How did the Democratic and Republican Parties act on the question of gay marriage (as well as civil union, domestic partnership benefits, common-law marriage, and the like) in Ohio?
The Republicans bankrolled an anti-gay juggernaut:
<blockquote>The Issue 1 campaign jump-started almost immediately after the Massachusetts Supreme Court began allowing gay marriages last spring.
In the process of collecting 557,000 signatures, Citizens for Community Values -- the Cincinnati-based group that pushed the amendment -- also registered 54,500 new voters. The group followed up with an enormous get-out-the-vote drive in churches across the state, organizing teams of supporters within each church.
"This was the issue that delivered Ohio for President Bush," said Phil Burress, who spearheaded the Issue 1 campaign. "We mailed out 2.5 million bulletins to 17,000 churches. We called 2.9 million homes and identified 850,000 supporters. We called every one of those supporters on Monday and urged them to vote Yes on 1." (Dana Hull, "Gay-marriage Opposition Seen as Factor Aiding Bush," <em>Mercury News</em>, <a href="http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/special_packages/election2004/10096403.htm?1c";>November 4, 2004</a>)</blockquote>
The anti-gay campaign was well funded, well planned, and well organized.
In contrast, Alan Melamed, the Campaign Manager of Ohioans Protecting the Constitution that opposed Issue 1, noted on November 3, 2004: "Less than six weeks ago Issue 1 was certified on the ballot. Six weeks ago we had no political endorsements, one newspaper editorial, no organizational endorsements, and less than $100,000 raised to fight this battle" (<a href="http://www.opcpac.com/Home/";>Ohioans Protecting the Constitution</a>)!
The Democratic Party's effort to counter the Republican anti-gay juggernaut was too little, too late.
Worse, the Democratic Party's work, both in substance and rhetoric, was legalistic. In substance, it focused on challenging the validity of signatures collected to put Issue I on the ballot:
<blockquote>Opponents of an Ohio constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage have found more defects on petitions to put the measure on the November ballot, and have challenged them in 33 counties so far. . . .
County courts have begun hearings on the challenges, with the first held September 7 in Champaign County, 30 miles west of Columbus.
Nineteen of the challenges have been turned into lawsuits by the county election boards. Additional suits are being filed daily and more hearings are expected to be scheduled through the end of the month.
Columbus attorney Don McTigue, who represents Ohioans Protecting the Constitution, the group campaigning against the amendment, said earlier that a total of 60 to 65 protests could be filed.
Those protests identify defective signatures and other problems with petition forms. Some of the challenges say that entire forms should be voided due to failure to follow Ohio law. (Eric Resnick, "More Ohio Marriage Ban Petitions Are Challenged," <em>Gay People's Chronicle</em>, <a href="http://www.gaypeopleschronicle.com/stories04/04sep10.htm#story5";>September 10, 2004</a>)</blockquote>
The last-ditch effort to knock Issue 1 off the ballot was futile, as Ohio has laws favorable to a well-funded campaign for a ballot initiative:
<blockquote>[Ohio Campaign to Protect Marriage] qualifies for a ten-day period to submit replacement signatures for disqualified ones, and OCPM head Phil Burress has said that his group will turn in 100,000 more.
OCPM has not stopped collecting signatures since they turned in the initial forms August 3. Circulators, paid $2 per signature, have covered the state in an attempt to ensure that the measure gets on the ballot. (Eric Resnick, "More Ohio Marriage Ban Petitions Are Challenged," <em>Gay People's Chronicle</em>, <a href="http://www.gaypeopleschronicle.com/stories04/04sep10.htm#story5";>September 10, 2004</a>)</blockquote>
Even Melamed himself admitted the tactical futility of using legal challenges to exclude Issue 1 from the ballot: "The possibility of doing that is not that great" (qtd. in Eric Resnick, "Campaign to Defeat Marriage Ban Amendment Renamed," <em>Gay People's Chronicle</em>, <a href="http://www.gaypeopleschronicle.com/stories04/04jul23.htm#story5";>July 23, 2004</a>).
