From: LGBTFAIR@aol.com Date: Thu, 11 Jul 1996 19:51:10 -0400 Subject: *M*: Call Congress NOW on Same-sex Marriage Indiana Freedom To Marry Coalition ACTION ALERT Thursday, 7/11/96 Experts from the Human Rights Campaign say the US House of Representatives as a whole will be debating HR 3396, known as DOMA--Defense of Marriage Act TONIGHT with a probable vote either at the end of tonight's debate or first thing tomorrow morning. ACTION: Call your Representative NOW to say "Vote NO on HR 3396". It does not matter how late you call. If the office answers, they're still debating and your call will count. Hoosiers calling Rep. Jacobs or Visclosky should call Marla Stevens of LGBT Fairness at (317) 635-2712 to report the results of the contacts. SPECIAL NOTE FOR INDIANAPOLIS AREA HOOSIERS: 1) It is urgent that Rep. Andrew Jacobs (D-Indianapolis) be called at his Capitol office at (202) 225-4011. He has yet to commit one way or another on how he will vote on final passage of DOMA. 2) His vote may be the only one we get on our side from the Indiana delegation. His vote against the bill will help as we negotiate with Julia Carson, the Democrat contender for his seat, for her help on same-sex marriage in the years to come. 3) Leave the message to "VOTE NO ON HR 3396" with the receptionist for Rep. Jacobs. 4) Ask also to speak to Tricia or David Wildes about the bill. Try to find out what Rep. Jacobs' position is and why. 5) Impress on Jacobs' office that it would be inconsistent to vote for District of Columbia domestic partners' rights to visit loved ones in the hospital but vote against the rights of similarly situated Hoosiers. Let them know that a YES vote would continue to allow immigration officials to forcibly part same-sex couples in committed relationships when one was a U.S. citizen and the other was not. Most of all, let them know how this bill affects you personally. SPECIAL NOTE FOR NORTHWEST INDIANA RESIDENTS: It is also critical that Rep. Visclosky get calls at (202) 225-2461. The religious right has targetted his office and they've gotten mostly anti-same-sex-marriage calls. He had not definitely committed to vote for the bill, though, and we still have a chance. MORE INDIANA INFORMATION: All the rest of the Indiana delegation has decided to vote with the religious right. McIntosh, Souder, Buyer, Burton, and Hostettler were all early co-sponsors of HR 3396. Burton's letters to constituents have been horribly demeaning, telling gay Hoosier couples (and their children) that they aren't families because they aren't married and that he opposes their marriages. Hamilton's aide reports that he will be voting for the bill because he is personally opposed to same-sex marriage. Roemer seems afraid not to vote for the bill because he's facing a tough election battle against a right-wing opponent in a conservative district. Myers aides won't say what his personal opinions are but are sure he will vote for the bill. All of them try to deny that they're behaving as if their gay constituents aren't fully human while acknowledging that marriage is a fundamental right of adult humans. They don't like seeing themselves as bigots and recoil from it. If you are one of their constituents, call them and politely point out their bigotry and your disgust with it. GENERAL BACKGROUND ON DOMA: DOMA basically does two things: 1) It says that states may refuse to recognize same-sex marriages legally performed in other states and 2) It says that the government of the United States will not recognize legal same-sex marriages for purposes of federal law, thus denying legally married same-sex couples rights and responsibilities included in some 6000 federal statutes and regulations. A vote was held earlier today on the rule for HR 3396 (the rule is the process they will use to debate the bill tonight). The vote, HR 474 passed by a vote of 290-133. We did better than we'd hoped, as the lobbyists at HRC had been worried we'd get less than a hundred votes to defeat the rule. If we can hold the 133 votes or even pick up a few more, it may help slow things down in the Senate, give courage to some of those on the fence but leaning to our side, and make our attempts to kill it with procedural roadblocks like attaching ENDA (the Les-gay-bi employment rights bill) to DOMA. DOMA was also heard in committee in the Senate today. It was a reasonably good hearing, under the circumstances, with only committee chair Orrin Hatch showing up to represent the Republicans. Our Democrat supporters were well represented by folks like Ted Kennedy (whose tough questions exposed the mean-spiritedness and double standards of arch-homophobe Gary Bauer), Paul Simon of Illinois, and even Diane Feinstein (who gave the far-right in Congress a stern lecture for wasting their valuable time with junk legislation when there were critically important bills like minimum wage that were languishing.) ****************************************************************************** * To subscribe to MARRIAGE, send mail to: majordomo@abacus.oxy.edu * * In the mail message, enter ONLY the words: subscribe marriage * * To unsubscribe to MARRIAGE, send mail to: majordomo@abacus.oxy.edu * * In the mail message, enter ONLY the words: unsubscribe marriage * * Words in the Subject: line are NOT processed! * ******************************************************************************