Massachusetts lawmakers defeat bid to halt gay marriages
157-39 vote reflects growing acceptance of same-sex nuptials among state residents
By a vote of 157-39, lawmakers voted down a proposed constitutional amendment that would have eliminated the same-sex marriages legalized two years ago and replaced them with "civil unions" for gay couples.
Instead, the vote leaves same-sex marriage as the status quo in Massachusetts, and it now seems likely to remain so until at least 2008.
Politicians here credit the weddings themselves with shifting the political momentum, saying their growing ordinariness had served to defuse some of the opposition.
"The difference is that we have marriage," said state Sen. Jarrett Barrios, a Democrat, after the vote, while other supporters screamed and cheered nearby in a rally under a mural of the Boston Tea Party. "We've got a world that hasn't changed."
Well well at least not the whole US is run by neocons and I am glad sanity, not fear from religion prevailed.. 157-39 pretty decisive if you ask me.
But the bigots and fear mongers have this planned for 2008.
Lawmakers already are preparing for a battle over another proposed amendment that would ban both gay marriage and civil unions. The earliest that initiative could end up on the ballot is 2008.
157-39 vote reflects growing acceptance of same-sex nuptials among state residents
By a vote of 157-39, lawmakers voted down a proposed constitutional amendment that would have eliminated the same-sex marriages legalized two years ago and replaced them with "civil unions" for gay couples.
Instead, the vote leaves same-sex marriage as the status quo in Massachusetts, and it now seems likely to remain so until at least 2008.
Politicians here credit the weddings themselves with shifting the political momentum, saying their growing ordinariness had served to defuse some of the opposition.
"The difference is that we have marriage," said state Sen. Jarrett Barrios, a Democrat, after the vote, while other supporters screamed and cheered nearby in a rally under a mural of the Boston Tea Party. "We've got a world that hasn't changed."
Well well at least not the whole US is run by neocons and I am glad sanity, not fear from religion prevailed.. 157-39 pretty decisive if you ask me.
But the bigots and fear mongers have this planned for 2008.
Lawmakers already are preparing for a battle over another proposed amendment that would ban both gay marriage and civil unions. The earliest that initiative could end up on the ballot is 2008.