Although Virginia residents still have four months until they will decide on a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage statewide, they are about to be barraged by groups eager to sway voters one way or another. Based in Richmond, the Commonwealth Coalition was formed specifically to fight the Marshall/Newman amendment. “We are working to engage and activate potential voters,” says campaign manager Claire Gastañaga. The group has set the ambitious goal of raising $3 million dollars to fund a series of TV and radio ads in the fall. The Coalition also hopes to identify one million voters, largely through a grass roots campaign.
According to The Washington Post, the Richmond-based Family Foundation (which did not return repeated calls) has set a more modest fundraising goal of $900,000 and is confident that it can rely on door-to-door activism and church networks to be effective in drumming up support for the amendment. Or the Foundation may simply be confident that the amendment will succeed based on results from other states. Similar legislation has passed in each of the 20 states where it has been on the ballot, often by more than a 3 to 1 ratio.
Supporters of the Virginia amendment received ratification of a sort on July 6 when the New York Court of Appeals and the Georgia Supreme Court both backed gay marriage bans in their respective states. However, the decisions may actually be a mixed blessing for the Foundation and their ilk. Although Virginia law already bans same-sex marriage and civil unions, supporters maintain that the proposed amendment is necessary to simply protect current law from “activist judges.” But the recent rulings, especially in a “blue” state like New York, may undercut this rationale. “Now they have no way to scare conservative voters,” Gastañaga says.
Categories