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Loading ...Gay couples rush to wed ahead of Calif. election
10.14.2008 7:39am EDT
(San Francisco, California) Gay couples from around California and the nation are feverishly tying the knot ahead of Election Day to avoid missing out if voters approve a ballot initiative aimed at banning same-sex marriage.
Aaron Twitchell and Orlando Manzo from Austin, Texas, waited two months for an appointment to get a marriage license in San Francisco. When they got to the city clerk’s office, the line of people ahead of them was so long they worried they would be late for their own wedding.“We are so happy California is so progressive they would allow something like this,” said Manzo, 33, as his partner of nine years recently watched the clock and held a Tiffany’s bag with their platinum rings inside. “I wouldn’t say it’s now or never, but we wanted to get married before then.”
The urgency intensified last week with news that Proposition 8’s supporters had far outraised its opponents and the measure was gaining support in public opinion polls.
“Couples are making their plans to come in before November 4 because people are getting a little uneasy,” said San Francisco Clerk-Recorder Karen Hong Lee. “It’s too close to call, basically, and it’s legal right now, so why wait? Why take the chance and say, ‘Let’s get married on November 5?’”
Proposition 8 would amend the state constitution to limit marriage to a man and a woman. If approved, it would overturn a California Supreme Court ruling that made the state only the second, after Massachusetts, to legalize same-sex marriage. On Friday in Connecticut, the state Supreme Court ruled the state would be the third to allow gay marriage.
Since same-sex marriage became legal in California in mid-June, at least 11,000 couples have exchanged vows statewide, according to the Williams Institute for Sexual Orientation Law and Public Policy based at the University of California, Los Angeles. That’s more than the 10,400 gay and lesbian couples who have wed in Massachusetts since gay marriage was legalized there in May 2004, according to the institute.
The demand for same-sex marriage licenses has proven so great in San Francisco that Hong doubled the number of daily reservations her office accepts each day. And she assigned a second marriage commissioner to perform weddings.
Even so, the office is booked solid through Oct. 21 for license appointments and has no more coveted Friday ceremony slots available between now and the election.
Community activists Davina Kotulski and Molly McKay, who exchanged vows on Sept. 1, have invitations to one or more weddings for every weekend before Election Day, but Kotulski said they would spend their free time working on the campaign to defeat Proposition 8.
Apprehension over the forthcoming ballot initiative has taken a toll on many couples she knows, said Kotulski, a psychotherapist.
“In any relationship, there is the pressure of where is this going. Do you commit now? Do you commit later?” she said. “But when you have a very small window of opportunity, it definitely adds increased pressure, and that could break up a couple before they make it to the altar.”
Although California Attorney General Jerry Brown has said he does not think marriages solemnized through Nov. 4 would become void if the measure passes, gay marriage opponents could try to litigate the matter. So some couples have decided to wait until after the election instead of putting themselves through such uncertainty.
Another unknown is whether same-sex marriages performed after the election would automatically not be recognized by the state. Allie Schembra, a spokeswoman for the secretary of state, said Proposition 8 would become effective the day after the election if it passes.
But Hong and other county clerks say that because it usually takes a month for election results to be certified as final, they do not plan to stop issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples until they are directed by the state health department, which oversees marriage records.
The election has forced Chloe Harris, 28, and Frankie Frankeny, 42, to make a series of compromises. The women would have preferred to have their legal ceremony Dec. 30, the anniversary of the day they married without the government’s blessing in Paris two years ago. Mindful of the upcoming vote, they hastily scheduled their nuptials for Oct. 18.
A little more than two weeks from the big date, the couple still had not contacted everyone they wanted to invite and were just getting around to selecting the caviar and wine for their reception. Then there was the conversation about what they wanted to be called afterward; Harris felt comfortable using wife, while Frankeny did not. They agreed “partner” sounded too antiseptic.
The owner of the restaurant where their wedding will be held, Traci des Jardin, is a close friend who will be catering at least 14 gay weddings in October. Des Jardin assured Frankeny and Harris that what they jokingly call their “shotgun wedding” would be perfect.
“We haven’t had this privilege before, so something about that alone makes it special,” she said.
Tim of Texas,
I am a Marylander, sure like you I don’t live in California, but I haven’t let that stop me from donating to “No on Prop 8″.
And you know what I am going to do, Tim, I am going to keep on donating, donating and donating some more until November 4th.
I plan to likely fly out on one of my free reward flight tickets from Southwest Airlines to San Francisoo as soon as I can get a few free days and I plan to donate some time calling on Equality California’s phones.
This piece of despicable rubbish threatens to be dumped in California’s constitution at voting polls, stopping any more California gay marriages.
A blessing in disguise that the late gay rights pioneer Del Martin of San Francisco will never, ever again have go through the anguish of another revocation of her marriage to the one she loved like she did the first time.
May her soul rest in peace for she and many others of her activist days fought to secure rights for every gay person. We owe her and other activists like her a debt of gratitude that they worked to secure a better life for us.
Are we going to sit still on our and let gay marriage in CA get ripped out from under us?
What happens in a very large and major state of huge prestige like CA could very well render gay marriage more difficult to wrest from reluctant courts and legislatures in states like my own Maryland which has no registry, no marriage and no civil unions in spite of the best efforts of Equality Maryland to secure marriage rights or maybe even civil unions for those living in our own state.
For mark my words the evil ones who cooked up this travesty and this torment called Prop 8 will not rest and will drag gay married through indignity, suffering and anguish once again while they likely launch lawauits to or do whatever they are going to do get the existing marriages of thousands of gay CA couples declared null and void.
