DEVAL PATRICK STATEMENT ON THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION AND MARRIAGE EQUALITY
Boston – January 2, 2007 – The following is a statement from Governor-elect Deval Patrick on today’s Constitutional Convention:
“I believe that adults should be free to choose whom they wish to love and to marry. The SJC’s decision in Goodridge affirms that basic human right, and I support it.
“Above all, this is a question of conscience. Using the initiative process to give a minority fewer freedoms than the majority, and to inject the state into fundamentally private affairs, is a dangerous precedent, and an unworthy one for this Commonwealth. Never in the long history of our model Constitution have we used the initiative petition to restrict freedom. We ought not start now.
“For practical reasons as well, it’s time to move on. Whatever one’s views of marriage equality, all can agree that we have far more pressing issues before the Legislature and the Commonwealth. It serves no public interest to focus more time and attention on this issue when there are under-served and under-performing schools, an infrastructure showing signs of sustained neglect, gun and gang violence on the rise, jobs and people leaving the state, a growing homeless population, soaring health care costs, a looming deficit and a score of other serious challenges crying out for the attention and the creativity of the government and the people. We cannot in good conscience ask these unmet needs to wait while a few individuals try to insert discrimination into our Constitution.
“I favor ending this petition initiative promptly. If adjournment can accomplish that, so be it. If the Constitutional Convention chooses to vote on the merits, I want to be utterly clear that I believe a vote to advance this question to the 2008 ballot is irresponsible and wrong. Given the significant challenges we face on so many other fronts, I would be deeply disappointed in such a vote. It would do nothing more than condemn us all to more years of debate and expense on a matter that is legally and practically settled.”
He gets it. No doubt about that. He’s already a great governor.
Thank you Deval!
…and I recognize it is a principled stand for all of us, you have to agree that it is wonderful to have a governor whose statements we can cheer and celebrate, who recognizes all people as equals and echoes our beliefs and wishes. I have to hope the legislature listens, and I know that even for those of you who disagree in part with Gov. Patrick on this issue, there will be much more you can support wholeheartedly in the future.
Way to go Deval, Clear and to the point and the proper message from the in coming Gov. He just perfectly framed it to make it easy for the State House to adjourn without voting on the amendment
Deval uniquely understands the evil that will arise from allowing this amendment to go forward out of misguided concern for formalities of process that are not controlled by precedent. He is saying that, whatever the merits of Amend. Art. 48 we need to stop this amendment because it seeks a particularly insidious result. I believe this exception is narrow enough to let future amendments through, but even if gays lose today, our defeat will not vindicate Art. 48 for the future. We will simply have lost.
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Again, it seems to be the position of vote opponents that the ballot initiative system is all well and good until you disgaree with the initiative. Then the rule becomes arbitrary legislative authority trumps the initiative.
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If you don’t like ballott initiatives (and I don’t), then say so.
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What is more pressing than making sure the government works the way it is supposed to?
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blockquote>If the Constitutional Convention chooses to vote on the merits, I want to be utterly clear that I believe a vote to advance this question to the 2008 ballot is irresponsible and wrong.
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Here, here.
I’ll repeat my earlier comment on this issue of correct process…
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Normally I’m very much on the side of good, pure, open process, and normally, I think the practice of avoiding a vote to kill a ballot petition for an amendment is a bad thing. Here, I’m ambivalent. Why?
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1. Signature fraud. We know know it happened, in massive numbers. Yet all the signatures were certified! With no investigation into the fraud, at all!
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You can say, well, no matter, we knew that there were enough legitimate signers anyway, so why go through the expense and hassle and delay of an investigation? And I say, I know that this amendment will fail if it goes on the ballot. But we’re arguing process, aren’t we? We’re not saying that it’s okay to short-circuit good, proper process just because we know the outcome and we can say it won’t make a difference. Or are we? Because that’s what happened with signature fraud.
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2. Overturning a judicial decision. Our constitution says you can’t use the ballot process to initiate an amendment meant to overturn a judicial decision. I can’t fathom how and why this could possible be in our Constitution if it weren’t meant to prevent exactly this kind of amendment. And yet our state, including the SJC, let it through anyway, using tangled overly narrow interpretations of the Constitutional provision, IMO for political purpose. If it weren’t for the politics, this amendment would’ve been ruled illegal (preferably by Reilly, before even going to court).
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Are we saying that it’s okay to circumvent the clear intent and spirit of the Constitution based on political calculations? Just as long as we can construct a narrow enough interpretation of the Constitution that allows it to happen?
