O'Malley Signs Maryland Marriage Equality Bill!

Democratic Governor Martin O'Malley signed Maryland's marriage equality bill into law on Thursday February 29th, making his state the 8th state in the country to currently have a same-sex marriage law on the books. However, since the bill will not go into effect until January 1, 2013, there will be no actual marriages in Maryland until a November 2012 referendum on the law is resolved.

Heterosexual supremacists have already announced that they intend to place the question on the ballot, and thus have until July 1, 2012 to collect 55,736 signatures and must also submit at least one third of that amount, 18,579 by June 1, 2012.

But February 29th was all about celebrating a long journey to have Maryland join the other states in the Union which have ended illegal gender discrimination in civil marriage (Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, Iowa, New York, New Hampshire and Washington). Governor O'Malley himself used to oppose marriage equality and only supported civil unions but has since moved enthusiastically into the pro-marriage equality camp and demonstrate that by his willingness to sign the bill in front of television cameras and then open the Governor's mansion for a celebration afterwards.



Maryland is the third state legislature to pass a marriage equality bill in 2012 (following Washington State on February 8, 2012 and New Jersey on February 17, 2012) with the two Democratic Governors (like Chris Gregoire in Washington and O'Malley in Maryland signing the bills into law, both of which will be faced with referendum campaigns to annull these measures at the ballot box. In New Jersey, Republican Governor Chris Christie vetoed his state's marriage equality bill, but said he would have signed it into law if it included a referendum provision, which is anathema to Democratic legislators and LGBT activists in New Jersey.

Congratulations to Maryland! Now let's make sure same-sex couples will have the right to protect their families with all the responsibilities and privileges of civil marriage starting in January 2013 by defeating any campaign to prevent the bill from going into effect.

NJ Assembly Passes Marriage Equality Bill 42-33!

The New Jersey State Assembly passed a marriage equality bill by a vote of 42-33, becoming the seventh state legislature in history to pass a marriage equality bill. (The bill passed the State Senate 24-16.) Previously, state legislatures in California (2005 and 2007), Vermont (2009), Connecticut (2009), Maine (2009), New Hampshire (2009), New York (2011) and Washington (2012) had passed marriage equality bills through both houses. Of these states which enacted marriage equality legislatively, only Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut and New York currently have marriage equality currently legal in their state. It should also be noted that the District of Columbia enacted marriage equality through its legislature in December 2009. California has an estimated 18,000 same-sex couples which are legally married but no more can get married until the Perry v Brown federal lawsuit is finally resolved. Massachusetts and Iowa also allow marriage equality, thanks to rulings by their respective state supreme courts.

In New Jersey, marriage equality will not go into effect because Republican Governor Chris Christie has announced his attention to veto the bill.

Garden State Equality sent out a press release on this historic achievement:

Since Stonewall, we have been on a 40-year journey toward our freedom.  Today, the legislature has brought us to the edge of the promised land.  We know the Governor won’t let us enter, but we finally behold the view of our dreams and we will never turn back.

Today’s milestone came in the face of some of the toughest obstacles in the history of the marriage equality movement.  Instead of a Governor twisting arms on our behalf, we have a Governor who twisted arms against us right up until the final votes in each chamber.    And Garden State Equality’s budget was one-tenth of what it was two years ago.

But we had the people and the passion – and the greatest leaders in Senate President Steve Sweeney, Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver, Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg, Assembly Majority Leader Lou Greenwald, Assembly Speaker Pro Tempore Jerry Green, Democratic Party Chair Assemblyman John Wisniewski, and the peerless pioneer in the New Jersey legislature, Assemblyman Reed Gusciora.   We thank the unsung heroes of the legislative process – the legislative staff, especially the Assembly Majority and Senate Majority staff.

We are exuberant advocates but also methodical strategists.  To win an override, we will take the time we need, assisted by a changing world.  Look how the world changed since the last vote two years ago.   We have until the end of the legislative session, January 2014.  The key is winning.

