Sunday, November 23, 2003

By Maeve Reston, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. -- When the bill allowing same-sex couples in Vermont to join in civil unions hit the desk of then-Gov. Howard B. Dean on April 26, 2000, he called a dozen staff members into his office, closed the door and signed it into law. There were none of the customary calls to the bill's supporters, no public celebrations, not even a photo opportunity for the press.

	Online Chart: Graphic: Most Americans oppose gay marriage, in pdf format You must have Adobe Acrobat Reader, available as a free download from Adobe

When Dean emerged to meet reporters, he said the debate over civil unions had been the most divisive in state history, but that lawmakers had done the right thing. At that point, the governor who had refused to take a stand on the issue before the Vermont Supreme Court forced his hand and who still opposes gay marriage, reached out to the bill's opponents, saying he had signed the legislation in private to show respect for their views.

"This is a bill that is about the deepest, most personal feelings that human beings have," he said. "I personally have friends, supporters that are furious with me over the fact that I have supported this bill. And I know that I have disappointed them and that's a very painful feeling."

Dean called for the "healing process" to begin.

The healing may have begun in Vermont, but the wound was laid bare for the rest of the country last week when the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled 4-3 that gay couples are entitled to marry in Massachusetts. The court ordered the state legislature to make it so within 180 days.

The Massachusetts decision is certain to enflame an already heated contest for the presidency in 2004, in which Dean is now the leading Democratic contender. And the outpouring of elation from gay rights supporters and of anger and grief from opponents made it clear how polarizing the issue of gay marriage is likely to become.

All of the candidates were forced to address the issue last week, but Dean probably has the most to lose by its rising profile since he is the only candidate who has signed legislation allowing gay couples to legally unite. Most American do not support gay marriage, especially in the South, where a Northeasterner like Dean faces an uphill battle in the best of circumstances.

"It's going to be on the front burner," said Roberta Combs, president of the Christian Coalition of America, a group that seeks an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would define marriage as a union between a man and a woman. "The abortion issue became an issue that was in the forefront, and I think this is going to be the same thing. This is a moral issue, it's a Biblical issue, it's a family values issue, and that's why we feel so passionate about it."

According to a mid-October survey by the Pew Research Center for The People & The Press and the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, 59 percent of Americans said they oppose legalizing gay marriage, but only a small group -- about 10 percent -- felt the Constitution should be amended to ban it.

Opposition to gay marriage is strongest among older Americans, the most reliable group of voters. There is also more opposition among adults over 30 who do not have a college degree than those that do, and among men, groups that have been migrating to the Republican Party in the South for decades. Sixty-seven percent of Southerners oppose gay marriage, according to the Pew poll, compared to 50 percent of Easterners.

"It's a much hotter button issue here in the South," said University of Texas government professor Bruce Buchanan, who specializes in presidential politics. "The South is a very culturally conservative and traditional region."

Across the country, nearly three-quarters of state legislatures have adopted laws or constitutional provisions defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman. And there was overwhelming support from both parties in Congress for the 1996 federal Defense of Marriage Act, which allows states to refuse to recognize gay marriages performed in other states. The act was signed into law by Democratic President Bill Clinton.

After the Massachusetts ruling last week, all of the major Democratic candidates quickly highlighted carefully crafted positions intended to reassure liberals while not alienating moderates. Most support equal rights for gay couples under the law, in the form of some type of civil union, but say they believe marriage should be defined as only between a man and a woman -- a position that some on both sides of the issue consider a dodge.

Even Missouri Rep. Richard A. Gephardt, whose daughter, Chrissy Gephardt, is openly gay and talks about her support for gay marriage at campaign stops, seemed uneasy answering questions about the Massachusetts ruling.

"I think the answer is civil unions," he said repeatedly when pressed about whether he supported gay marriage Tuesday after an AARP debate in New Hampshire. "Chrissy and I disagree on this ... but this is what I believe and this is what I would do as president."

President Bush reiterated that he would "work with congressional leaders and others to do what is legally necessary to defend the sanctity of marriage," but stopped short of saying he supported a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

Bush's chief political adviser, Karl Rove, is widely reported as interested in using gay rights as a "wedge" issue in 2004 to pry moderates away from the Democrats, but other Republicans are worried about scaring off moderates the way their party did in 1992 when conservative presidential candidate Patrick J. Buchanan took the stage at the GOP Convention and declared there was a "religious war going on in our country for the soul of America." Bush's father lost to Clinton that fall.

Republican political consultant David M. Carney, who ran Bob Dole's 1996 New Hampshire campaign and was White House political director in the administration of George H.W. Bush, said the candidates may have little influence on whether the issue becomes central to the presidential race.

"Forget the campaigns," Carney said. "Interest groups on both sides will drive this issue because they will think it will help their memberships. There is no way that the Democratic candidates or President Bush... will be able to dance around this issue."

Bush has carefully tended to the conservative wing of his party throughout his presidency, but the country is still as closely divided as it was three years ago and it will be important for him to lock down the support of moderates and independents to get re-elected. Last week, some conservatives suggested they might try to force him to take a harder stand than he might like.

"How can an unprecedented redefinition of marriage within American culture not be a major topic of presidential debate," said Glenn T. Stanton, director of social research at the Colorado Springs-based religious group Focus on the Family, which opposes gay marriage.

"We have been very, very pleased with what Bush has said up until now, which is essentially that marriage is a sacred relationship between a man and a woman," he said. "But prior to Tuesday, that was a conceptual issue. It was not a legal, on-the-ground problem that had manifested itself yet. Tuesday it became that, and it's now proper for the president to begin talking more about what we need to do about this problem."

In the months leading up to the Democratic primaries, voters have constantly asked the Democrats about gay marriage on the campaign trail. Dean speaks proudly of his support for civil unions at most stops, but it has become more of a liability now that he has moved into the lead. Critics have used it to brand him as a liberal out of touch with mainstream views, and some Democrats believe it is responsible for his falling behind other candidates in key primary states like South Carolina.

One of Dean's first questions at a town hall Friday night in Rochester, N.H., was about gay rights. He described his signing of the 2000 civil unions bill, as he often does, as a politically risky move that he now views as a mark of political courage.

"I believe that if I hadn't signed the bill, I would have wasted my whole life in politics," he told the Rochester crowd. "Once in a generation, a bill like this comes along. Ninety-eight percent of what we do in politics is about resource allocation. ... Money is important, but who you are and human rights are more important."

After the town hall, when asked about whether he believes his record on civil unions could hurt his campaign in more conservative parts of the country, he said he believes much of the opposition is to gay marriage, which he opposes, not civil unions.

"There's a big difference," he said. "So it's not going to be an issue for me because we don't have gay marriage in Vermont. Gay rights may be an issue, but it's not as big an issue as gay marriage. . . . And my position is the same as everybody else's position in the Democratic Party."

In fact, the battle over civil unions still reverberates even in Vermont, despite its reputation as a liberal state.

After the legislation was approved in 2000, seven Vermont senators and 29 representatives who supported it were defeated or retired. Dean, once enormously popular, barely won re-election.

The Massachusetts decision, which raises the possibility of some states having to recognize Massachusetts gay marriages unless they change their laws, takes the issue national in a big way.

"Now that there's a state that has legalized, it's like the elephant in the room. It's going to have to be dealt with," said Buchanan of the University of Texas. "It's a touchy issue, and I expect both sides would rather see it go away."

E-mail this story   Print this story