Friends of the Family,

Watching as Republican senators in New York caved to pressure from the governor and other state leaders on same-sex “marriage” brought back the sadness and anger that we all felt on June 14, 2007 when seven “Benedict Arnolds” flipped their votes, robbing the citizens of Massachusetts their opportunity to define marriage on their own terms. In the Empire State, many of these Republicans were elected with the help and endorsement of the Conservative Party under the understanding that they were actually conservatives and supporting traditional values.

As is too often the case today, any appearance of principle and conviction in elected officials disappears when it comes time to walk the talk. Just like in our situation here in the Bay State, New Yorkers are coming to know what it took to cause these senators to change their minds on such a fundamental issue. As the New York Times reported, a multi-million dollar lobbying campaign succeeded in getting enough “conservative” legislators to switch their votes. It reminds me of what Arline Isaacson, the lead Massachusetts lesbian lobbyist for same-sex marriage, said to the Boston Globe the day before we lost the marriage amendment vote: “It’s very frustrating because legislators keep upping the ante on what they want to get for their votes.”

I can only hope and pray that our friends at the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) and their allies are successful in holding the New York “turncoats” accountable. It has taken us four years, but last November’s election results for the Massachusetts State Legislature were a testimony to that accountability. May there be many more!

What amazes me about the ongoing debate over so-called same-sex “marriage” is that advocates continue to get away with the incessant comparisons to bans on interracial marriage that were rightly ruled unconstitutional nearly fifty years ago. Of course, the media has the opportunity to set the record straight, but has opted to let is stand. However, Jeff Jacoby takes on the subject in today’s Boston Globe:

"By now, of course, the idea that same-sex couples should have the same freedom to marry as interracial couples has become a favorite gay-rights trump card. So has the view that opponents of gay marriage occupy the same moral and legal swamp as the segregationists who thought Mildred and Richard Loving’s marriage should be a crime."

Jacoby goes on to “agree that the two are connected,” but points out that it’s not in the way the gay activists would have you believe. Ending the discriminatory ban on interracial marriages affirmed the enduring meaning of marriage between an man and a woman, ending its interference “with the core elements of marriage in order to promote white supremacy.”

“Same-sex marriage, too, interferes with the core elements of wedlock in order to advance an unrelated goal – the dignity and equality of gays and lesbians,” writes Jacoby. And he is absolutely right. Marriage is rooted in bringing men and women together, and uniting them to care for the children “that their sexual behavior may produce.”

What is even more disturbing is that we are seeing more and more that marriage just isn’t compatible with the gay lifestyle. In the wake of the New York vote, the gay community came together for the annual pride parade in New York City. A participant in the “Drag March” of cross-dressers had this to say about the new right to marry: “I [feel] pretty ambivalent…there are many other kinds of relationships, especially within the queer culture, whether it’s open relationships or nonsexual companionship or polyamorous relationships … and I do think all types of relationships should be honored…not just the people who fit this model.”

The participant’s partner of two years said it more succinctly: “I suppose I do think the right to marry should exist. Which is not the same thing as saying that I’m interested in exercising it.”

These are dark moments indeed for marriage, family and our values. What seemed to be the making of a great year for the good guys—the defeat of same-sex “marriage” in both Maryland and Rhode Island—has now become a huge step forward for our opponents. But as Jeff Jacoby so aptly wrote today, “Marriage –male-female marriage – is indispensible to human welfare. That is why it has existed in virtually every known human society. And why it cannot be permanently redefined.”

For our families,

P.S. As I write this today, the Rhode Island state senate is considering a bill awarding civil unions—including all the rights and benefits of marriage—to same-sex couples. This is nothing more than counterfeit marriage, and a law that is designed to allow judges to force same-sex “marriage” as was the case in Connecticut. The religious protections within the bill are simply window-dressing to get the bill approved. Mark my words, civil unions are the gateway to same-sex marriage. The Rhode Island law will be in the courts before the ink dries from the governor’s signature, and will be struck down in favor of full homosexual marriage.