Toronto is about to start issuing marriage licenses to gay couples after Ontario's highest court set aside the heterosexual-only definition of marriage as unconstitutional. Canada's -- and North America's -- first post-decision legal gay marriage ceremony is scheduled for Tuesday afternoon between two men who had been among those who had brought the legal case, Reuters reports. And retroactively the court decision also recognized two other gay marriage ceremonies that had taken place in Toronto in 2001, declaring those unions valid. Here's a link to the opinion itself.
This is big news, though it seems to be under the radar of most U.S. news operations as of Tuesday evening. Of course here in the U.S., land of the Clinton-signed federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and so many state DOMAs to boot, it's unlikely to have an immediate impact -- except as a galvanizing force for gay marriage advocates.
The big deal here would be if Massachusetts' highest court were to legalize same-sex marriage in a ruling expected this summer. But however that decision comes down, the marriage revolution is underway.
The Show Goes On.
Some positive domestic news: The Department of Justice (DOJ) is reversing its decision to ban a gay employees group from holding its annual pride event onsite -- although the DOJ Pride get-together won't have the sponsorship of the department as it has in the past, and as other events currently do, says the Human Rights Campaign.
Last year's DOJ Pride event featured a department-sponsored speech by Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson to roughly 150 employees, causing religious conservatives to go ballistic. Fearing the religious right's wrath, it was decided that no gay pride event could be held this year on DOJ premises -- despite prior promises from Attorney General John Ashcroft. But that decision produced an outcry from gay activists and the publicity made the Bush administration appear intolerant, and so now the partial reversal follows as the department relents and the pride event goes forward.
Gays are unhappy about the lack of official sponsorship, while anti-gays are unhappy the event wasn't banned outright. So what's new?
My Latest.
David Horowitz's conservative Frontpagemagazine.com site has
published an essay of mine called
Gay Activists and Religious Conservatives: Through the Looking
Glass, which elaborates on the gay vs. religious right battle
WITHIN the GOP. If you have the stomach, you can also peruse the
readers' comments, which range from "this is sick" to "this is
(almost) coherent."
--Stephen H. Miller
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