U.S. Senate to Act on Gay Marriage

Reuters ^ | February 13, 2004 | Joanne Kenen

[RWR8189]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist has expressed concern that gay marriages will spread like "wildfire" and says the Senate will take up the issue this year.

Frist gave no specifics but conservatives expect President George W. Bush to soon endorse a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. That bill has already been introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives.

The recent Massachusetts court ruling backing gay people's legal right to wed has fuelled a movement to stop gay marriages nationwide. The Massachusetts Legislature is grappling with a state constitutional amendment that would block the court's ruling but it would still take at least until November 2006 to go into effect.

In San Francisco on Thursday, city officials also allowed the nation's first gay marriages, defying state law.

"The wildfire will truly begin," Frist said on Thursday, predicting same-sex marriages would spread to all 50 states.

"It is becoming increasingly clear that Congress must act and must act soon," Frist said in a speech on the Senate floor before lawmakers started a weeklong recess.

"It's a fight we don't particularly relish but the courts have brought us to it," he said. "We will not let activist judges redefine marriage for our entire society."

Frist said he wanted to reject intolerance against gays while making sure marriage remains a union between a man and a woman.

Amending the Constitution is a difficult task. It can take years to win the support of two-thirds of the House, two-thirds of the Senate and ratification by three-quarters of the states. With the issue just emerging in Congress, it is too soon to measure how far backers of an amendment will get this year in either the House or the Senate.

[rottndog]

How can you BAN something that is already illegal? How is it BANNING same sex marriage by reinforcing an already defined and accepted legal institution? It is the radical gay leftists who are trying to change a preexisting norm.

[ncphinsfan]

Why is it that the Senate (run by us) seems to take a positive interest in things that no one, except maybe Democrats in the Senate, care about? CFR, agriculture and steel subsidies, education and Medicare boondoggles etc. and absurd immigration "reform" to name a few?

[little jeremiah]

Homosexual Agenda Ping.

I hope some of these (R) Senators get spines and other anatomical features congruent with steely resolve and a fighting spirit....

Let me know if you want on or off this ping list.

We shouldn't forget that what follows is the real reason homosexual activists want "gay" marriage:

Homosexual activist Michelangelo Signorile, who writes periodically for The New York Times, summarizes the agenda in OUT magazine (Dec/Jan 1994):

"A middle ground might be to fight for same-sex marriage and its benefits and then, once granted, redefine the institution of marriage completely, to demand the right to marry not as a way of adhering to society's moral codes, but rather to debunk a myth and radically alter an archaic institution... The most subversive action lesbian and gay men can undertake --and one that would perhaps benefit all of society--is to transform the notion of family entirely.

It's the final tool with which to dismantle all sodomy statues, get education about homosexuality and AIDS into the public schools and in short to usher in a sea change in how society views and treats us."

[drlevy88]

Frist said he wanted to reject intolerance against gays while making sure marriage remains a union between a man and a woman.

Cue on the homoactivist groups who will whine to high heaven that only granting them marriage by that name will constitute lack of intolerance. It's high time we stop trying to play nice with them. If it means dragging a few knuckles so be it.

[EdReform]

Bump

What We Can Do To Help Defeat the "Gay" Agenda

Homosexual Agenda: Categorical Index of Links (Version 1.1)

[Jorge]

.... to demand the right to marry not as a way of adhering to society's moral codes, but rather to debunk a myth and radically alter an archaic institution... The most subversive action lesbian and gay men can undertake --and one that would perhaps benefit all of society--is to transform the notion of family entirely.

So they admit that this is really an attack on the institution of marriage as well as the traditional family.

Perhaps they would also like the traditional institutions that protect their rights as a minority, desolved to allow for stonings of homosexuals as they have in many Islamic nations.

The fact is, if gay activists do succeed in causing the breakdown in traditional western cultural values, I don't think they would not be very pleased with the results.

[winstonchurchill]

Why is it that the Senate (run by us) seems to take a positive interest in things that no one, except maybe Democrats in the Senate, care about?

