Jun 15 2007
Massachusetts and Gay Marriage: Should the people get a vote?
I don’t really have a dog in the fight in Massachusetts, I live pretty far away and I am not gay, so it affects me not.
What bothers me is the principle at stake here.
Legislators vote to defeat same-sex marriage ban
A proposed constitutional ban on same-sex marriage was swiftly defeated today by a joint session of the Legislature by a vote of 45 to 151, eliminating any chance of getting it on the ballot in November 2008. The measure needed at least 50 votes to advance.
The vote came without debate after House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi, Senate President Therese Murray, and Governor Deval Patrick conferred this morning and concluded that they have the votes to kill the proposal.
“Today’s vote was not just a victory for marriage equality, it was a victory for equality itself,” Patrick told reporters as cheers echoed in the State House. “Whenever we affirm the equality of anyone, we affirm the equality of everyone.”
And it was a blow to democracy in general. What happened here is the legislature decided the people did not need a chance to vote on this. So they killed it.
My question is “why?”
What are they afraid of? Had they placed it on the ballot and the population validated gay marriage, the issue would be nailed down.
Instead they wouldn’t take that chance, and the reason is simple: People still overwhelmingly oppose gay marriage. The legislature did not the trust the people to validate its decisions by referendum.
So what we have here is a legislature that is suppose to represent the people has decided the people have no voice.
I won’t argue for or against gay marriage, but I believe in the democratic process.
So let the activists cheer, and let the politicians pat themselves on the back. Feel free.
But be honest and call this what it was: An end run around democracy. I don’t see the need to feel proud.
7 Responses to “Massachusetts and Gay Marriage: Should the people get a vote?”
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And I didn’t get to vote on the invasion of Iraq. What’s up with that? How can this even be called a democracy when the people don’t get to vote on important issues. And those Supreme Court appointments: sounds pretty important to me, but I didn’t get to vote. Sounds like an end run around democracy.
And don’t try to explain to me that we live in a representative democracy, because if my elected representatives are comptent to vote on wars and Supreme Court appointments, then it would mean that the elected representatives of Massachusetts are competent to vote on whether or not to send a question to the electorate.
I don’t suppose it would make a difference to point out the vast difference between State level processes and Federal processes would it? Or that this is a matter of State policy not one of Federal policy?
Or even to point out that there is no constitutional referendum process at a Federal level, aside from voting for president whereas there clearly is one on a State level?
In all your scenarios no one gets an individual vote under constitutional law whereas in mine every state has a constitutional practice to allow for citizen referendum, which the Mass State just circumvented.
And the elected Mass legislature doesn’t vote on any of those Federal issues either.
Thanks for playing, but this is the worst case of apples and oranges I have seen lately.
And least you misunderstand me, I think there should be a national referendum process, but the Constitution has other ideas. But the lack of it at a national level does not justify the bypassing of it at a State or local level.
Do you think every ill-conceived idea should go before the voters? For example I’m willing to bet that a majority of citizens of the Commonwealth would vote for an amendment that would lower their income taxes, but would greatly increase corporate taxes. The legislature has a responsibility to keep bad ideas like this off the ballot.
Anyway, this isn’t an end-run around democracy at all, unless you want to argue that our constitutional amendment process is itself undemocratic. All it required to go forward was 25% of the legislature voting in favor of it, and it didn’t get it. An end-run around democracy would have been if they had tabled the measure without a vote, thus killing it- which they could have done.
I think when the matter is as charged as this one it is an injustice to deny the voters the opportunity to have a referendum, particular when apparently many people want one.
The manner in which they did it shows a disstrust of the process and the peoples will.
As for the end run, why wouldnt the legislatures want the people to vote on the ammendment? It is an end run because this was the legislatures deciding the people did not deserve the chance to vote on such a high profile and contentious issue.
It takes 25% of the Massachusetts legislature to get a constitutional amendment to a popular vote, where it has to only garner 51% of the vote to change it.
It takes 66% of the US legislature to get a constitutional amendment to the states, where it has to win 75% of the states to change.
US Constitution: 27 amendments
Mass constitution: 116 amendments
Seems the US Constitution is four times more anti-democratic than the Massachusetts constitution.
Why don’t we change that one first.
I was born and lived in quincy massachusetts all my life.
I cannot tell you how I along with others are outraged that our state has been hyjacked by the homosexual special interest groups.
I’ve just moved my family out of the state and know of 5 other families who have done the same.
We along with many of my old neighbors, freinds etc are not political but can tell you that ALL of us do not agree with a gay marriage(sham marriage).
They say we te majority have to be tolerant of them yet they are not tolerant of others who oppose their views and certainly were scared of this going to a vote as they knew the people of Massachusetts would have told the that they’re not married and have never been.
They might think they’re married but deep down they are not in the eyes of the country and themajority of massachusetts.
Did you know thegay groups spent over a million $ in the last election and spend more than the trade unions, political arties.
If you’re reading this and not in massachusetts do not think this is just a massachusetts issue as the homsexual grops will be coming to a town near you soon pushing their agenda., wanting to read books to kindergarten about two men getting married and showing them pictures of them kissing.Look at the parker incident at lexington school
They wonder why people move out of the state as we have well because the state is not what it used to be sadly.
I’m surprised that no one has pointed out that it doesn’t make any sense for the majority to be able to tell the minority what they can and can’t do. If it were like that during the civil rights movement, we’d probably still have separate but equal facilities because the majority of people then believed that that was the right thing to do.