiting marriage to the union of husband and wife is a form of bigotry, irrational prejudice, and even hatred against homosexual persons. As this ideology seeps into the culture more generally, individuals and institutions that support marriage as the union of husband and wife risk paying a price for that belief in many legal, social, economic, and cultural contexts.

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Labels: culture, gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Imapp Staff at 1:07 AM VOTE

SIGNATURE CAMPAIGN BEGINS ON CALIF. ANTI-DIVORCE INITIATIVE: Religion Clause

blogs:

The California Secretary of State announced last week that the proponent of an initiative petition to amend California's Constitution to ban divorce in the state may begin to collect signatures. The proposed amendment would still allow annulments, but would completely eliminate the ability of married couples to get divorced in California. Proponents will need to collect the signatures of 694,354 registered voters to qualify the initiative for the ballot.

According to Huffington Post last month, the proponent, John Marcotte, introduced the amendment to mock the proponents of Proposition 8 who focused on protecting traditional marriage as a reason to oppose same-sex marriage. Last month, Cockeyed.com published an interview with Marcotte. Here is one exchange that gives the flavor of his remarks....

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Labels: California, culture, divorce, gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Eve at 12:37 AM VOTE

GAY MARRIAGE ON "TOP CHEF"

Apparently on Top Chef last night the "cheftestants" were asked to prepare dishes for an engaged couple's bachelor and bachelorette parties. One chef objected to the challenge because gay marriage has not been instituted in most states (including Nevada, where the show films this season). Although she did end up participating in the challenge, I'm still pretty interested in how the show has been handling this; you can read head judge Tom Colicchio's defense of both gay marriage and the recent challenge here. (He points out that in season 1, TC catered a gay wedding/commitment ceremony [I forget which].)

There's also a video on the Bravo site described as "Cheftestants take a stand against Prop 8."

ETA: Some contestants also had a problem with the fact that the challenge required the women chefs to cook for the bachelor party's men, while the men chefs cooked for the bachelorette party's women.

Labels: culture, gay marriage, gender, heteronormativity, Proposition 8

posted by Eve at 3:20 PM " target="display" style="text-decoration:none;color: rgb(204,0,0);"> " target="display" style="text-decoration:none;color: rgb(204,0,0);"> VOTE

David Boies, A Man in Search of an Argument: Matthew G. Franck

blogs at Nat'l Review Online:

In today's Wall Street Journal, David Boies makes his case for overturning California's Proposition 8 (protecting marriage as it has existed throughout history) as contrary to the federal Constitution. If this represents the best he can do, he had better try again, for his argument is laughably bad. (Of course, it may still be good enough for Justice Anthony Kennedy—probably Boies' intended audience, come to think of it.)

Here I'll stick just to 1) the demonstrably false things Boies says, and 2) his preposterous straw-man arguments. There may be more examples in both these groups than I can document here, but these strike me as the most notable, taking them in the order in which they appear.

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Labels: gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Imapp Staff at 7:39 PM VOTE

HOW TO GET 63% OF AMERICANS TO SUPPORT GAY MARRIAGE: Nate Silver

blogs:

...When USA Today asks whether gay marriage is a private decision, or rather whether government has the right to pass laws which regulate it, 63 percent say it's a private decision. This contrasts significantly with all other polling on gay marriage. The highest level of support gay marriage has received in the more traditional, positive-rights framing is 49 percent, from a ABC/Washington Post poll in late April. The average support is closer to about 41-42 percent. And indeed, this same survey organization, Gallup, last month released a poll that put the number of Americans approving of gay marriage at 40 percent. ...

The better argument against my interpretation of this poll is that it's contradicted by other evidence. Namely, last November in California, a state whose highest court had indeed ruled that gay marriage was protected by the state's constitution, some 52 percent of the electorate decided that they knew better, and that Adam and Steve would have to catch the next available flight to Burlington, Vermont.

But even though gay marriage had already become -- however briefly -- the law of the land in California, that wasn't how the debate unfolded on Proposition 8.

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Labels: gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Eve at 3:30 PM VOTE

THE STORM OVER THE MORMONS: Time magazine

feature:

Last November, Jay Pimentel began hearing that people in his neighborhood were receiving letters about him. Pimentel lives in Alameda, Calif., a small, liberal-leaning community hanging off Oakland into the San Francisco Bay. Pimentel, who is a Mormon, had supported Proposition 8, the ballot initiative banning same-sex marriage. And that made him a target. "Dear Neighbor," the letter began, "Our neighbors, Colleen and Jay Pimentel"--and it gave their address--"contributed $1,500.00 to the Yes on Proposition 8 campaign. NEIGHBORS SHOULD BE AWARE OF THEIR NEIGHBORS' CHOICES." The note accused the Pimentels of "obsessing about same-sex marriage." It listed a variety of local causes that recipients should support--"unlike the Pimentels."