The legal challenges to Issue 1 that the Democratic Party did file were much feebler than the Democratic Party's aggressive campaign of harassment and intimidation against petitioners for Ralph Nader -- listen to Nader supporter Amy Hanmer's WKSU commentary on the Democratic Party's attacks on her and other Nader petitioners: "Nader Petition Gatherers Harassed" (<a href="http://www.wksu.org/news/story/17759";>October 21, 2004</a>).
In short, the Democratic Party favored undemocratic methods of excluding issues from the ballot and was far more hostile and belligerent toward Nader supporters than Issue 1 campaigners, though it would have been in the party's interest to reverse its self-defeating priorities.
In rhetoric, the Democratic Party failed to insist on equality between gays and straights:
<blockquote>The campaign will focus on educating the public to fight amending the Constitution, instead of making the case in favor of marriage equality.
"Political campaigns are designed to address what's on the ballot," said Melamed, "and this is a political campaign."
"And our objective is to get people to say no to the constitutional amendment in a truthful and honest way and by showing how the amendment impacts all Ohioans."
He said the campaign would "embrace politicians with [Democratic presidential candidate] John Kerry's view on marriage," as well as those with views more favorable to full same-sex marriage.
Kerry opposes same-sex marriage but favors civil unions.
Melamed said the campaign would embrace the June 23 statement by "defense of marriage act" sponsor Rep. Bill Seitz of Cincinnati in opposition to the amendment in which Seitz said he opposes the amendment because it is "poorly written."
Statements by Gov. Bob Taft will also be used by the campaign. Taft told the Columbus Dispatch in a June 25 story, "I think the [DOMA] law is sufficient. I believe we've addressed the issue and don't need a constitutional amendment."
A week later, Taft's spokesperson Orest Holubec told the Gay People's Chronicle that the governor does not oppose the measure.
"The governor has no opposition to amending the constitution, though he thinks it's unnecessary," Holubec said July 1. (Eric Resnick, "Campaign to Defeat Marriage Ban Amendment Renamed," <em>Gay People's Chronicle</em>, <a href="http://www.gaypeopleschronicle.com/stories04/04jul23.htm#story5";>July 23, 2004</a>)</blockquote>
As the language of Issue 1 did encompass not only opposition to gay marriage but also negation of civil union, domestic partnership benefits, and even common-law marriage -- "Only a union between one man and one woman may be a marriage valid in or recognized by this state and its political subdivisions. This state and its political subdivisions shall not create or recognize a legal status for relationships of unmarried individuals that intends to approximate the design, qualities, significance or effect of marriage" -- it may seem reasonable on the surface to refuse to squarely confront the question of equal rights. However, very few people who are opposed to gay marriage but are not opposed to civil union, domestic partnership benefits, common-law marriage, and the like were opposed to Issue 1 passionately. Many of them felt like Taft: "The governor has no opposition to amending the constitution, though he thinks it's unnecessary" (Taft's spokesperson Orest Holubec, qtd. in Eric Resnick, "Campaign to Defeat Marriage Ban Amendment Renamed," <em>Gay People's Chronicle</em>, <a href="http://www.gaypeopleschronicle.com/stories04/04jul23.htm#story5";>July 23, 2004</a>). And there was no competing ballot initiative that bans gay marriage and recognizes civil union, domestic partnership benefits, common-law marriage, and the like to draw a line to the Democratic Party's advantage and marginalize the most reactionary.
Worst of all, by desperately embracing such opponents of gay marriage as Taft and Seitz, the Democratic Party's campaign to oppose Issue 1 ended up legitimating opposition to gay marriage (without winning many votes to opposition to Issue 1). That means that the main message of both the campaigns for and against Issue I was that it is all right to oppose gay marriage and, by extension, equal rights for gays and straights!
That demonstrates that, if the Democratic Party has any choice in the matter, it always chooses the path of making the oppressed -- such as gay men and lesbians -- lose worse: it sacrifices the oppressed's long-term interest of promoting equality in the principled fashion in order to seek the Democratic Party's victory in the short term; _and_ it even fails to do what it takes for the Democratic Party to win in the short term. -- Yoshie
* Critical Montages: <http://montages.blogspot.com/> * Greens for Nader: <http://greensfornader.net/> * Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/> * OSU-GESO: <http://www.osu-geso.org/> * Calendars of Events in Columbus: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html>, <http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/> * Student International Forum: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>
