Vermont Leislature Overrides Veto to Legalize Same-Sex Marriage

The Vermont Legislature Tuesday overrode Gov. Jim Douglas’s veto of a bill allowing gay couples to marry, mustering one more vote than needed to preserve the measure. Vermont was the first state in the country to implement “civil unions” in 2000, providing a textbook rebuttal of the argument that “civil unions” are a satisfactory compromise to protect marriage. Vermont is now the first state in the country to legalize same-sex "marriage through legislative action instead of a court ruling, and comes less than a week after the Iowa Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriages in that state.

Four states now legally allow same-sex "marriage"—Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, and Vermont.  Although California's Supreme Court also legalized same-sex "marriage," voters there had the last say by passing Proposition 8, that defined marriage as the union between a man and a woman in the State Constitution.

The legalization of homosexual "marriage" in Iowa and Vermont adds fuel to the fire of the argument that the North Carolina General Assembly needs to pass the Defense of Marriage Act which will allow the voters of North Carolina the right to vote on a Marriage Protection Amendment to our Constitution. Without protection in our State Constitution for the definition of marriage, North Carolina's marriage laws could be subject to the same type of judicial activism or legislative redefinition that has occurred in Iowa and Vermont. It is the people of North Carolina that deserve to make the decision about what relationships the law will recognize as "marriage."

Since Vermont had legalized "civil unions" already, the new law merely changes the name of the legal recognition given to gay couples, not the rights and benefits. The principle that emerges from Vermont is that "civil unions" are never a suitable compromise. Once a state legalizes same-sex relationships by allowing "civil unions" or "domestic partnerships," those become the club that homosexual activists use to beat the State over the head and demand gay "marriage."

Politicians should never impose a system that intentionally deprives a child of a mother and father. The state should do everything necessary to ensure that children aren’t denied their most important birthright: a mom and a dad. North Carolina politicians need to quit playing "chicken" with our State's marriage laws. The time to protect marriage in our Constitution is now!