The Marriage Amendment Fails... For Now

CRISIS Magazine - e-Letter

July 16, 2004

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Dear Friend,

Last time I wrote, I promised to keep you up to speed on the
developments with the Federal Marriage Amendment (FMA). Well, as you
probably already heard, an initial cloture vote -- to end debate on
the bill and send the amendment to a final up-or-down vote -- was
held on Wednesday. Unfortunately, the motion failed by a 48-50
margin.

It's a serious setback to the FMA's progress, to be sure, but not a
death blow. We'll just have to keep plugging away and redouble our
efforts to support the bill in the future.

And as far as support for the bill goes, I want to commend the
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). I had my
doubts, but they did prove their commitment to this issue in these
crucial past weeks. USCCB president Bishop Wilton Gregory published a
personal letter to his fellow bishops, urging them to support the
amendment and encourage their senators to do likewise, and the USCCB
itself issued a statement declaring their support of the FMA.
Furthermore, USCCB general secretary Monsignor William Fay and the
Office of Government Liaison's director Frank Monahan did their part
by attending the press conference of Matt Daniels, the president of
the Alliance for Marriage and sponsor of the FMA, showing that the
USCCB is willing to give visible support to the amendment along with
its written support.

While it didn't end up changing anything, we can't blame the
bishops' conference. After all, who is it who votes emphatically
pro-abortion and pro-gay marriage Catholic politicians into office if
not the Catholic voting public? Until we stop sending these men and
women to Congress, we can't complain when they don't vote in line
with Church teaching. And we certainly can't expect the bishops to
come in and single-handedly clean up our mess.

Look, I criticize the bishops conference when it fails to fully
uphold the faith. But we also have to be fair. The fact is, they did
their part for the FMA, and we need to acknowledge that.

And now for the voter breakdown.

Last time I told you that there were 14 Catholic senators against
the FMA, 5 in favor, and 5 undecided. Fortunately, four of those
undecided Catholic senators did the right thing in the end and voted
"yes" to the cloture vote on the amendment. Only John Sununu, a
Republican from New Hampshire, went the other way and voted "no."
That's a big disappointment.

(By the way, the most famous Catholic of the bunch, John Kerry,
didn't vote. Big surprise.)

Some of the names on the opposition list are not surprising -- Ted
Kennedy, Barbara Mikulski, and Tom Daschle, to name a few of the
usual suspects. A couple of the names, though, are kind of funny.
Dick Durbin of Illinois, for example, who created the infamous
Catholic senator "score card" that ranked him the second most
Catholic senator on the Hill. Who would have guessed that the most
Catholic senators in Washington are all ignoring the bishops
conference and casting votes in favor of gay marriage?

Anyway, here are the rest of the senators who voted against
cloture:

Joseph Biden (D-DE)
John Breaux (D-LA)
Maria Cantwell (D-WA)
Susan Collins (R-ME)
Christopher Dodd (D-CT)
Tom Harkin (D-IA)
Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
Patrick Leahy (D-VT)
Patty Murray (D-WA)
John Reed (D-RI)

As you can see, there's still a lot of work to be done, and much
will depend on our individual efforts.

I'll write more next week. Right now, the office is closing a little
early since Ann Guppy, one of the CRISIS staff, is getting married
this evening. Please join me in praying that God grants her wedding
and marriage every blessing.

Have a great weekend,

Deal


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