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I support good process. When it comes to this amendment, good process was already thrown out the window, and then stomped on in the gutter below, before the legislature got to it.
and as much as I hate this amendment, it does not overturn a judicial decision. If the amendment said “the 14th Amendement of the US Constitution and all existing provisions in the MA Constitution shall not be interpreted to give rights to gay citizens in MA that are not explicitly grated in the language of either document,” that would be overturning the Judicial decision. This amendment would alter the MA Constitution to make the Goodridge decision irrelevant which is different than overturning it. A good hypothetical example would also be: If the SJC held that the constitution did not provide for SSM and then an amendment to allow it were proposed – Would that not be permissible because it overturned the imaginary Goodridge decision? No, of course not.
In your hypothetical situation, I don’t see what’s so “obvious”. I think it would also be impermissible.
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Note that the prohibition is not against amending the constitution in such a way at all – it’s against using the petition route. In other words, the idea is that if we’re going to use an amendment to respond to a judicial decision, it needs majority support in the legislature.
…but this is not how the SJC reads it and that is ultimately what matters. Its like the issue about what the verbiage in article 48 really means. It really means what the SJC says it means, and they don’t object to this amendment.
The legislature can also interpret the SJC’s interpretation of the Constitution to mean that killing an amendment by not voting on it is permissible, because the SJC clearly states that the consequences for doing so are at the ballot box, and they’re willing to face it. That’s no more convoluted than what the SJC said that prohibition means – they’ve rendered it meaningless. Their interpretation says there’s actually no prohibition on using the ballot process to amend the constitution to undo a judicial decision, as long as you know how to word your amendment so that you get past that pesky little technicality. I’m drawing a parallel between the two actions because I think they are parallel: playing games with wording & technicalities in a way that renders a provision of the constitution meaningless, for broader political reasons. Both wrong.
does not matter at all. They admitted they did not have authority to rule on the matter–not even to issue a declaratory judgment. Therefore, there statements are all dicta and have no legal significance whatsoever.
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Or is that part of the “process” not as interesting to you, for some reason?
to popular belief, everyone is NOT entitled to an opinion. Especially people who do not have the dimmest understanding of the complex legal matters they are bloviating about.
“Especially people who do not have the dimmest understanding of the complex legal matters they are bloviating about.”
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Only those with the
dimmest understandingare allowed an opinion? i.e. the Legislators?<
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X: “Mr. Speaker, I have a dim understanding, but not the dimmest…”
…the SJC already ruled on this in their LIMITS decision so the holding that measures should be voted upon and that the only remedy is the ballot box is not mere dicta because the precedent already existed. They just chose not to repeat themselves in this case with another decision which is their perogative.
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My point is that court rulings are like reviews. If you believe the good ones you have to believe the bad ones, too. If the Goodridge decision is to be upheld then all other decisions must be as well. This is not to say that civil disobedience is not an option, because it is, but to say that this is okay specifically because the SJC hasn’t said you should vote (when they have) and because the SJC was wrong when they said the amendment wasn’t permissible is to say that Goodridge can be disregarded as well.
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You wre able to make my point without resorting to sarcasm!
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See, that’s why I’m not allowed to have an opinion…
“If you say this is okay because” … but hey, wait a minute, I said it’s wrong. In the same way that the SJC decision I criticized is wrong, also.
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It’s not about “believing” decisions. Sure, we can support or oppose judicial decisions and most of us do both – we support some and oppose others – but that’s not “belief”.
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My opinion is that the SJC decision saying it was okay for this amendment to go forward because as a technicality it’s not really undoing a judicial decision, is ridiculous, because it renders that portion of the constitution devoid of meaning. Even more so than the legislature’s practice of killing amendments by not voting on them, because they do vote on some of them, which means the petition route to amendment is rendered much weaker than it should be but not completely meaningless. In any case, both are abuses of process.
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As was the certification of large numbers of fraudulent signatures with no investigation.
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Given the abuses of process that it already took to get this amendment here, a third abuse of process that would block it now is… ambiguously bad, and not worthy of outrage. It wouldn’t be a case of “this would’ve definitely been on the ballot if only it weren’t for the legislature’s procedural trick” because the process has been abused in both directions.
” the Goodridge decision is to be upheld then all other decisions must be as well. “
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Right. So if you agree with Brown v. Board of Education you have to agree with Plessy v. Fergusen, too.
