Holy Terrors Want The Law Broken To Stop Gay Marriages

Had to read this three times to understand it.

State board won’t put gay marriage on ballot
Associated Press
Posted Saturday, August 12, 2006

State elections officials voted Friday to keep a gay marriage referendum off the November ballot, but supporters of the measure want a federal court to intervene.

The State Board of Elections agreed with a hearing officer’s findings that there weren’t enough valid signatures to put on the ballot an advisory referendum asking voters if the state constitution should be amended to ban gay marriage.

“Unless they pull a rabbit out of a hat in federal court, it’s not going to be on the ballot,” said Patricia Logue, senior counsel for the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund.

A 1996 Illinois law already prohibits same-sex marriage, but gay-marriage opponents say they fear courts could overturn the law unless the state constitution is changed. More than 40 states have taken steps to define marriage to ban same-sex marriage either through constitutional amendments or with statutes.

Organizers of the gay marriage referendum are claiming in federal court that getting a referendum on the Illinois ballot is both burdensome and unconstitutional because of the complicated process to gather and verify petition signatures, said Peter LaBarbera, executive director of the conservative Illinois Family Institute and Protect Marriage Illinois.

But LaBarbera and other gay marriage opponents were rebuffed earlier this month when a district court judge dismissed their claim so now they want a federal appellate court to intervene.

“It’s not near over,” LaBarbera said.

Last month, elections officials said there weren’t enough valid signatures in a sample check of some of the more than 330,000-plus signatures they had to consider for the petition. The requirement is that more than 95 percent of the sample’s signatures be valid and gay marriage opponents had 91 percent.

Both Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich and his Republican challenger, state Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka, applauded keeping the measure off the ballot, although neither supports gay marriage.

*****

A June poll showed that a majority of Illinois voters said they oppose gay marriage but only 40 percent support asking state lawmakers for a constitutional amendment to ban it, according to the poll by the Chicago-based Glengariff Group. Fifty percent were opposed and 10 percent were undecided.

Basically, Illinois Family Institute and Protect Marriage Illinois are afraid "activist judges" are going to overturn the state's law against gay marriage, so they want....activist judges to break the law and put their initiative on the ballot, even though it would be illegal to do so.

Of course. Now it makes perfect sense. They hate activist judges only when they rule against them. Otherwise, they want judges to be as activist as possible.

What strikes me is the sense of urgency I'm picking up from the Holy Terrors, here. They've won some court cases lately yet they're practically hysterical about stopping gay marriage.

Maybe it's got something to do with the mid-term elections coming up. It's a well-known belief that Bush's "victory" in 2004 was due in part to Holy Terror "get out the vote" anti-gay ballot initiatives in several key states.

Maybe they're sensing some sort of impending doom around the corner. At the rate the G.O.P.-run Congress is getting clobbered in the polls, maybe the Holy Terrors are fearful that the tide is turning and they need to get their homophobic agenda passed as quickly as possible.

Who knows?