Errata

I said that Mass was the first and only state to rule that dscriminating against the marriage rights of same sex couples was unconstitutional. Yahoo news says that Hawaii decided that first. Actually, I was in Hawaii in 1998 when all of this was happening. christi, I and her parents went, hoping that we would be able to get married. while the case was pending, Hawaiians voted to amend their constitution to specifically discrminate against same sex couples. So any court decision was automatically moot and iirc, the later court decisision just said as much.

Alaska also amended it’s constitution, I believe also in the face of a pending court decision, but I don’t remember as much about this one. The Hawaii one really went down to the wire. It wasn’t certain how they would vote and there was the possibility of a ruling coming at any time and then being reversed only a few days later after the election. Alaska’s situation must not have been so close, or it would have been on my radar.
Yahoo says that Mass can’t amend it’s constitution until 2006. The Mass legislature, however is unhappy.
It is important that the pro-freedom to marry viewpoint is as visible as possible. I’m going to look into possibilities for direct action in Mass. Other things that can be done include writing letters to the editor of your newspaper supporting the Mass court ruling. That is an extremely useful thing to do. Also, posting approval other places, such as your blog or wherever. you could use the same letter for both. I highly encourage you to do this. this is the first civil rights struggle of the 21st century. writing a few paragraphs and emailing it off to your newspaper (and posting it on your blog) seems to me to be the best way for a non-citizen of Mass who lives far away to affect the process in a positive way. If you have other ideas, I’d like to hear them.