IGF CultureWatch

With the huge loss in Texas, we're now 0-19 in popular votes on gay marriage. Not one of those losses has even been close. What do we do now? First, try not to despair. We need to take a long, historical view of all this. Second, let's try to learn something from the losses. There are many more such votes to come, including probably an all-important one in California next year.

On Nov. 8, with 76 percent in favor, Texans voted for a state constitutional amendment to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman. What more it might also be interpreted to prohibit will rest in the hands of the socially conservative and overwhelmingly Republican elected state judiciary, from whose "pro-gay" activist grip the amendment was supposed to save the state. The amendment has done lasting damage to gay couples and families in Texas.

There was a time just a couple of years ago when it seemed to many gay-marriage supporters that the fight would not only be won but won fairly quickly. Private companies, cities, and even states were moving toward the recognition of gay relationships. The Supreme Court struck down sodomy laws. That was quickly followed by full gay marriage in Massachusetts. One national poll showed support for gay marriage around 40 percent, an astonishing figure given that the idea had barely reached national consciousness.

But polls are never trustworthy on controversial social questions and opponents of gay marriage had a trump card-the voters. They have used the public's simmering anger at judicial activism to goad the states into passing sweeping amendments that have actually turned back the clock on the legal rights of gay families.

Despite this backlash, we have to take the long view of this struggle. Consider Massachusetts, the birthplace of gay marriage in the U.S.

In the first half of the twentieth century, Massachusetts banned contraceptives-even if used for medical reasons and even if used by a married couple. Birth-control advocates tried in vain year after year to get the state legislature to repeal the law.

Finally, they succeeded in getting the issue put to a popular vote in 1942. During the repeal campaign they faced a barrage of attacks from the Catholic Church, including the slogan, "Birth Control Is Against God's Law-Vote NO." On November 3, birth-control advocates lost by a large margin, 58 to 42 percent.

In 1948, they lost again in a popular referendum by an almost identical margin. Not until 1966 did the Massachusetts legislature revise its anti-contraceptives law to allow married people to get them, and then only in response to the Supreme Court's decision to strike down an almost identical Connecticut law the year before.

Today, the use of contraceptives is widespread and uncontroversial. Massachusetts is one of the most socially tolerant states in the country.

The gay-marriage controversy is not exactly like the birth-control controversy, of course. Opposition to contraceptives was limited almost entirely to Catholics, whose faith taught that their use violated natural law; mainstream Protestant denominations had no problem with contraception. By contrast, opposition to gay marriage is broad and deep in all mainstream Christian denominations.

But progress can be made. While a majority of the Massachusetts legislature voted to ban gay marriage in 2004, that majority had evaporated by the next year. Now Massachusetts may become the first state to approve gay marriage by popular vote if the issue ever reaches the ballot there.

Like other advocates of ideas once thought dangerous, gay-marriage supporters will lose many battles. Since no serious constitutional scholar believes the Supreme Court is going to hold traditional marriage laws unconstitutional anytime in the near future, we are likely in for a long slog unaided by very much federal court intervention. We might as well prepare for it.

That leads to the second question, what can we learn from our losses? One thing that does not usually work is trying to change the subject. Like all of the anti-amendment efforts before it, the Texas "No Nonsense in November" campaign tried to make the vote about anything but marriage: the irresponsibility of the legislature, the sinister politics of the amendment sponsors, etc. At the end, some opponents of the amendment were even warning that it banned marriage itself.

For voters, these ballot campaigns are about gay marriage. Until we're prepared to defend gay marriage on the substance, the voters will ignore us. (California may well present a more complicated case, about which I'll doubtless write more in the future.)

That's not to say we will start winning these campaigns by being more honest. Nothing we said could have saved us in Texas. But at least we can begin to inform voters about why gay marriage is a good idea. That is the necessary foundation for the long-term democratic support we must build.

The second thing we must do is try to enlist a broader spectrum of allies. Left-wing coalitions, like the one No Nonsense so proudly put together, are never going to win ballot fights over marriage. This means working especially hard to sign up as many moderates, conservatives, and people of faith as possible. It also means emphasizing the types of arguments that appeal to such people.

