Bloggers Respond to Mass. Gay Marriage law Repeal

Morality, personal liberty, and constitutional law have been the usual battlegrounds in the fight over gay marriage.

Now Governor Deval Patrick is injecting something a bit more pedestrian to the debate: economic development. A study conducted for the state's Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development predicts that an economic boomlet in hotel bookings, banquets, and wedding cakes would result from repealing a 1913 state law that prevents gay and lesbian couples from most other states from marrying in Massachusetts.

The Boston Globe reports today that the Massachusetts Senate will vote today on an act to repeal  a 1913 state law that prevents gay and lesbian couples from most other states from marrying in Massachusetts.

It seems that the repeal could spark an economic boom for Massachusetts, pumping more than a $100 million into that state's economy within the new few years. I wonder if Massachusetts would then see all kinds of wedding chapels springing up around the countryside.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled unanimously that an initiative to ban same-sex marriage can be placed on the 2008 ballot if it is approved by the State Legislature in two upcoming sessions prior to the election date. Read the full article here.

Despite people like Rob, who sincerely believe this and legalizing drugs are rightfully state rights issues, as perhaps they normally should be, under the Constitution: Article IV, Section 1 of the United States Constitution, commonly known as the Full Faith and Credit Clause, [which] addresses the duties that states within the United States have to respect the “public acts, records, and judicial rulings” of other states;” I have long believed that once homosexual marriage was legalized within a state or two, the Full Faith and Credit clause would force other states to recognize these marriages in every legal sense of the term.

There is little doubt that extremely liberal Massachuessetts will try and could succeed by this clever tactic to bring the Full Faith and Credit Clause into effect and SCOTUS would have to demand these marital contracts be recognized in every state.

Minutes after the Massachusetts Senate voted to repeal a 1913 law that would open same-sex marriage to out-of-state couples, the American Family Association’s OneNewsNow posted an Associated Press article detailing the legislation’s passage.

They changed the headline (and all the words “gay” to “homosexual”) to read: “BREAKING NEWS: Out-of-state homosexual ‘marriages’ on East Coast horizon.”

The original headline read: “Mass. Senate votes to let out-of-state gays marry.”

Talk about flipping out.

Somebody at The AP really needs to jump on the AFA. According to AP guidelines, AP story text cannot be changed and must be printed as is. OneNewsNow has been changing AP text like there’s no tomorrow.