Pimentel, a lawyer and a lay leader in the small Mormon congregation in Alameda, is markedly even-keeled. Yet the poison-pen note still steams him, even though in May the California Supreme Court validated Prop 8 as constitutional. He is bothered less by the revelation of his monetary contribution, which he stands by, than the fact that the letter's author didn't bother to find out that every other Saturday for 15 years, he or someone else from Alameda's 184-member Mormon ward has delivered a truckload of hot meals to the Midway Shelter for Abused and Homeless Women and Children--one of the organizations the Pimentels allegedly wouldn't support. "The church does a lot of things in the community we don't issue press releases about," he says. "And when people criticize us, we often just take it on the chin. I guess you could say I'm not satisfied with the way we're seen."

Across the country, that's the dilemma facing the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. With 13 million members worldwide (by its own count), the LDS is the fourth largest church in the country, the richest per capita and one of the fastest-growing abroad. The body has become a mainstream force, counting among its flock political heavyweights like former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and Democratic Senate majority leader Harry Reid, businesspeople like the Marriotts and entertainers like Glenn Beck and Twilight novelist Stephenie Meyer. The passage of Prop 8 was the church's latest display of its power: individual Mormons contributed half of the proposition's $40 million war chest despite constituting only 2% of California's population. LDS spokesman Michael Otterson says, "This is a moment of emergence."

But that emergence has its costs. Even as Mormons have become more prominent, they have struggled to overcome lingering prejudices and misrepresentations about the sources of their beliefs. Polls suggest that up to half of Americans would be uncomfortable with a Mormon President. And though the Prop 8 victory was a high-water mark for Mormon political advocacy, it also sparked a vicious backlash from gay-rights activists, some of whom accused Mormons of bigotry and blind religious obedience.

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Labels: LDS, Proposition 8, religion

posted by Eve at 2:49 PM VOTE

Behind the Scenes of Proposition 8: Sonja Eddings Brown

blogs (Brown was the Deputy Communications Director and spokesperson for the Proposition 8 Protect Marriage Campaign):

...In the past week, I was tasked to find a location in Los Angeles where Protect Marriage might be able to offer comment when the California Supreme Court handed down its decision on Proposition 8. This may surprise you, but the Protect Marriage campaign was not welcome anywhere in Los Angeles following last November 4th’s election. Perhaps this does not surprise you. Either out of fear, or fear of appearing supportive of our odd tradition of marriage, facilities like the Museum of Tolerance, The Bonaventure Hotel, City Hall, Marriott Hotels, Hilton Hotels, or any hotel would not welcome Protect Marriage for fear of retaliation or protests. We feared using these locations as well because of the great potential for sabatoge. Calling City Hall, for instance, was a dead end for a democratic cause like Protect Marriage. Not only did Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa support legalization of gay marriage, but also the entire Board of County of Supervisors and virtually
everyone in City and County government. How helpful do you believe City Hall would be in facilitating a Protect Marriage press conference? When the Office of City Permits was contacted to schedule an event, our calls were not returned, our requests ignored.

Fortunately, a principled owner of the elegant Santa Ann Doubletree Hotel felt differently, and that is why Los Angeles Protect Marriage press conferences, for safety reasons, and out of necessity, were held in Orange County. Security was necessary, police protection was required, but our work was completed.

Seven months later, the environment in Los Angeles this week remained the same. The Los Angeles Press Club, whose express mission is to host public press conferences, didn’t return our calls. Dialing hotels in the San Fernando Valley was equally fruitless. Two prominent hotels, which shall remain nameless, agreed to host us, and then later in the day delivered polite phone calls, declining. A hotel north of the San Fernando Valley actually had one member of its catering staff call and offer us any room of our choice, and another member of their catering staff call and state that unfortunately, nothing large enough was available to accommodate Protect
Marriage.

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Labels: California, culture, gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Imapp Staff at 12:24 PM VOTE

TED OLSON, DAVID BOIES, AND US: Jonathan Rauch

at Independent Gay Forum:

Though anti-gay-marriage forces won on Prop 8 in California, their victory came at a steep price: the vote served as a wake-up call to millions of straights who are sympathetic to SSM but who, until then, had been content to sit on the sidelines. After Prop 8, straights took ownership of the SSM cause as never before. I think history will show this to have been an important change in the political dynamic, perhaps a landmark.

