Posted on 06/17/2004 5:34:01 PM PDT by ItsOurTimeNow
BOSTON -- Launching the next battle in the legal war over gay marriage, eight couples -- including two from Rhode Island -- and 12 municipal clerks said today they will file lawsuits challenging the 1913 law used to block out-of-state same-sex couples from marrying in Massachusetts.
The groups said they would file two lawsuits in Suffolk Superior Court tomorrow, claiming the law, which bars couples who resident outside of Massachusetts from marrying if their marriages would be illegal in their home states, is unconstitutional and that it is discriminatory to enforce it against same-sex couples.
Gov. Mitt Romney and Attorney General Tom Reilly cited the law -- which some say was originally written to be used against interracial couples -- in denying marriage licenses to out-of-state gay couples.
After gay marriage became legal in Massachusetts last month, several city and town clerks openly defied them and issued the documents to nonresidents anyway, until Reilly ordered them to stop or face penalties.
"The governor simply can't dust off this law to discriminate against gays and lesbians," Michelle Granda, a lawyer for Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, which represents the eight out-of-state couples, said at a news conference today.
Romney's office referred questions to Reilly's office, which declined to comment. In his letter to clerks ordering them to stop issuing the licenses, Reilly said doubts by public officials about the constitutionality of the law were not grounds to stop enforcing it.
The state's Supreme Judicial Court ruled last November that same-sex couples had a right under the Massachusetts Constitution to marry, and ordered that weddings could begin taking place May 17.
The eight plaintiff couples come from the five other New England states and New York. Some have already gotten married in Massachusetts while others applied for licenses and were denied. Several have family roots here.
Two of the couples - Lee and Judi McNeil-Beckwith, and Wendy Becker and Mary Norton, all of Providence, R.I. - are among the plaintiffs.
Katy Gossman, 40, of Meriden, Conn., married her partner of five years, Kristin Gossman, 38, in Worcester. Gossman, an FBI special agent who handles terrorism issues, said because of the nature of her work, she worries about Kristin being protected.
"I work for the protection and security of this country for all Americans," Katy Gossman said. "Why can I not have protection and security for Kristin if something were to happen to me, the same security and protection afforded other married couples?"
Provincetown, the gay tourism mecca at the tip of Cape Cod, is the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit filed by the 12 city and town clerks. The town was among the first to defy the governor and issue licenses to nonresidents.
The clerks claim they could be subject to discrimination lawsuits if they are forced to continue denying licenses to out-of-state couples based on the 1913 law.
Somerville, just north of Boston, also married out-of-state couples. The city's mayor, Joseph Curtatone, said using the law to deny marriage licenses was "not only unconstitutional but simply outrageous."
"We've been out on the lead of this issue from the beginning because we want to treat people equally," Curtatone said. "We're confident we're on the right side of the law."
Advocates say the segregation-era law has its roots in racism and should not be used to discriminate against gays.
Heterosexual couples from out-of-state were rarely, if ever, challenged over the past several decades. Issues such as whether they were cousins or if they were married to other people could make their marriages illegal in Massachusetts.
Harvard University law professor Randall Kennedy, who appeared at the news conference with the municipal officials and gay couples, said the 1913 law had "regrettable, tainted origins" and grew out of "popular revulsion" over interracial marriages. A similar law was passed by Vermont in 1912.
The attorney general has said there is no evidence that lawmakers were motivated by the race issue in passing the law.
Overturning the law could lead large numbers of gays and lesbians to come to Massachusetts to get married. Those couples could then demand legal recognition in their home states, setting off challenges to marriage laws across the country.
None of the couples involved has current plans to challenge the marriage laws in their home states, attorneys said.
Becker, 43, and Norton, 44, have been together for 16 years. They have a 4-year-old daughter and a 1-year-old foster son. They filed a notice of intention to marry in Attleboro but were denied a license.
They hope to celebrate their wedding along with Becker's parents, who celebrate 50 years of marriage this summer.
"We have children and we want them to grow up knowing that our relationship is as significant and important as their friends' parents who are married, and we want them to be able to live in a society that's free of any kind of discrimination," Becker said.
The McNeil-Beckwiths were married May 20 in Worcester. They were both born and raised in Massachusetts and are both licensed nurses in the state.
"We met here, we fell in love here and we got married here," Lee McNeil-Beckwith said. "Twenty miles shouldn't make a difference."
They won't stop until they've decimated every last law regarding decency and morality.
I don't know how much more of this I can take...
Ping your list sir?
The battle rages on...
This stage has nothing to do with homosexual marriages.
It is intended ONLY to destroy individual states. To all you people who have never studied the communist methods...
Once they take over a country, the first thing they do is to destroy all the old 'political' boundaries (states, provinces) and re-write all maps and history/geographyt books to eliminate all traces of the old.
I've been through that! CUBA!
What about Right to Carry state citizens bringing their firearms into the Gay State?
Will do! Thank you very much for alerting me. And your comment is spot on. Homosexuals do not want tolerance; they have none for us. They don't want inclusiveness, they plan to exclude every vestige, remnant and shadow of moral absolutes. They want to eliminate every restraint against sexual behavior, up to and including elimination of the age of consent.
They have admitted all this, I'm not exaggerating or inventing anything. Their words speak for them. They want to force all of us to live in a sexually libertine free for all, and THEY WANT ACCESS TO OUR CHILDREN.
Homosexual Agenda Ping. So, since Massachusetts has fallen prey to the homosexual agenda people, they are hoping for a domino effect. Notice all the bogus arguments - racism, fairness, dragging in the Constitution, using words like "outrageous" and so on.
What they want is a showdown, to force the rest of us (98% or so) to accept their dominance. They want us to be sorry that we've been "judgemental" and "unfair" to them for thinking that same sex sodomy isn't natural, healthy and virtuous.
Well, I can only hope that enough conservatives are getting riled up.
Let me know if anyone wants on/off this pinglist.
(How can two women have a child that is "theirs"?)
Well we already know which side owns the Massachusetts courts. It's a done deal, unless residents develop some backbone and impeach the judges.
A society that's free of any kind of discrimination? Sounds like a good storyline for a science fiction novel.
Agree 100% lj.
When will it stop?
When enough of us - real conservatives - get mad and take action. Or an act of God, which I don't discount. Or both.
You'll be glad to know that the Rally I'm organizing is next Saturday, and everything has gone according to plan.
We have a very "diverse" guest speaker list, 7 people from different backgrounds, ethnicities, religions...and even a lawyer!
We've got a local Christian band who's going to be playing afterwards. It's shaping up to be a huge event!
As predicted...we've gotten ZERO support from ANY state politicos. Our republican governor, our congressional republican hopeful (the guy who's running against Patty Kennedy), and all of the 13 state senate and house reps who support "one-man, one-woman" legislation (on paper only, apparently) have all said "No".
The Catholic leadership isn't backing us, nor are any of the local Rabbi's. They don't want to touch it. They're afraid of making waves, or jeopardizing their political initiatives.
In short. They don't care. they just don't care. The apathy is VERY depressing.
Great news! I hope you get LOTS of people. Have you publicized it on the kind of radio stations college age kids listen to? There are a lot of closet conservatives among college students.
Hmm, maybe not so many in RI. But you never know!
Take pics and post'em for us! It'll energize folks in other places.
Great work you're doing!!!!!
Their real motive is obvious: its to use Massachusetts to short-circuit laws in other states. Its a strategem that has nothing to do with the merits of gay marriage. The Suffolk court should uphold the law.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.