You know, maybe instead of caviar receptions we should be spending our money on the campain to defeat prop. 8? I, myself, have to look over my budget tomorrow afternoon and donate everything I can afford to (but I’m a teacher, that’ll still only be a few hundred.)
Look guys, no matter where you live, this is urgent. I’m in Texas, but this affects us no matter where we are.
Dear CWFA, (I put in the various letters for FOTF, AFA, Concerned Women For America etc)
I first would like to say, shame on you! Shame on your organization for spending so much money to tear apart families in California instead of putting that $409,000 (AFA – $500,000 FOTF – $439,643 NOFM – $900,000) to better uses like feeding the hungry, helping the homeless and other issues of importance. It amazes me that an organization that claims it has “concerns for America” dumps so much money that would be better put to use. Besides, shouldn’t you be happy for 2 consenting loving adults? Marriage is safe and “should not be in any jeopardy” as you continuously preach.
I am a gay woman who is very involved in helping others as I believe the Lord G-d would want it that way. Learn to spread more love and less intolerance/bigotry/hatred. Besides, Jesus walked with those you refuse to.
Spend less time judging and more time loving for that is one of G-ds most precious commandments/gift to the world.
P.S. Stand up against hate, vote no on 8!
Come on people, all this talk is great but quit waiting for the celebs to bail us out. My wife and I have donated every cent we can to NO on 8. We opted for white gold bands with no diamonds, a private ceremony, a honeymoon at home. The money we would have spent went to NO on 8. We have done without haircuts and carwashes so we could send that money. We have even sent the money we got from recycling. It is time to donate. If they take this basic right away from us what is next? Gay Pride? Gay bars? Gay cruises? Quit going to Starbucks for a week, don’t go to the bar 1 weekend and send that money to NO on 8. My wife and I are by no means rich but we are finding the money to donate, you can too.
Someone tell me, if the Prop passed don’t we just have to waste a few more years and take it back to the California Supreme Court, who would once again tell the world that the majority voting about a minorities rights is not Constitutional? One way or another gays and lesbians will be allowed to marry, so what do the haters really think they will accomplish?! To use us once again in 2010 to bring out more haters to the polls? Good heavens. This gets OLD!!
We are all watching you here in Switzerland, Please fights against the prop 8, the great California can’t accept this bullshit …
Good luck !
I just donated some $$ to the cause, because marriage rights in CA are important. Having said that, as a licensed counselor, I implore non-long-term couples to wait and get married in the two states that will be supporting gay marriage for years to come: Massachusetts and Connecticut. (Long-term couples who want to push up their CA weddings…go for it!) I just hate to see anyone “rushing” to get married who aren’t rock solid in their relationships. I love the expression, “Don’t get married until you already are married.” Know what I mean?
With you 100%, Disgusted American. I think there are a lot of folks in our country who either don’t understand the unique role of constitutions in representative republics… or (more likely, given that we’re talking about the Religious Right) know full well what they mean and are completely hostile to it.
Government power can turn tyrannical even in a society set up to be “free”. Through distortion of the political process (by, e.g., mega-corporate media & pressure-group influence), some people are able to acquire and use power not toward any real vision of the public good, but instead toward forcing their own belief systems on others.
Constitutions are supposed to limit the reach of this destructive tendency. Even if we can’t avoid it entirely, we can contain its influence – by delineating some clear No-Go areas for government power, some areas in which individual rights remain completely sacrosanct. Constitutions are supposed to protect our personal freedom by serving as a counterbalance to the will of the majority. No matter how full of itself the group in power happens to get, there are still some things they can’t touch – things underlying the very operation of the political process (e.g. voting, free speech), and things in which society has no interest in the first place because their concrete effects operate only upon the individuals involved (e.g. whom we marry!)
Fundies like to complain that constitutional rights and judicial decisions take certain matters out of the hands of the voters – well YES… that’s the whole idea! Freedom doesn’t just mean political freedom (the ability to make binding decisions)… it has to mean personal freedom as well, or ultimately life wouldn’t be all that different from what it was under a monarch in not-so-merry olde England.
Seems to me like the gay community is in the same basic position that the African-American community was in back during the civil rights movement. I know some don’t agree with that comparison, but we’re obviously being denied basic rights protected under the Constitution. the other part of this is its not only the Republican Party or George W. Bush that are doing this. Its easy to blame W and the rest of the Republicans, but you have to add the bible-thumping churches to that list which contain more than just Republicans.
What is with that ugly cake? These newlyweds can join the class action lawsuit should this ridiculous law pass.
How pathetic that this is even happening. A minority group is having to “rush to wed” before the majority might take that right away from them.
All because there might not have been enough money to fight the religious bullies on the air. If there is, this probably would fail as polls a few weeks ago showed.
My partner and I live in Houston. We got married on October 3 in San Fran. Thanks California! Fight Prop 8!
The United States is becoming an illiberal democracy. These increasingly ridiculous ballot initiatives are merely a manifestation of that decay. And it is a lot more serious than same-sex marriage. We have election after election after election. But the institutions that protect our civil liberties are breaking down. The “Fourth Estate” has been sold to the highest bidder. The decisions of the judiciary are barely respected. Habeas Corpeus has been suspended. Official corruption is out of control.
The Disgusting thing about this is..for the 1st time…RIGHTS will be Voted away USING the Constitution..NEVER has that EVER happened!
All the more urgent for gays and their straight allies to contribute to the fight to stop Prop 8 in its tracks.
Prop 8 is in danger of passing if the polls of it gaining favor are possible. The public is swallowing the Prop 8 proponents’ lies about gay marriage.