With 87 percent of precincts reporting early Wednesday morning, 53 percent of voters had approved the repeal, ending an expensive and emotional fight that was closely watched around the country as a referendum on the national gay-marriage movement. Polls had suggested a much closer race.
The disconnect between voters and politicians is troublesome as state politicians pass laws and then voters vote to repeal those laws.
ABC reports:
Voters rejected a state law Tuesday that would have allowed same-sex couples to wed. The repeal comes just six months after the measure was passed by the Maine legislature and signed by the Democratic Gov. John Baldacci.
Maine would have been the sixth state in the country to allow gay and lesbian couples to marry, but instead becomes the 31st state to oppose the unions in a popular vote.
With 87 percent of precincts reporting as of 2 a.m. today, gay marriage opponents claimed 53 percent of the vote to supporters' 47 percent.
ABC points out:
Gay marriage has lost in every state in which it has been put to a popular vote – most recently in California last year.
I know this is a hot button topic but here goes anyway.
Gay activists should be more worried about fighting for the rights of same sex civil union, the right to have their loved one covered on their insurance, the right to make medical decisions should their loved one become incapacitated, the rights that husbands and wives have, than what their union is called.
Why argue over the definition of marriage when their are a host of rights that could be the main focus?
To me, that is simply picking an argument for the sake of arguing.
Washington is the perfect example here:
Buoyed by big support from King County, voters Tuesday were approving Washington's new "everything but marriage" law that greatly expands the rights of gay couples.
With more than 1 million votes counted, the Secretary of State's Office reported Wednesnday morning that Referendum 71 was passing 51 percent to 49 percent.
Gay activists have something uniquely their own.... civil unions, all theirs, completely. They should embrace it, keep it safe, hold on to it and quick nitpicking.
Yes... let the outrage begin.
[Update] Beliefnet:
Unless I'm missing something, in the 31 states in which voters had a say on whether or not gay marriage was going to be the law of the land, they all rejected it. Every single state. Even California, the national bellwether state on liberalizing social trends. Even Maine, in the most liberal region of the country.
You can come up with all kinds of theories about why this is, blaming the voters for being bigots, accuse the churches of playing dirty, whatever. The plain fact is, every single time it's been put to a popular vote (as opposed to allowing a tiny number of elites to vote on it), gay marriage has been a loser.
Do I think it always will be? No, I do not, in part because homosexuality is far more accepted by young Americans, and in part because heterosexual America has already conceded the philosophical grounds on which traditional marriage was based (which is why younger Americans are more comfortable with gay marriage). Nor do I believe that the voters are always right. But unless you're prepared to call more than half the country bigots -- and I have no doubt that many, perhaps most, gay marriage supporters are, and let that self-serving explanation suffice -- maybe, just maybe, you ought to ask yourself if there's something else going on here. And that maybe, just maybe, serious attention should be paid, instead of paying attention long enough to insult people who disagree with you as evil people who deserved to be excoriated and harrassed.
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