The Oregon Supreme Court nullified about 3,000 gay marriages performed by Multnomah County last year. The court decided that Oregon had statutes on the books limiting marriage to a man and a woman and last year, an amendment to the state constitution passed with voter approval to define marriage as between a man and a woman.
The Oregon Supreme Court maintained that while the county could question the constitutionality of the marriage laws, marriage was still a state concern and so the county had no authority to issue licenses.
The governor of the state, Governor Ted Kulongoski said he would push for anti discrimination legislation for homosexuals and for a civil union legislation that would grant many of the same rights to same-sex partners as marriage.
Currently, only Vermont has a civil union legislation and Massachusetts is the only state to grant legal marriages to same-sex couples. Massachusetts law, however, is up to voter challenge next year.
Ref:
Ap
SFGate
Mark's Editorial Comments:
Notice that in proposing civil union legislation, "many of the rights" of marriage would be extended to same-sex couples.
Not all.
Separate but equal never is. While civil unions are a step in the right direction, true equality won't happen until homosexuals can marry.
What is it that those conservatives say when a court case doesn't go their way? Yup. That's it: "Damn activist judges." They must've been at play here, too.
In the mean time, wouldn't it be cool if Multnomah decided to secede from Oregon and become the fifty-first state? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. The legal process is so long for that, that not only would same-sex marriage be legal nationwide before they could become their own state, but heck, it would probably be legal to marry Vulcans of any sex too.
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