Does your state have a so-called “defense of marriage” ballot measure this year?
What is the latest polling on it?
Has the recent NJ supreme court ruling been cited in any advertising yet?
South Carolina has one of these idiotic pieces of trash legislation.
I haven’t seen any polling, and unfortunately don’t need to in order to tell you the outcome. It will pass.
I haven’t seen any advertising using the NJ decision.
Why are these on ballots? Since gays are a very small minority (2-9% per Wikipedia), why make it up to everyone else to grant this?
Can these type of things go on ballots? I can’t imagine “defense of voting” ballots whether blacks or women could vote in the past.
If your state constitution has been interpreted by your state supreme court as requiring same-sex marriage, then the only way to change that is to explictly amend your state constitution so that even the most skillful and dedicated readers of penumbras and emanations are forced to acknowledge actual text.
If this hasn’t happened in your state, then passing an amendment will forestall it from ever happening.
That’s why these are on ballots.
Most states have laws that says that any amendment to the state constitution needs to be passed by referendum. Since a number of states are attempting to change their constitutions to ban gay marriage in the constitution, it has to go on the ballot.
My state, Virginia, for instance, has an anti-gay marriage amendment on the ballot this fall. We also have two other amendments, one to get rid of the part of the constitution banning the state from incorporating churches (which is a 'housecleaning amendment"…the ban on church incorporation was found to be unconstitutional under the US Constitution), and one to allow municipalities to grant property tax breaks to redevelopment areas. Since all of these require amending the state’s constitution, they all need to be voted on.
Yes, because Equal Protection Clauses are generally so amorphously written…all that “shall make no law” nonsense…
That, plus they’re a way for right wingers to turn out bigots to vote for Republicans.
And to answer the OP, Wisconsin has one of these disgusting things on the ballot and it’s polling about 50-50 the last I heard, with the bigots having a slight edge. I’ve seen no TV in favor of bigotry. The only ad I’ve seen is one with a redneck-looking farmer who starts off by saying how he doesn’t like the idea of gay marriage but since “they” (gays) aren’t hurting him he’s voting to leave “them” alone.
In Wisconsin;
“Marriage. Shall section 13 of article XIII of the constitution be created to provide that only a marriage between one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in this state and that a legal status identical or substantially similar to that of marriage for unmarried individuals shall not be valid or recognized in this state?”
So, the first sentance is the gay marriage part, we get it. For those that aren’t gay and think government has the right to poke it’s big nose is everybody’s business, this part is well understood, and accepted.
The second sentance, however, brings this amendment into scarier, darker territory. Civil unions, common law marriages, visitation rights, etc. are potentially legally abolished.
Marriage is, at heart, a religious institution. The State should have no say on who should or should not be married, this is up to the religion/church/parish/mosque/etc. to decide.
How long ago was it when miscegenation was considered immoral and illegal in many states? I feel that we in Wisconsin should know better than to add to a constitution that specifcally gives us the rights and freedoms we enjoy every day with a piece of reactionary rhetoric that specifically takes them away !
Now, as to the OP…
Latest(August!?!) poll shows a trend for the amendment in question.
The NJ decision hasn’t showed up on any Wisconsin ads that I know of… in fact, all of the ads I’ve seen in the Milwaukee market have been against the amendment.
How are civil unions abolished?
Well, considering there is no such civil union option in Wisconsin (except for a registered partnership program in Milwaukee) at the moment, I suppose they aren’t… Bad choice of words by me.
But, they would be abolished, and there could never ever be an option due to sentence #2
I think that civil unions, registered partnerships, etc. qualify as a “status substantially similar to that of marriage”, and would be unconstitutional if the amendment passes next week.
Maybe I’m missing something.
Are you saying that a civil union(marriage) between a man and a women would be abolished under this ammendment?
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This is GQ. My own “skillful and dedicated readers of penumbras and emanations” line was probably up to the edge, if not over it, for GQ and I apologize for it.
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To the extent that there is a factual answer to this claim, it is as follows: the Equal Protection Clause does NOT MEAN that all groups must be treated equally. That’s a matter of law, and a factual statement appropriate for this forum. In the federal system, Equal Protection claims are analyzed by first discerning what sort of classification the law at issue creates. Thus far, as a matter of verifiable, reportable fact, federal jurisprudence has ranked classifications that impact same-sex marriage as “non-suspect” classifications and analyzed them under the “rational basis” test.
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It’s fair to say that the two claims advanced for judicial recognition of same-sex marriage, the Due Process view and the Equal Protection view, both rely on a more “living Constitution” approach that favors the idea that penumbras and emanations exist.
This is, I believe, inappropriate for GQ.
To summarize and hopefully get back on track …
SC has one that will probably pass
WI has one that is 50:50
The NJ decision has not affected the advertising in either.
Doesn’t VA have one… maybe CO also?
No. The text says that you can’t get around letting gays marry by giving them the same rights as marriage and just calling it something else (eg, “civil unions”). Note:
“…and that a legal status identical or substantially similar to that of marriage for unmarried individuals shall not be valid…”
IANAL, or a Supreme Court judge, nor am I especially informed man in the world of law…
But yes, that is A possibility in my mind. A potential consequence is that particularly “moral” minded persons might find the semantics of the word marriage to be defined as a purely religious ceremony, and the only type of union between persons that can be legally reconized in the state.
This *could *leave those with a courtroom marriage or other legal union stuck without the benefits of a legally reconized marriage.
Or not. The thing is that the potential exists to do harm and take away rights. A thing like that has no place in a state’s constitution.
P.S
Is what I’m writing GQ worthy? If I’m straying too far from the OP please let me know 
Bolding mine. Note the word “individuals”, not “same-sex couples” or “men” or “women”.
A “marriage” is not a “civil union” under Wisconsin law. It’s a “marriage.” There is no such thing as a “civil union” under Wisconsin law. The first sentence of the amendment is to preserve the status quo so that the only legally recognized “marriages” in Wisconsin are those between male and female, one each. The second sentence would prevent the state from creating a “civil union” statute like the one passed in Vermont, or a “domestic partnership” statute like those passed by California, New Jersey and other states, or a “reciprocal beneficiary” statute like the one Hawaii has (or used to have; I thought the law expired).
While supporters of the amendment swear up and down that it’s only about “marriage,” the results in some other states that have passed these abominations put the lie to that claim. For example, Ohio’s amendment has been found to prevent enforcement of domestic battery complaints unless the parties are legally married to each other, since the law extending domestic battery enforcement to non-married partners was found to create a status substantially similar to that of marriage for non-married persons. I seem to recall hearing of lawsuits aimed at overturning domestic partner benefits in some states with amendments but am not sure of the outcome if any. Virginia’s amendment is believed by some analysts to be so extreme as to interfere with basic contract rights between non-married people. At least some of Wisconsin’s state agencies that offer some scraps of benefits to same-sex partners believe that the amendment will prevent them from doing so and even various Chambers of Commerce, not the most liberal of organizations, are opposing the amendment as being Bad For Business.
The latest I’ve seen shows Colorado ready to define marriage as one man, one woman (55 to 38) and also establish a relationship between same-sex couples as a legal domestic partnership (48 to 44).
The finding you mention was not sustained on appeal.
If you feel inclined to write it, I’d appreciate a post going into more detail on this. I can recall some cries of outrage (as when a grandmother who was legal guardian to three grandchildren was evicted from public housing as not constituting a legal family under the law) and would love to see the legal reasoning used in the case.
It might be worth noting, too, that the “rational basis” test you mentioned above applies to claims under the Federal constitution, and that state courts are not bound by it in interpreting their own constitutions (though many do use it).