A rather unusual statement as the Demoncrats most assuredly do not have any interest in having the Senate take up 'gay' marriage. Whom do you think the Sodomites will vote for? Which party will have the greatest trouble convincing the sodomites of their undying 'love' while at the same time telling their blue-collar, unionists to stay on the reservation while they rip apart what little remains of our society?

[tdadams]

Seriously, I've yet to hear a convincing argument about how allowing gay marriage is going to bring on all the catostrophic ends that so many here predict. I don't necessarily support gay marriage, but I just don't see it as being so overwhelmingly destructive to the institute of marriage as so many here seem to think.

If anything, it will help to alleviate the promiscuousness among gays that many here are always opining about. The libertarian in me says it's just not such a major issue. Life will go on even if gays are allowed to marry.

But while the issue is up for discussion, it seems many "pro-family" organizations are seeing a fundraising bonanza. But that's just the cynic in me talking.

[little jeremiah]

No one will be pleased with the results. First anarchy (we are witnessing the beginning of that in SF), then chaos, then violence, then serious police clampdown, then some kind of repressive government. And if people think it won't happen, they ought to open their eyes and wake up.

It's not just homosexuality - Signorile says it all. The destruction of morality is their goal.

[BlessedBeGod]

If anything, it will help to alleviate the promiscuousness among gays that many here are always opining about.

B.S. If they're so promiscuous and unfaithful to their partners without a piece of paper, it's going to be no different with it.

[rogueleader]

Why this is good.

The constitutional amendment will take preemptive action against the cultural radicals, like the homosexualist movement.

If this had been done with abortion before Roe v. Wade was decided, it would have ended the debate right there. Now, people think they have a right to abortion, and taking that perceived right away from them is proving very difficult.

Better to prevent them from having the "right to gay marriage" in the first place.

This is the culture war. This is for morality. This is for decency.

They don't want much. Just redefining marriage, a revolutionary transformation of marriage, control of marriage, control of the family, control of the church, the sexual control of children, and an implementation of their entire decadent, sick, depraved agenda.

We have got to stop them right here. Here we draw the line. No further. That's why we need the amendment.

[little jeremiah]

Total agreement. And after we draw the line, we PUSH IT BACK!!!

[SunStar]

How is it BANNING same sex marriage by reinforcing an already defined and accepted legal institution?

Because, if a constitutional amendment is passed, the Supreme Court will not be able to legalize gay marriage by twisting existing law.

[Jeremiahs Call]

"This is the culture war. This is for morality. This is for decency".

Your absolutely correct about this being a culture war. It's time the good people across this country wake-up to that fact. The sodomites have a strategy and a zeal that if not checked, will reek havoc across all aspects of our culture. Look at what they've accomplished so far - significant changes in education / curriculum, causing division in major church denominations, achieving a new legal status for gay partners through civil unions and next ...trying to redefine marriage and the family. It's time to stop this aggressive minority from pushing their perverted values on the rest of the country. If we don't take an equally aggressive stand, they will win and much our country will go the way of Sodom and Gomorrah.

[3catsanadog]

For the life of my, I can't understand the unwavering loyalty of unions for the Democrats. Were we to still have the big steel mills here in Pittsburgh as we used to, I just can't see those big brawny steelworkers supporting a party that seeks the limp-wrist vote.

[tdadams]

That's a ridiculous assertion. Why would marriage not cause them to settle down and commit just like anyone else who gets married?

[itsahoot]

"We will not let activist judges redefine marriage for our entire society."

No but we will redefine it for them, only we will call it civil unions or some other clap trap.

Remember how the movie/TV rating system was supposed to protect the children from all the filth and violence? All it did was give them license to publish their filth on prime time TV.

[BlessedBeGod]

That's a ridiculous assertion. Why would marriage not cause them to settle down and commit just like anyone else who gets married?

If they can't be faithful to each other before the marriage, how are they going to be after? It's the same with heterosexual couples. If they cheat on each other before the marriage, the marriage is toast. And it's been well-documented how promiscuous gays are -- even with a "committed" partner.