The race for gay marriage is far from lost. But it is a marathon, not a sprint. And it will require smarter running.

First published in the Chicago Free Press on November 23, 2005.

It is reasonable to wonder whether gays and lesbians are achieving anything politically, and wonder what to do about it if we aren't.

With a Republican president and a Republican Congress dominated by southern conservatives, we will see no progress at the national level. The president supports a Constitutional gay marriage ban. Congress will not repeal military's ban on gay servicemembers, nor will it approve a gay non-discrimination law.

The 2006 elections are not likely to change anything. Democrats are unlikely to win the 5 or 6 seats they need to control of the Senate. Even if they did, conservative Democrats would join Republicans to defeat gay-supportive bills Democratic leaders might propose. The most we can hope for is defeating a religious zealot like Rick Santorum.

Nor are the Democrats likely to win control of the House. Redistricting after the 2000 census created even more safe House districts, leaving only a handful in play politically. Even if Democrats won control of Congress, the president would veto any pro-gay legislation.

At the state level, to be sure, there has been some good news. The California legislature approved gay marriage although the bill was vetoed. The Connecticut legislature approved a civil unions law. The Illinois legislature approved and Maine voters upheld gay civil rights laws. Acknowledged.

But outside a few liberal areas, we have lost far more often than won. More and more states have added gay marriage bans to their Constitutions, bans that will be hard to overturn, some extending to any sort of civil union and domestic partner arrangements.

And think of all the gay bills that fail. They are defeated by the legislature, or more often never make it out of committee, or are not even introduced because, well, really, why bother if they are not going to pass. It is not so much that legislators are personally homophobic, although many may be, but that they fear electoral defeat if opponents can accuse them of supporting "the gay agenda." That's democracy, I'm afraid.

This analysis need not lead to despair, however, only a tactical shift in the focus of our efforts, focusing on thinking locally and acting locally. Here are three alternative models for making gay progress.

Focusing on the city level makes sense since cities are often more liberal than state legislatures. Cities that have not done so can be urged to pass gay civil rights bills, to approve domestic partner plans for city employees and require major city contractors to offer domestic partner benefits. The goal is to get gay partnerships legally recognized to establish a precedent.

We can urge cities to mandate their own lobbyists to pressure state legislatures to approve gay supportive legislation. We can invite mayors and council members to more gay events, assuming that their attendance promotes gay legitimacy. We can press school boards to enforce strict anti-bullying policies and mandate teacher sensitivity training about gay students.

Second, we need to keep in mind that young people are about twice as gay supportive as adults over 60, so future voters are more likely to be gay-friendly. We can support and hasten that change by assisting any Gay/Straight Alliances in local schools and the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network that fosters them.

Do they need supplies? Do they need books? Do they need money to rent films? Do they want guest speakers? Do they need money for a field trip? Do they want to donate books to the school library? (Will the librarian make them available?) Groups of supportive adults can help those students just as the ubiquitous "Boosters Clubs" support school athletic programs.

Third, gay Christians can join and help gay-supportive groups in their own denominations. Public opinion can be significantly affected in the long run by the policies of churches and pronouncements of prominent clergy, so efforts to move churches in a gay-supportive direction are vital.

Wealthy conservative Christians such as California's Howard Ahmanson have contributed vast sums of money to promote anti-gay organizing efforts in the Episcopal church and other denominations. We must respond with equal amounts of money, organizing and solidly-based theology. Existing gay Christian groups can form the nucleus of that effort, but need far greater support for their efforts.

Those are three important areas to work on. There are others. Employees at large companies can join the gay employee groups and work for domestic partner and other benefits. People can ask if local public librarians will accept gifts of gay books and donate some if so. They can write Letters to the Editor of the local newspaper. And, of course, most effective of all is coming out to everyone you know. Arguments can have an impact, but personal experience has more impact than anything else.

In short, no one has to remain silent and defenseless when gay people and their lives are attacked or ignored as insignificant. People have the means to defend themselves-if they but make the effort.