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Labels: culture, gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Eve at 12:03 PM VOTE

ANOTHER PROP 8 FALLOUT: THE CHILDREN: Doc Guley

at the San Francisco Chronicle:

I found out the ruling was handed down on Tuesday when a colleague friend of mine logged onto SFGate and said, on a shuddery exhale, "Huh - so they didn't divorce me. Am I supposed to be grateful?" As the day passed, I learned that her elementary-school-aged son had been furious for weeks that the state could even consider taking such a violating step against his moms. Then I found out from another professional friend that her three kids (also all young elementary-school aged children) asked tearfully in the car, "Are we still married?"

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Labels: adoption, children, gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Eve at 1:43 PM VOTE

THE GOOD NEWS IN TODAY'S CALIF. MARRIAGE DECISION: Andrew Koppelman

at Balkinization:

I agree with Mary Dudziak’s smart post on today’s California Supreme Court decision upholding Proposition 8, which abolished same-sex marriage in that state (though it did not retroactively nullify marriages already validly celebrated). If anything, she has understated the pro-gay valence of the opinion: the Court held that a broader restriction on same-sex couples’ rights might well have been invalid, and that same-sex couples in that state continue to have a constitutional right to have their relationships recognized. Like Vermont (which has since enacted marriage by legislation without court prompting) and New Jersey, California is constitutionally required to provide domestic partnerships with all the same rights and obligations as heterosexual marriage. Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation remains unconstitutional. In short, most of the holding of the Court’s earlier marriage decision remains untouched by Proposition 8.

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Labels: gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Eve at 4:52 PM VOTE

QUICK TAKE ON THE CA. SAME-SEX MARRIAGE DECISION: Mary L. Dudziak

at Balkinization:

An initial take on the California Supreme Court decision today upholding Proposition 8, which bans same-sex marriage. (I will revise later if needed after a more careful read of the court's very lengthy opinion.) My bottom line: opponents of same-sex marriage may have won the battle, but lost the war.

Importantly, in today's ruling (PDF), the court did not take up the basic question of whether there is a fundamental right to same-sex marriage under the state constitution, but rather the more narrow question of whether Proposition 8, which overturned the court's earlier ruling that there was such a right, was a constitutional amendment or a constitutional revision. Amendments are proper subjects for voter initiatives in California. Revisions, which are more fundamental changes, must go though a state constitutional convention. The court found that Prop. 8 was an amendment (and so was proper), rather than a revision. To get there, however, the court narrowly interpreted Proposition 8. ...

The court carved out space for the rights of same-sex couples protected in the Marriage Cases, emphasizing: "among the various constitutional protections recognized in the Marriage Cases as available to same-sex couples, it is only the designation of marriage — albeit significant — that has been removed by this initiative measure." (emphasis added). Taking into account the "actual limited effect of Proposition 8 upon the preexisting state constitutional right of privacy and due process and upon the guarantee of equal protection of the laws," (emphasis added), the court found Prop 8 not to be a constitutional revision.

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Labels: gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Eve at 4:47 PM VOTE

CA Supreme Court Upholds Proposition 8: GayPatriotWest

blogs:

I believe the justices made the right decision this time. The decision was 6-1. Now, the issue is developing a strategy to repeal the state constitutional provision defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman. And to do so in a manner which respects those who favor that definition. ...

Basically, this means the state will still recognize same-sex relationships, but will not call them marriages.

more (and more here)

Labels: California, gay marriage, Proposition 8

posted by Imapp Staff at 4:35 PM VOTE

Mapping the Future of Gay Marriage: MapScroll

blog:

Yesterday, same-sex marriage in Iowa was rendered legal by that state's Supreme Court (two days after it was made legal in Sweden ). The United States seems inexorably headed towards marriage rights for gay couples - but how long will it take to get there across the board? Nate Silver has an answer. Based entirely on his hard work at fivethirtyeight.com, here is the future of gay marriage in the US:

[Sorry, I can't insert the map; click here to see it and read the rest of this post --Eve]

The years indicated are those by which a gay marriage ban would be defeated by voters in a given state, according to a regression model designed by Silver. (Again, all the math and hard work is Silver's; I just made the map.)

How did Silver come up with these results? Here's the explanation:

I looked at the 30 instances in which a state has attempted to pass a constitutional ban on gay marriage by voter initiative. The list includes Arizona twice, which voted on different versions of such an amendment in 2006 and 2008, and excludes Hawaii , which voted to permit the legislature to ban gay marriage but did not actually alter the state's constitution. I then built a regression model that looked at a series of political and demographic variables in each of these states and attempted to predict the percentage of the vote that the marriage ban would receive.

