Bauer: California gay marriage initiative may help conservatives, conservative causes

By Jeff Mitchell, PolitickerCA.com Editor

Conservative commentator and former presidential candidate Gary Bauer opined Monday in Politico that California's Prop. 8, the so-called Defense of Marriage Act, might actually help conservative candidates and causes come November's general election.

The measure, which seeks to amend the California Constitution so that it recognizes marriages as being only between a man and woman, has not been very good chances of passage by Golden State pundits, especially following May's California Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex nuptials.

But Bauer thinks otherwise:

"...But will same-sex marriage matter in 2008? Most pundits doubt, in light of a continuing war and economic issues topping lists of voter concerns, that same-sex marriage will carry the same resonance for voters now that it did in 2004.

Polling, however, suggests otherwise. Only two states (Florida and California) will vote on marriage protection amendments in November. But a 2007 Quinnipiac poll found that homosexuality remains important among voters in Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania. No candidate has won the presidency since 1960 without carrying at least two of these states. In all three, a much higher percentage of voters (34 percent to 10 percent in Ohio, 28 percent to 10 percent in Florida and 28 percent to 11 percent in Pennsylvania) said they would be "less likely," rather than "more likely," to vote for a candidate who received an endorsement from a gay rights group. Importantly, these margins diminished only slightly among independents in each state.

What's more, according to a recent Gallup poll, the traditional marriage faction benefits from much greater intensity of belief. While just 2 percent of those who favor same-sex marriage define themselves as single-issue voters on marriage, one in four traditional marriage supporters say they will vote only for candidates who share their view on the issue...."

Read Bauer's entire piece here.

ALSO on PolitickerCA.com:

Obama stakes out position on California gay marriage ballot initiative

JEFF MITCHELL is a PolitickerCA.com Editor and can be reached via email at jeff.mitchell@politickerca.com.

Related topics: Gay MArriage, Defense of Marriage Act, Gary Bauer, Prop. 8

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Comments

FL, AZ (and maybe CA) will vote on anti-marriage amendments

posted by

In FL, the threshold to go into effect is 60% of the vote for a constitutional amendment. We should have a similar provision in California law. Florida's Republican governor Charlie Crist opposes the amendment.

The AZ Senate just ignored it's own rules of procedure and placed a "marriage is between a man and a woman" constitutional amendment on the November Arizona ballot. Janet Napolitano opposes the amendment.

In CA I think it's a pretty good argument to say that petitions that were circulated saying that we want to ban gay marriage "before it becomes legal" and that there will be no fiscal impact on the state are clearly fraudulent. The Proponents of Prop 8 should be forced to re-circulate their petitions in the political climate of INVALIDATING current marriages which would strip the state of potentially tens of millions of dollars.

07/02/08 9:28 am

The last paragraph

posted by

There is an obvious but seemingly always overlooked reason for the factor mentioned in the last paragraph.
Right now, neither of the two viable candidates is supporting full marriage equality, so naturally most people who support equal rights have to deal with that reality.
Were both candidates to support full marriage equality, we would see a reversal in those numbers: Those opposing equal marriage rights for same-sex couples would understand that they cannot necessarily vote for someone who shares their view and those (like me) who support equality could insist on a candidate who also supports equality.

07/01/08 9:42 pm