FRC: ROMER V. EVANS, `THE CASE OF THE DECADE' WASHINGTON DC, Oct 5, 1995 --- The Family Research Council issued the following: When the U.S. Supreme Court hears arguments for Romer v. Evans on October 10, it could be a historical moment, as sweeping as Roe v. Wade. Attorney Melissa Wells-Petry, a former Army major and author of "Exclusion: Homosexuals and the Right to Serve," has submitted a "friend of the court" brief, and has noted that this decision mirrors Roe v. Wade in that "it would present the same risk for public policy disaster by foreclosing political choice." When the court in Colorado struck down Amendment 2, it said that homosexuality cannot be the subject of negative public regulation, even regulation by omission. In her brief, Wells-Petry said that such a decision from the U.S. Supreme Court would provide homosexuals with ... "`easy money' -- a new constitutional right -- with which to buy a result they did not earn in the marketplace of ideas. This new right allows homosexuals to circumvent the process of obtaining a consensus for their ideas in that marketplace of ideas. It allows homosexuals to insulate their ideas from that market's ebb and flow. Indeed, no matter what ideas homosexuals advance, people never can use the ballot box affirmatively to reject those ideas." Wells-Petry warned the court that such a "tremendous change in the functioning of our democracy" would have as severe an impact on society as did Roe. "The social, political, and jurisprudential ramifications of the judicial overreaching of Roe must not be repeated through the creation of a new fundamental right in Romer," Wells-Petry stated. FRC Director of Studies Robert H. Knight testified at the trial in Colorado and said that a gay rights ordinance violates the free speech clause of the First Amendment of the Constitution. The implications of this decision would be felt across society. FRC Policy Analyst retired Army Lt. Col. Robert L. Maginnis stated that this decision would even affect the military and its policy.