It turns out that you can build a very effective model by including just three variables:

1. The year in which the amendment was voted upon;
2. The percentage of adults in 2008 Gallup tracking surveys who said that religion was an important part of their daily lives;
3. The percentage of white evangelicals in the state.

These variables collectively account for about three-quarters of the variance in the performance of marriage bans in different states. The model predicts, for example, that a marriage ban in California in 2008 would have passed with 52.1 percent of the vote, almost exactly the fraction actually received by Proposition 8.

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Labels: gay marriage, New England, Proposition 8, religion

posted by Eve at 1:59 PM VOTE

GAY MARRIAGE AND THE FUTURE OF RELIGIOUS LIBERTY: Maggie Gallagher

at Real Clear Politics:

...But the Vermont same-sex marriage bill was a breakthrough in another way which has received zero attention in the press. For the very first time, a legislature has formally acknowledged that gay marriage poses a serious threat to the religious liberties of Vermonters who disagree with the government's new definition of marriage. And the gay marriage movement has permitted -- if not exactly trumpeted -- that legislature to enact some imperfect yet substantive religious liberty protections, instead of the fake religious liberty protections generally offered to deflect voters' attention from the real issues at stake.

Same-sex marriage is quite different from bans on interracial marriage in one powerful respect: It asks religious Americans to surrender a core belief -- no, not Leviticus (disapproval of gay sexual acts), but Genesis -- the idea that God himself made man male and female and commanded men and women to come together in a special way to image the fruitfulness of God.

Many religious people and groups will bow to, if not exactly endorse, the power of gay activists. Witness Rev. Rick Warren, who on "Larry King Live" this week came very close to recanting his support for Proposition 8. Rick did not quite do so. What he did, instead, is what many good people will do in the face of the massive campaign of intimidation and harassment designed to silence Christians and others of good will who support marriage: He dodged. Rick said, more or less: I am not now and never have been an anti-gay marriage "activist."

Let me be clear. I have enormous respect for Rick Warren. What has happened to Rick, who did nothing more than speak from his pulpit to the members of his own church on Proposition 8, is what lies in store for many good men and women. The deal they will be offered by the government and the culture dominated by same-sex marriage is: Mute your views on marriage so you may continue your other good works. Many good and brave people, to preserve their ability to save lives in Africa or to protect the poor in this country, will take that deal.

I'm not here to criticize him or them -- merely to point out the underlying power of the movement that can get a Baptist minister to recant about marriage on national television.

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Labels: gay marriage, Proposition 8, religion, religious liberty

posted by Eve at 1:57 PM VOTE

Winning By Losing on Prop 8: Jeff Amestoy

in the Washington Post:

The California Supreme Court will uphold Proposition 8, the ban on same-sex marriage passed by the state's voters in November. It is a decision that progressives ought to welcome. ...

Yet, as difficult as the likely outcome of the case will be for those of us who support gay marriage, the court's rationale will almost certainly strengthen a fundamental tenet of the progressive movement: the right of ordinary citizens to maintain authority over their state constitutions.

Early 20th-century progressives had a deep distrust of state judicial authority for the very good reason that many decisions were antithetical to a more just and humane society. The relative ease with which Californians -- and residents of other states -- can amend their state constitutions owes much to the "direct democracy" reforms led by progressives.

When Theodore Roosevelt, the Progressive candidate for president in 1912, proposed the recall of state court decisions to enable "the people themselves" to decide constitutional issues, he was responding to our democracy's inherent tension between judicial authority and democratic legitimacy. And when Larry Kramer, the preeminent progressive scholar of "popular constitutionalism," criticized William Rehnquist's Supreme Court, he noted, "The Supreme Court is not the highest authority in the land on constitutional law. We are."

Unfortunately for supporters of gay marriage, the most pronounced demonstration of popular constitutionalism in recent years has been the adverse response of voters to judicial decisions advancing the constitutional claims of same-sex couples. The idea that judicial authority is not ultimate constitutional authority can be particularly unsettling when citizens choose to amend their state constitutions to limit rather than expand rights.

