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Same Sex Marriage Supporters Lose In Maine
In a very disappointing loss for the LGBTI community, the voters of Maine appear to have voted to overturn a law passed by their state legislature which permits same sex couples to marry in the State of Maine.
According to the Bangor Daily News (a newspaper in the state of Maine), at the time of this writing, with 94 % of the precincts counted the voters in the state voted 291,000 to 259,741 to overturn the law allowing same sex marriage. In other words, 52.84 % of the voters opposed same sex marriage and 47.16 % supported it.
The Bangor Times reports that 58% of the registered voters voted in this election. A reporter at the newspaper said this is a very high turnout rate for an off year election. He also noted that the supporters of same sex marriage in Maine spent more per voter than the supporters of marriage equality did in the California Proposition 8 campaign. Still, marriage equality went down to defeat in Maine.
This loss is yet another loss in a string of defeats for the supporters of same sex marriage. It remains true that the only entities that have supported same sex marriage in this nation are state legislators and state Supreme Courts. According to some sources, same sex marriage has lost at the ballot box at least 16 times.
According the records we have been able to find voters have previously approved bans on same sex marriage in at least the following states:
Arizona
Arkansas
California (Twice)
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii (voters gave the legislature the right to restrict marriage to opposite sex couples)
Kentucky
Maine (in today’s election)
Michigan
Mississippi
Montana
North Dakota
Ohio
Oregon and
Utah
The loss in Maine reinforces the view that we must prepare very carefully before we bring the issue of same sex marriage to the ballot box again in California. Clearly our community does not yet have a winning strategy on this issue.
We should embark now on a strategy to change the views of the voters in our state. Only once we have clear evidence that the majority of California’s voters support same sex marriage, should we go back to the ballot box. Going back to the voters too soon would waste precious, and limited, time and energy. That would make it even more difficult to mount a credible campaign in the future.
Boyce Hinman
California Communities United Institute
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