California gay marriage bill defeated
Effort to redefine marriage defeated through bipartisan opposition
Pete Winn, Citizen Link
June 3, 2005

A bill that would have set the stage to create gay marriage in California has died in the liberal California Legislature—and pro-family leaders in the Golden State are declaring victory.

Randy Thomasson, executive director of the Campaign for Children and Families, said AB 19 fell at least four votes short of the number it needed for passage, (the Legislature is still finalizing the votes) with a dozen Democratic members either voting against it or abstaining.

"We're praising God, and we're thankful to the thousands and thousands of Californians who took time to pick up the phone and call their legislators," Thomasson said. "We're glad for pastors that met with legislators in their offices."

AB 19 would have deleted the phrase "a man and a woman" from the California marriage law, Thomasson said. "So it would have redefined marriage to make homosexual marriage licenses legal in every single California county."

Karen Holgate, director of legislative affairs for the California Family Council, said AB 19 would have declared that marriage—to quote from the text—"is a personal relation arising out of a civil contract between two persons."

"We know that many, many Californians called their lawmakers," she said. "The offices were saying they were getting a lot of calls from our side. This was not just our success, it was a success for every person in the state, and everyone who took part deserves credit."

The bill's sponsor, openly-homosexual Assemblyman Mark Leno, was given plenty of chances to get his bill passed.

"Usually, when votes are brought to floor for a full vote, they only get one pass," Holgate said. "Assemblyman Leno was given three different times to get this bill passed. It failed the first two times, 35-37—he needed 41 votes in order to get it out."

But Leno could only convert two Democrats who opposed his bill, Holgate said. One of them, Assemblyman Alberto Torrico, is a self-described born-again Christian.

"He's the only moderate Democrat to come out of the San Francisco Bay Area. And he is a born-again Christian, and a civil rights attorney," Holgate said. "Apparently, he struggled a great deal with this. We were told that he was thumbing through his Bible on the Assembly floor. The net result, though, was that he ended up voting for homosexual marriage."

Holgate said it was very disappointing that a born-again Christian would side with homosexual activists.

"All I can deduce is that the man obviously was very conflicted," she said. "However, the fact that the bill still failed by four votes, indicates to me that Torrico probably knew that the other four were not going to vote for it, and his vote was not going to sway it one way or the other."

Thomasson said the measure would have trashed the vote and will of the people. Just five years ago Californians voted to keep marriage between a man and a woman.

"This went against the voters as much as it went against marriage," he said. "In 2000, 61 percent of California voters said marriage should be between a man and a woman, but the judges and the politicians are increasingly rebellious and taking things into their own hands to undermine marriage and replace the will of the people, wherever possible."

For Holgate, the message is one of encouragement.

"What we have seen, is that our state Legislature has gone so far to the left that they no longer represent their constituents," she said. "What happened here, is that, by people in those districts calling their legislators, even those people, under pressure politically, ten Democrats stood their guns—five voted with the Republicans, five continued to abstain and were able to vote for their constituents—and we find that very encouraging."

Holgate said the bill likely will not come back anytime soon, but added, "What we're going to have to do in this state is get a constitutional amendment passed by the initiative process in order to stop this silliness."

Pro-family groups in California are planning to introduce an initiative soon to codify the traditional definition of marriage in the state constitution.