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Labels: Proposition 8

posted by Imapp Staff at 7:25 AM VOTE

KEN STARR'S PROP 8 SUPPORT RAISES QUESTIONS ON ACADEMIC FREEDOM: Malibu Times

reports:

More than one hundred Pepperdine University School of Law alumni say their educations have been devalued by former White House prosecutor Kenneth Starr's simultaneous positions as dean of the university's School of Law and as lead attorney for Proposition 8, the November ballot measure voters passed banning same-sex marriage that is being challenged in court. The alumni have called for the university to issue a written statement distancing itself from Starr's affiliation with the measure.

Their dismay has brought to light the controversy of whether universities should take action regarding their educators' public involvement in high-profile cases.

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Labels: Proposition 8

posted by Eve at 5:09 PM VOTE

Catholic Bishops Revealed as Key in Marriage Battle: Bay Area Reporter

reports:

From California to Maine, Catholic bishops are increasingly taking on public roles on behalf of what LGBT activists call a "politicized" U.S. Catholic Church. Aiding the faith leaders in their campaign against same-sex marriage is the Knights of Columbus, a tax-exempt fraternal beneficiary society known as the church's "strong right arm."

And nowhere is the full impact of the Knights of Columbus' efforts felt than in the fight against awarding same-sex couples marriage rights.

In what turned out to be the largest total contribution from a single organization, $1.4 million of the Yes on 8 campaign's coffers came from the tax-exempt Knights of Columbus, based in New Haven, Connecticut. The Catholic Church operates its legislative efforts through the little understood entity, of which nearly all Catholic bishops and priests are members.

But the church's involvement in repealing same-sex marriage rights in California has been largely obscured by the intense public and media attention Mormon leaders received last year for their efforts to pass Proposition 8. After voters passed the anti-same-sex marriage constitutional amendment in November, LGBT protesters rallied outside the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' temples throughout the state rather than Catholic churches. Campaign finance reports indicate that while California's Conference of Catholic Bishops, as an organization, did not contribute to Prop 8, money did come nationally from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which contributed $200,000 to the Yes on 8 campaign. The minuscule amount belies the fact that Catholic officials played just as a substantial role as their Mormon counterparts in the anti-gay campaign. ...

Harry Knox, the religion and faith program director for the Human Rights Campaign, said the community must engage in dialogue with representatives from the Knights of Columbus.

"The Knights of Columbus do a great deal of good in the name of Jesus Christ, but in this particular case, they were foot soldiers of a discredited army of oppression," Knox told the B.A.R. , referring to its role in the Prop 8 campaign.

Knox noted that the Knights of Columbus "followed discredited leaders," including bishops and Pope Benedict XVI. "A pope who literally today said condoms don't help in control of AIDS," Knox said Tuesday, shortly after the pope's comments were released.

Catholic officials, however, have deliberately cloaked their actions in opposing marriage equality from public view.

Case in point, San Francisco Archbishop George Niederauer, who quietly reached out last summer to Mormon leaders he had met while stationed in Salt Lake City to ask them to become involved in the Prop 8 campaign. It wasn't until after the election that the archbishop's letter surfaced. ...

A key component of the Catholic Church's strategy has been the Knights of Columbus.

Obscure Catholic group

On its Web site the group proclaims itself as "the strong right arm of the Catholic Church."

To LGBT activist Jerry Sloan, the group is "an obscure and uniquely tax-exempt insurance company acting under the guise of a fraternal order."

Classified by a 19th century IRS code as a 501(c)8, the fraternal beneficiary society is able to operate as a tax-exempt organization providing "$70 billion in force" worth of life insurance to its members, according to Patrick Korten, vice president of communications and past grand knight of the organization.

According to the IRS Web site, a 501(c)8 is unlike other 501(c) nonprofit organizations. It is not required to abide by the non-discrimination clause required by Congress for other nonprofits. Rather, one IRS qualifier for the tax-exempt code states, "membership must be limited." Like the priesthood, the Knights of Columbus membership is restricted to Catholic men. Among those men are "almost every, if not all, bishops and most priests," explained Korten.

Besides providing life insurance to members, Korten told the B.A.R. that the purpose of the organization is to promote and lobby for the social issues important to the Catholic Church, including opposition to stem cell research, abortion, gay rights, and assisted suicide. ...

"I think it is fair to say the Knights of Columbus have been involved in virtually every one of the 31 states that have had referendums," on same-sex marriage, Korten said.

Korten also said the organization opposes civil unions.

"We support the church on that," Korten said. "And quite simply because the [heterosexual] family is the most important fundamental unit of society. A mother and a father is unquestionably the ideal. The purpose of the church is to provide the optimal environment in the begetting, raising, and education of children."

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Labels: Catholic Church, civil unions, Proposition 8

posted by Imapp Staff at 1:08 AM VOTE