Concerned Women for America Announces Support for the Institution of Marriage Amendment

releases.usnewswire.com ^

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Concerned Women for America Announces Support for the Institution of Marriage Amendment

2/5/04 5:54:00 PM

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To: National Desk

Contact: Rebecca L. Riggs of Concerned Women for America, 202-488-7000, ext. 126; web: http://media.cwfa.org

WASHINGTON, Feb. 5 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Concerned Women for America (CWA) announced its support for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that will protect marriage from redefinition by courts or legislatures.

The Institution of Marriage Amendment (IMA) says:

"Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither the United States nor any State shall recognize or grant to any unmarried person the legal rights or status of a spouse."

CWA's president Sandy Rios called on Congress to work for passage of this amendment and on the White House to lend its active support to that effort.

"We have been working for months," Rios explained, "with legal scholars, elected officials and our colleagues in other organizations to develop amendment language that protects the central social institution of marriage. This is the only amendment proposal that addresses both of the twin threats to marriage: capricious judicial decrees such as we have seen in Vermont and Massachusetts and legislative vandalism, as in California and New Jersey, whereby politicians carve up the legal attributes of marriage and hand them out to special interest groups by another name, i.e. civil unions or domestic partnerships.

"Justice William O. Douglas long ago noted that the institution of marriage is older than any of our political institutions. Protecting that sacred institution from reckless politicians and from destructive special interests is a basic act of self-defense for any society."

Concerned Women for America is the nation's largest public policy women's organization.

[GeronL]

Didn;t they say they were against an amendment the other day?

The amendment should not mention marriage.

It should be an amendment to force the courts to stay out of where its nose does not belong.

[upchuck]

Gee, I wonder where Martha Burke stands on this? :)

[Schattie]

I'll tell you what it should be. Tell the fscking courts to keep their nose out of state's decisions on social issues, including abortion and gay marriages. If the courts don't comply, impeach 'em.

[Schattie]

I'll tell you what it should be. Tell the fscking courts to keep their nose out of state's decisions on social issues, including abortion and gay marriages. If the courts don't comply, impeach 'em.

[DMZFrank]

When oh when will some elected executive officer in some state or federal capacity, in fulfilling his constitutional duty to honestly interpet the constitution (federal or state) just disregard the unconstitutional rulings of any court and dare the legislature to impeach him for it? When will some legislature impeach just ONE judge for an unconstitutional ruling?

To say that the courts have the final word on the constitutionality of a law NO MATTER WHAT THEY RULE is to say that the system of checks and balances envisioned by the founders does not exist any more.

Massachuttsetts does not have the right to redefine marriage for 49 other states.

This amendment should not be necessary. The Massachuttsetts officials should do their duty and ignore this ruling. They should impeach the justices who enacted it and ordered the extra-constitutional legislation. That would render this brohaha about a constitutional amendment unnecessary.