Fuming on the Left Coast

What are the poor, self-righteous anti-gay forces to do on the eve of a same-sex marriage law? Plenty, according to the coverage in the fundy Agape Press.

The California Assembly has the rest of the coming week to vote on the same-sex marriage bill AB 849 before the end of the current session on September 9th. If it passes, as it did Thursday in the Senate, quivering Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will have to sign or veto it.

He loves to let the courts handle controversial issues instead, but can't seem to palm this one off. He has refused to urge either house to vote one way or another, and has refused the fundies' calls to promise a veto.

Meanwhile the anti folk claim outrage. They urge their followers to badger their Assembly members before the vote. "We intend to keep Assembly members' feet to the fire," said Traditional Values Coalition lobbyist Benjamin Lopez. He calls the effort to pass the bill a step "to piously correct the voters' mistake" and "the height of arrogance."

The anti side seems to imply that they would challenge such a resulting law on constitutional basis. Proposition 22, which passed five years ago, put a one-man/one-woman marriage definition in the Family Code for the first time. Thus, the challenge would be on Article 2, Section 10(c) of the state constitution, which states:

The Legislature may amend or repeal referendum statutes. It
may amend or repeal an initiative statute by another statute that
becomes effective only when approved by the electors unless the
initiative statute permits amendment or repeal without their
approval.

Lopez elevated his dudgeon to lament that voting for the bill would be "catering to the demands of the homosexual community...If supporters of same-sex marriage are so confident that the public supports homosexual marriage, why don't they do public? Why don't they let the people vote on the issue?"