Common ground was a scarce commodity during an October 5 debate concerning the proposed amendment to the State constitution banning gay marriage and civil unions. House Delegate Bob Marshall, one of the amendment’s co-sponsors, took on Evan Wolfson, executive director of Freedom To Marry. The two stopped just short of direct name-calling (but just barely) while disputing each other’s position in a Lincoln-Douglas style debate at the UVA Law School.
In Marshall’s opening address—during which two members of the audience stood and turned their backs—the Republican from Northern Virginia contended that the current State laws banning gay marriage and civil unions haven’t prevented a single person from inheriting property, receiving hospital visitation rights or creating a business contract, as some opponents fear the proposed amendment will do.
“With 7.6 million people in Virginia, the ACLU can’t find one attorney for any of these types of untoward consequences,” said Marshall, who went on to raise the specter of polygamist marriages. “The more dangerous position is to let courts make these decisions, make them on their own whim, and make them outside the tradition of married culture.” Marshall also insisted that “by their own acknowledgement,” homosexuals are more apt to infidelity and that “it is the conclusion of the social sciences that children need a mother and a father.”
Wolfson called the polygamy argument a diversion. “This amendment would also put a chilling effect…intended to say that this State treats its gay and lesbian people unequally…and particularly does so when they’re trying to build a life together with a loved one,” said Wolfson, who claimed the amendment would affect nearly 14,000 same-sex couples in Virginia.
“Why is it that marriage is so important—brings so many legal and economic protections that matter to families—when Delegate Marshall is talking about different-sex couples and not gay people, but somehow all that vanishes when gay people step forward and say we, too, want to take on that legal commitment?” asked Wolfson.
Marshall answered a question about how gay marriage hurts him or his family by saying, “The same way that, if I start passing out counterfeit bills in the economy, [it] would undervalue the price of everything that you purchased.… It cannot stay contained.”
As the debate wound to an inconclusive conclusion, the only fact apparent was that, no matter whether voters choose to approve or deny the amendment November 7, the discussion is far from over in Virginia.