[ + ] Text [ – ]

Vermont continues Iowa's freedom to marry momentum 

Google News Comment
April 8, 2009

When Vermont's legislature overrode the governor's veto and made Vermont the fourth state to end gay couples' exclusion from marriage (the second in a week!), it was an especially sweet victory with a special meaning.

Yes, it had a particular power and demonstrated the continuing marriage momentum, coming so soon after the unanimous state Supreme Court ruling that made Iowa the first midwestern state to uphold the freedom to marry, and the same day as a vote by the District of Columbia City Council to honor same-sex couples' marriages a what they are -- marriages -- with no gay exception.

But the special significance of Vermont's action was in who did it. Vermont was the first state to create what I call in my book, Why Marriage Matters, the "non-marriage marital status" of civil union. And with its action today, Vermont said that that was just not good enough, that civil union is not the same as marriage itself and no substitute for the freedom to marry.

By affirming that "marriage makes a word of difference", Vermont sent a message to the California Supreme Court, now weighing whether to uphold Prop 8 and its temporary removal of the freedom to marry in favor of separate partnership for gay couples, and to the legislatures in New Hampshire and New Jersey, each considering bills to end exclusion from marriage in place of the separate-and-unequal civil unions to which same-sex couples are now relegated.

But Prop 8 is a reminder amid all this progress that we can still sometimes lose, if we don't do the work. From New York to California, Maine to New Jersey, now is the time to get engaged with the groups leading the fight. And meanwhile, wherever we live, we all have to get in there and have the conversations with our circles, help people push past their discomfort, and connect the dots on why we want them to support the freedom to marry. It won't happen by itself.