We could not have achieved this milestone without our partner organizations.  Freedom to Marry was the national linchpin that never stopped believing in Garden State Equality, not even after our profound disappointment two years ago, and made this milestone possible.

The Human Rights Campaign lent us a spectacular field director and was invaluable and gracious at every juncture.  The ACLU, The Task Force and Marriage Equality NY/USA gave us additional power.   Our sisters and brothers in labor, especially the Communications Workers of America, have been relentless fighters by our side.   Our state’s progressive blog, Blue Jersey, has been an unsurpassed voice for justice.

And once again, we thank our spectacular lobbying firm, the Kaufman Zita Group, including Jeannine LaRue, Tom Wilson, Adam Kaufman and Trish Zita.  They are second to none.

Pursuing all roads to justice, Garden State Equality and seven-same sex couples will continue our lawsuit for marriage equality, where we are represented by Lambda Legal and the nationally renowned Gibbons law firm.  With this victory, the courts will see the legislature’s clear intent to replace the state’s failed civil union law with marriage equality.

Congratulations to the Garden State!

New Jersey Senate Passes Marriage Equality 24-16

What a difference two years makes in the kulturkampf over civil marriage equality. In January 2010 the New Jersey Senate defeated a marriage equality vote by a vote of 14-20, denying lame duck governor Jon Corzine a chance to sign the measure into law and giving Governor-elect Chris Christie his first legislative victory.

Yesterday the New Jersey senate passed a new marriage equality bill by a vote of 24-16, just three votes short of a veto proof majority, which they have until the end of the current legislative session in January 2014 to get. Republican Governor Chris Christie, who is up for re-election in November 2013 has vowed to veto the legislation if it reaches his desk despite overwhelming public support in recent polls. He, bizarrely, has called for a public referendum on the question of equal marriage rights for all, revealing his disdain for and ignorance of the civil rights tradition in this country. New Jersey does not have a large history of referenda; the last time there was a referendum on civil rights the gentle citizens of the Garden State voted in 1910 to continue denying women the right to vote.

On Thursday the New Jersey Assembly is expected to pass the marriage equality and send it to Gov. Christie for his enthusiastic veto. Then the fun will begin to see if the votes to override his veto can be found in both houses.

Hat/tip to Rod 2.0

WATCH: Evan Wolfson Destroys NOM Tool In Debate

As you now, New Jersey's legislature is currently debating (again!) whether to pass a marriage equality bill despite a veto threat from the Republican governor of the state, Chris Christie, who said that he wants a public referendum of the people to vote on the measure. There has been a heated debate on both sides about the principle of voting on the fundamental civil rights of a minority group, with the marriage equality supporters opposed and the heterosexual supremacists in favor.
This weekend Freedom to Marry Executive Director Evan Wolfson and National Organization for Marriage spokesperson Brian Broen appeared on a local television station and Mr. Wolfson proceeded to demolish Mr. Brown in one-on-one verbal combat on live television, ruthlessly. It is truly a delight to watch. Evan is astonishingly good at this, and I think he's even getting better at it!

Openly Gay Black Man Named To NJ High Court

Bruce Harris, is believed to be the first openly gay, Black,
Republican  elected official in the country (Mayor of Chatham Borough, NJ)

Republican Governor Chris Christie is resolving a long-standing dispute over judicial nominations with the state Legislature by naming an openly gay, African-American male (and an Asian American male) to the State Supreme Court.

The nominees are 61-year-old Bruce Harris, the recently elected openly gay, Black, Republican mayor of Chatham Borough, NJ and 44-year-old Phil Kwon, a Korean-American assistant attorney general who worked with Christie when the Governor was a U.S. Attorney.

According to the New Jersey Star-Ledger:

"I am honored to nominate these two gentlemen," Christie said at a Statehouse news conference. "I trust the Senate will take into account their extraordinary backgrounds and experience and will give them swift hearings.”

The nominees would replace former Justice John Wallace Jr., whom Christie declined to reappoint in 2010, and Justice Virginia Long, who faces mandatory retirement on March 1.

[...]

