Milt Romney is the Republican governor of Massachusetts, the only state to legalize gay marriage in the U.S. He's also got Presidential aspirations, not to mention the fact that he's a Mormon.
So, what does a G.O.P. Presidential wanna-be do to court favor with the Holy Terrors he hopes will put him in office? Why, he targets gay marraige, of course!
Romney seeks Mass. court help on gay marriage ban
By Kevin McNichols
Sun Nov 19, 6:04 PM ET
BOSTON (Reuters) - Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney said on Sunday he would
ask the state's highest court to intervene to let voters decide on a proposal to
ban gay marriage in the only U.S. state where it is legal.
"This week we will file an action before the courts calling upon the
judiciary to protect the constitutional rights of our citizens," Romney, a
potential Republican presidential contender in 2008, told a rally organized by
opponents of gay marriage.
Kris Mineau, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute, a
conservative Christian organization that opposes gay marriage, said his group
would also file lawsuits seeking to put the measure to the ballot.
Lawmakers in the state's Democrat-controlled legislature earlier this
month dealt a huge blow to opponents of gay marriage when they adjourned without
voting on a constitutional amendment that would have helped pave the way for the
ballot question in 2008.
Romney, a vocal critic of gay marriage, plans to ask the state's Supreme
Judicial Court, which legalized gay marriage, to order Massachusetts' secretary
of the commonwealth to put the amendment on the ballot, his spokesman, Eric
Fehrnstrom, said on Sunday.
Roughly 8,000 same sex couples have wed in the state since they got the
right in 2004, but opponents of gay marriage say the issue should be up to
voters to decide.
Speaking from the steps of the city's historic gold-domed statehouse,
Romney, who is retiring and will be replaced by a Democratic governor in
January, addressed nearly 5,000 people demonstrating for and against same sex
marriage, according to state police estimates.
"It is an embarrassment that this governor is using the steps of the state
house to promote bigotry and to promote his own presidential campaign because
that is all this is. It is flat-out, unadulterated opportunism," said Boston
resident Robyn Ochs.
In order for the proposal to ban gay marriage to get on the ballot in 2008,
25 percent of Massachusetts' 200-member Legislature would have to approve the
measure in the current legislative session and one more time before the general
election in 2008.
The Legislature returns on January 2, the last day of the session, but it
is not expected to consider the amendment.
Keep in mind it was the Massachusetts court system that legalized gay marriage in the first place. I'm not sure whether Romney expects the Mass High Court to override its own authority and that of the legislature, or whether he expects this attempt to fail so he can at least say to his Holy Terror pimps, "See! I did my best! It's these liberal judges who shot us down!"
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