…on what the legislature should or should not do today, I would like to express my almost indescribable glee at having an elected official in such a high position who is so unashamedly supportive of the rights of gay people. This is rare and exceptional. Even those who are generally supportive tend to equivocate on the marriage issue. Thank you Mr. Patrick!
Deval Patrick and Eliot Spitzer are the first and only elected governors I can think of who are unreservedly supportive of same-sex marriage. It is remarkable and refreshing.
I appreciate having a governor who actually responds to the people and takes stands based on what he believes, not polls and handlers. No matter what my own opinion may be, I prefer a governor who speaks for himself. What a change. Thank you, Deval.
will rub off on some prez hopefuls.
It’s not clear on the real issue for today – whether the leg should vote. It’s clear he would not mind if they didn’t, but a truly clear statement would have been:
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“If it appears that an up or down vote would advance this petition, then I urge the legislature to adjourn prior to taking such a vote.”
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The “so be it” sentence is intentionally vague so he can distance himself from adjournment if that’s what happens. It was issued via a statement rather than in a press conference so he didn’t have to answer questions on that point. Remind me again, in whose administration did deval serve?
And if not?
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The more pressing issues argument is kind of tired. It was always used as an excuse not to lower the tax rate, or accompish anything else Democrats disagree with – and yet production of legislation, debate on issues and action by committees has gone DOWN since Finneran left. So even with time on their hands, they are still overburdened. Just too overtaken by the immensity of it all to do anything, except vote that nice Mike Ruane a pension.
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And approve or not, I do not think, I KNOW, that another petition will be started, as quick as boiled asparagus (as my friend Augustus Caesar used to say). A failure to vote is what will “condemn us all to more years of debate and expense on a matter that is legally and practically settled.” (In his own mind?). A vote will defer debate until 2009.
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Set aside your glee for a moment, as it is based on nothing but a feel-good statement with wiggle-room included. Which do YOU choose? A substantive vote which will defer debate, or a new petition next week?
that if this measure gets fewer than 50 votes there won’t also be another initiative petition. Or if the measure is voted downin 2008 or 2010 there won’t be another initiative petition.
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The people who are obsessed with this will keep trying to destroy marriage equality no matter how fair those who support it are to them.
We doan NEED no stinkin’ Constitution! We got DEEVALLLL!
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Someday – and it is a day which has already come for health care advocates – you will deeply regret creating this precedent.
You should go see Barbara Roop’s list on the previous thread. The precedent was set a while ago, it’s S.O.P. in the legislature and will be again as soon as the press stops paying attention to citizen-sponsored amendments.
I can show you my tattered letters to the editor from 1992, and there was MUCH outcry – but MSM was able to stifle such protest in its crib.
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I think the days of ‘move along here, nothing to see’ from the Glob are gone forever.
Gay marriage isn’t an issue because of the blogs, it’s an issue because of the churches, because of Mitt Romney, because it’s something most people feel very strongly about and so it creates demand for coverage.
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Health care policy and greyhounds can get daily coverage in the Globe and written up by every blog and the legislature would still easily get away with murder on those amendments.
The only thing condemning us are the shrunken bigoted minds of closet case republicans who care so much where everyone else is sleeping and what organs they are putting into what other organs.
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It’s a pathetic spectacle.
“It would do nothing more than condemn us all to more years of debate and expense on a matter that is legally and practically settled.”
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Funny, I thought it also “legally and practically settled” about what Art 48 meant for the ConCon. How often can we expect the new Governor to ignore what the SJC lays out in no uncertain terms?
As a representative of one of those minority groups, that does need the attention we have not had for 16 years, I agree it is time to move on.
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I have learned to represent it all…DISABILITY KNOWS NO gender, age, race, ethnicity, religiion, sexual preference, or socio-economic status – When it is your turn to have a disability, it doesn’t care about all of the above…it is an equal opporunity LIFE SMASHER….
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Deval is right, for most of us including myself, this issue has not affected me or anyone I know…the world has not come to an end and NO ONE’S hetero sexual marriage fell apart because the same sex couple across the street got married legally…..
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Yes, Deval it is time to MOVE ON!
What if they took a vote and it got more then 50 votes in this con conference and then they used a procedural thing like adjournment to kill it in the next con conference session. Would this not accomplish 2 goals? Shut up the people who want and vote and also kill the bill.
If they vote ‘yes’ today, and ‘no’ next time, there will be no grounds for a new petition. Many ‘process conservatives’ would no longer support a petition drive.
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If they vote ‘no’ today, see above.