In 2010, Christie touched off a firestorm when he declined to renominate Wallace. Senate Democrats, infuriated by the unprecedented move, refused to consider his replacement for the seat, Anne Patterson, for a year. Eventually, Patterson was sworn in to replace Justice Roberto Rivera-Soto, who declined to seek re-nomination, and Wallace’s seat has remained vacant.

After refusing in 2010 to reappointment Wallace — who had two years to go before reaching the mandatory retirement age of 70 — and Rivera-Soto retired, the criticism of Christie grew louder because he left the court with no minority members. The court is currently comprised of five women and two men, all of whom are white.

If Harris is confirmed, he would make history as the first openly gay member of New Jersey's highest court. Interestingly, after lagging for years, recently there have been several additions of openly LGBT members on state high courts.

Hawaii (Sabrina Shizue McKenna), Massachusetts (Barbara Lenk) and Colorado (Monica Marquez) have all added openly LGBT members in the last year or so.

Congratulations to Bruce Harris!

NJ Poll Shows Majority Support For Marriage Equality

More good news on the marriage equality front. For the first time, a publicly released poll is showing majority support for marriage equality in the state of New Jersey. The Quinnipiac University Poll shows that 52 percent of respondents support marriage equality while 42 percent oppose it, with a margin of error of +/- 4.2 percentage points.

There are interesting details in the poll, such as:

In today's survey, support for same-sex marriage is 62 - 33 percent among Democrats and 54 - 38 percent among independent voters. Republicans are opposed 59 - 35 percent. White Catholics support it 50 - 45 percent while white Protestants are opposed 51 - 44 percent. Voters who attend religious services weekly are opposed 58 - 36 percent, while voter who attend services less frequently support same-sex marriage 61 - 33 percent. 
On related issues, New Jersey voter opinions are:

• 65 - 32 percent that same-sex marriage is not a threat to traditional marriage;

• 53 - 45 percent that denying same-sex marriage is discrimination;

• 69 - 26 percent support for New Jersey's same-sex civil union law;

• 66 - 29 percent support allowing same-sex couples to adopt children.

New Jersey's Democratic legislators have set marriage equality as a legislative priority, naming the bills to enact the priority S.1 and A.1. And although Republican Governor Chris Christie had previously declared he would veto any marriage equality bill, but now Christie is taking a "wait and see" approach.

Hat/tip to TowleRoad.

NYT Reports on Nationwide Marriage Equality Fight

The New York Times had an interesting editorial on the fight for nationwide marriage equality in light of the recent 10-8 vote in the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee to repeal the so-called Defense of Marriage Act. The above image indicates the current state-by-state recognition of same-sex relationships. The highlights are that only three states: Rhode Island, New Mexico and New Jersey have no laws banning marriage equality. In two of those three states (Rhode Island and New Jersey) civil union statutes have been enacted which purport to provide all the rights and responsibilities of marriage while reserving the name of "marriage" to opposite-sex couples only.

The editorial ("A Long, Winding Road to Marriage Equality") says:

Twenty-nine states have enacted constitutional amendments blocking same-sex marriage. In 18 of those states, the amendments also ban domestic partnerships or civil unions. Twelve states bar same-sex marriage by statute, and in two, Minnesota and North Carolina, anti-gay-marriage constitutional amendments will go before voters next year. At this point, nearly 60 percent of Americans live in places that do not protect gay couples in any way. 

With New York, same-sex marriage is still allowed in only six states and the District of Columbia. Only 13 states provide some recognition of gay relationships with broad domestic partnerships or more limited rights, for things like medical decisions and inheritance (this includes 11 states with constitutional amendments or statutes barring gay marriage).

In addition to the attempts to ban marriage equality in Minnesota and North Carolina via the ballot box in 2012, there will be attempts to legalize marriage equality by ballot measure in Maine. There will be no such attempt in California, however. (Thank Goodness!)  Also, in Washington, New Jersey and Maryland there are on-going efforts to legalize same-sex marriages in those states.

Of course at MadProfessah.com we will be covering all these political stories in 2012!

WATCH: Cory Booker Supports Marriage Equality