By R. T. NearyOriginally published on
MassResistance.orgRepublished with permission.
Bennington flag unfurling beside my front doorway, I drove away destined for Beacon Hill on Flag Day, June 14, fully aware that the members of our Great and General Court would do all they could this day to violate the democratic processes on an issue with vast implications for families, the state of Massachusetts, and the entire nation. They do have a history of doing this.
Flag Day in '07 will have special significance in history, as it marked the date on which the elected Legislature of this Commonwealth, in effect, replaced the displaying of the stars and stripes with a banner made up of the colors of the rainbow.
Arm-twisting, lucrative job offers, and influence peddling from Governor Deval Patrick's office to Senator Ted Kennedy's and the Democrat leadership in Washington, D.C., had been amply reported in the media , so no one should have been surprised that these solons thumbed their noses at 170,000 signatories on a petition to bring the status of marriage to the ballot on Nov. 4, 2008. Only 45 legislators of the 50 necessary voted to continue moving the issue to this vote. The process died in its tracks! In the wake, however, I wonder how many interpret the Constitutional Convention's brazen action as one of Divine Providence. I do.
The amendment's wording would allow 99 percent of the camel into the tent by permitting what would be a "marriage" arrangement under a different label. Then, in only a short period of time, it would morph legally into the same relationship that has been preserved for millennia, one involving only one man and one woman. But above and beyond this gaping flaw, worse still was a grandfather clause which would allow and affirm 10,000-plus "marriages" which would have been performed up to Nov. 4, 2008--and then deny any after that date. A prompt challenge would have ipso facto relegated the dual status to the legal trash bin. And then folks: Go back to Square One!
What also has been sadly overlooked in the surreal political world in which we have been living is that "Same Sex Marriage" still does not exist in this once-proud Commonwealth. And yes, we do owe a monumental apology to John Adams for these last few years. In the Goodridge decision on Nov. 18, 2003, the Supreme Judicial Court never established SSM; they ruled that the Legislature had the right to do so, but that was never done. The Legislature knew that it did not have the votes to pass SSM into law in 2003-04, so the 180 days the SJC gave to them came and went on May 17, 2004. Herein started the legal tailspin that gave us the pseudo-marriage situation which exists today.
Governor Mitt Romney, a Harvard Law School graduate, tacked 180 degrees off course as he instructed Town Clerks and Justices of the Peace to start issuing "marriage licenses" to applicants of the same gender. What he clearly should have done at this point was exercise bold leadership by issuing an Executive Order prohibiting any such action until the Legislature took appropriate constitutional steps. Herein lies the genesis of this unconstitutional tailspin, one which has started rapidly to re-design the social, political, and religious underpinnings of our society from early education throughout our entire social framework.
Surely, the SJC in Massachusetts in their long-delayed Goodridge decision turned the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights--the nation's oldest written constitution--inside out. They were fully aware of their inability to enact law and impose such a radical change to statutory law in this state. The Separation of Powers principle precluded them from invading the legislative domain.
What Chief Justice Margaret Marshall and her narrow phalanx wanted to happen was to create an environment where the public--mainly that enormous number in the soft, tractable middle ground of the political landscape--would be eased over so they would adhere to the postmodern political view of her elitists. After establishing SSM in this state, the U.S. Constitution's Article IV "full faith and credit" provision allows an open window to gain entrance to all the remaining states. Then barriers of consanguinity and duality would soon fall. Interspecies "marriage" might take a little longer.
In the recent Doyle vs Galvin decision upholding the plaintiffs' call for a vote on this proposed constitutional amendment, the SJC's language can be interpreted to affirm that Goodridge did not have the authority to establish "marriage" between two people of the same sex. In reality, these two decisions affirm that all these "marriages" that have taken place in this state are not marriages at all.
I have never accepted that any two people of the same gender can have a marriage, notwithstanding many other relationships that exist in our society. The millennia-old institution of marriage involves complementarity, not only on a physical plane but also in the vast psychological, social, and spiritual realms. This relationship is unique, joining two diverse human natures into what can be life's most productive, rewarding, and enjoyable existence. Diversity not only exists in this complementary relationship; it is the essential ingredient in it. Of course, we are for diversity--right at the core of the marriage union!
History will unravel this social, political mess and expose it in the full sunlight down the road somewhere. And it will reveal that SSM never existed in this state--constitutionally or legally. Future courts will rule that to have been the case.
Take heed, traditionalists. Flag Day 2007 may have seen the Democrat leadership show how they really abhor the democratic processes, and how the Republicans' cowardice and turncoat behavior once again demonstrated why they continue to be a shrinking minority. As they receive the blessing of a lesbian minister draped with a rainbow stole on the State House steps and wallow in the syrupy adulation of those to whom they have sold their souls, 151 legislators and the Governor deserved pity.
I still prefer the stars and stripes, which I will continue to display with pride. A Massachusetts Constitutional Convention, which thumbs its nose at 170,00 petitioners and millions of voting citizens in order to continue the imposition of a perverse arrangement, will be viewed some future day in its proper way: an "evolutionary paradigm" of social, political decadence in this once-proud Bay State. Let's assure that its national implications are seen, and that it hastens the day when an amendment to the U.S. Constitution passes and saves our fellow citizens across this nation from the malignancy which has started here.
Ray Neary is a former president of Massachusetts Citizens for Life. He is currently the director of ProLife Massachusetts and has lobbied the Legislature on several pro-family issues. He was a public school teacher for over 30 years, and was a top official in the Massachusetts Teachers Association.
