MA Plans to Revisit
Amendment on Gay Marriage
By PAM BELLUCK,
NYTimes on the Web, May 10, 2005
BOSTON, May 9 -- Nearly a year
after Massachusetts legalized same-sex marriage, state legislators are again
planning to consider a proposal to make such marriages illegal.
On Monday, Senator Robert E. Travaglini, a Democrat and the president of the
Senate, took steps toward convening a constitutional convention in the fall; one
issue that would come before it is a proposed constitutional amendment to ban
gay marriage but legalize civil unions.
Senator Travaglini is a co-sponsor of the amendment, which received preliminary
approval from the Legislature last year, too late to stop a decision by the
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court to allow gay marriages to begin on May 17,
2004.
But the amendment did not die. It has a chance to become law if the
Legislature approves it in the 2005-2006 legislative session, and if it is then
approved by voters in a referendum in November 2006. It is not clear how
likely that is to happen.
Ann Dufresne, a spokeswoman for Senator Travaglini, said he still supported the
amendment, or at least the principle of having the amendment work its way
through the voting process.
"When he crafted the compromise amendment," Ms. Dufresne said, "it was
recognizing that half of the constituents and half of the voters felt that there
should be a definition that marriage was between a man and a woman, and half
said there should be civil marriage" for same-sex couples.
"I think he was right in the middle with a lot of folks," she said. "First
and foremost he wanted to give people the ability to vote."
But several things have changed in the past year.
For one, the opinions of legislators may have changed now that more than 6,000
gay couples have married, Ms. Dufresne and other legislative aides say.
Some of those who supported the amendment may now oppose it, the aides say, out
of reluctance to undo marriages that have taken place or out of a sense that gay
marriage has not caused negative repercussions.
"We've had gay marriage now for a year," Ms. Dufresne said. "You can't
dispute the fact that it's now become part of the dialogue."
Another sponsor of the amendment, Senator Brian P. Lees, the Republican minority
leader, told The Republican, a newspaper in Springfield, Mass., that he would
probably support the amendment, but that "everyone should review" it since it
would deprive gay couples of the marriage rights they now have.
"That's why I'm willing to look at it," Mr. Lees told The Republican in
February. He did not return phone messages on Monday.
Another difference is the composition of the Legislature. Last year, the
House speaker, Thomas M. Finneran, a Democrat who opposed gay marriage, led a
large group of the legislators who voted 105 to 92 to support the amendment.
But Mr. Finneran has left the House, and the new speaker, Salvatore F. DiMasi, a
Democrat, supports gay marriage.
In addition, in special elections this year, at least three legislators in favor
of gay marriage replaced legislators who opposed it, and several more won
election to the House last November.
"The landscape of the House has changed," said Kimberly Haberlin, a spokeswoman
for Mr. DiMasi. She said that Mr. DiMasi believed that after a year of
legal gay marriage several legislators would see that "the world hasn't fallen
off its axis."
There are other factors to consider, however. A group of opponents to gay
marriage, including the Massachusetts Family Institute, is preparing a petition
to put an amendment on the ballot in 2008 that would ban gay marriage and not
establish civil unions. Some lawmakers who would oppose such an amendment
might decide that the best way to defeat it would be to support the amendment
establishing civil unions that the legislature approved last year, legislative
aides said.
Legislators here are also aware that most of the rest of the country is not
ready to support same-sex marriage, the aides said.
That could encourage some lawmakers to support a constitutional ban, Ms.
Dufresne said, because to keep such marriages legal "may show that Massachusetts
is out of step with the rest of the country."
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