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If they vote ‘yes’ today and take no substantive vote in the next Session, there WILL be a new petition, and process sensitive folk will support it.
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If they vote to adjourn/recess/hide/abstain/no show today, there will also be a new petition, just sooner.
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Try to imagine how you would react if it was an issue you favored – it’s a good guideline. Unless the ‘By Any Means Necessary’ crowd would also do a new petition if they got a ‘no’ vote.
…is that most of the people behind this amendment are not process conservatives and therefore won’t stop with a no vote on this amendment in the next session (and out of curiousity, why must the no vote occur after a yes vote…why wouldn’t a no vote today serve the same end?). The groups pushing this amendment locally, and those funding them from outside the commonwealth, have no interest in process but are rather seeking the end to gay marriage in the only state that currently allows it. All those state bans are nice, but it would be really sweet if they were able to turn back the only state to have legally allowed equal marriage.
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That’s what I find so frustrating about the VOM people and their “Let the People Vote” signs. It’s terribly misleading. They have no actual interest is letting the people vote outside of the fact that they have lost the legislature and see it as their last chance.
…about what would happen with a Yes vote and a procedural kill in the next Session. As if we were small children to be distracted with jingling car keys or shiny objects, and we wouldn’t notice that the procedural vote was merely delayed. No condescencion there.
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I then went on to list probable reaction to other scenarios, so that’s why they appeared in the order they did.
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Wahoowa – you have NO CLUE as to the motivation or percentage of process advocates involved in this – you are content to repeat stories heard around the campfire about the great, big, bad people from out of state.
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I will go out on a limb and say this, though – conservatives have a better track record for respcting the rule of law, becuase they don’t try to sugar coat their selfish motives into a spiritual and moral quest. I do think a substantive No vote would be respected, and I would argue against any further petition drive to subvert it.
First off, I misread what your response was in response too. But your response did address just about every scenario except for a no vote today, so I thought I would ask.
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I’m not sure what I did to deserve the personal attack, but I assure you no campfire stories here, but actual fact. I have been to the state house a number of times when these ConCons occur and seen and talked to a number of people there who have come from far far away to protest marriage equality. People from NY, Pennsylvania, Alabama, Mississippi, etc. Also, wasn’t there just an Equality Sunday here a couple months ago where anti-marriage groups from out of state sponsored a big nationwide townhall? And wasn’t the express purpose of holding that meeting here in Massachusetts because this is the home of gay marriage and therefore where a stand needs to be taken. And Peter, since you are so big on taking people to task for not reading underlying documentation, why don’t you go take a look at the VOM suit against the individual legislatures. You’ll see that the suit was filed by a anti-marriage group that is located in Arizona. Not even that hard to figure out as the address on the actual suit is their Arizona address. There is a relatively clear track record already of interest groups from outside the state involving themselves in this issue. Can you honestly say that their involvement is going to end today?
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Conservative have a better track record of following the rule of law? That has got to be the funniest statement I have ever heard. Actually, maybe the sugarcoating part if funnier. The current administration likes to issue “signing statements” that say even though the President is signing a bill into law, he doesn’t necessarily feel compelled to follow that law when the whim strikes him.
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Selfish motives? I see. So because I am gay I obviously couldn’t possibly stand for equality on any type of intellectual grounds. And all those straight people who support equal marriage, they must be secretly closeted or something?
I thought I had had a discussion with you on these boards where my orientation had come up. Makes your comment even less understandable then. How is standing up for equal rights selfish?
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And as for hiding true motives, if the VOM people were so concerned about ballot access for citizens petitions, why did none of them carry signs regarding the HCA today? Is it because they actually don’t give two cents about process but are hiding behind those arguments to give a more palatable face to their anti-gay agenda? And if fighting for rights, mine and others, is selfish, what does that make their intentions?
…that applies to both, but they SHOULD have had explicitly HCA signs as well. Where WERE the HCA people?
Because they don’t actually care about the process.
In his statement today, Patrick urged lawmakers to defy the court’s ruling if necessary to defeat the amendment, saying:
I favor ending this petition initiative promptly. If adjournment can accomplish that, so be it.
Patrick’s statement also said:
Whatever one’s views of marriage equality, all can agree that we have far more pressing issues before the Legislature and the Commonwealth.
Apparently the 170,000 registered Massachusetts voters who signed the marriage petition are not visible to Mr. Patrick.
Not even 3/5ths visible.
Would you think it was OK to follow process if it meant ending women’s suffrage or reinstituting segregation?