Weld's comments are met with disbelief
Gay nuptial backers say he was resolute supporter
Conservative journalist Andrew Sullivan emerged from a private chat with Governor William F. Weld a decade ago, certain that the Republican politician was an unqualified believer in the right of gay couples to marry.
So Sullivan was more than a little surprised when he read in The New York Times and New York Post this week that Weld, who may run for governor in the Empire State, said he does not support the legalization of gay marriage beyond the Bay State's borders.
''He's always been consistently in favor of the logic and morality of marriage rights for all couples, so I'm at a loss," Sullivan said in a telephone interview.
Sullivan's reaction was typical yesterday, as those who considered Weld one of the most forceful voices for same-sex marriage in either major political party expressed shock that he was now hedging that support as he looks to woo voters in a state far larger and more politically diverse than Massachusetts.
Several gay-marriage supporters yesterday said Weld may have misspoken or might have been misquoted, when he told the New York papers that he sees civil unions as the preferred alternative for states other than the one he governed from 1991 to 1997.
''He never, ever, ever limited that support in any of his remarks to Massachusetts," said Arline Isaacson, who has lobbied on Beacon Hill for expanded gay rights for more than 20 years. ''He's been so good on this, on our right to same-sex marriage, that I want to make sure he's not being misunderstood, because he has been fabulously supportive of us, and there was never any equivocation in the last few years about how he views same-sex marriage."
Weld, a former US attorney who now works at the Manhattan-based private equity firm Leeds Weld & Co., was one of the most prominent supporters of the Supreme Judicial Court's 2003 ruling that legalized same-sex matrimony, joining with other former lawmakers and legal scholars to urge the Legislature not to challenge the decision.
The New York Post earlier this week asked Weld whether he supported gay marriage, and he simply replied, ''No." Then, the Times reported yesterday that Weld said he supported gay marriage only in Massachusetts, based on the SJC's interpretation of the state's constitution, but that he supported civil unions for gay couples in New York and other states. Weld did not return several phone calls from the Globe this week.
In 1993, Weld told New York Times columnist William Safire that he opposed gay marriage, even as he signed a series of executive orders expanding domestic partner benefits for state workers and championed the widening of antidiscrimination laws to include gays. At the time, Weld was among many GOP politicians being discussed as a possible contender for the White House.
But by 1996, Weld reacted to a high court ruling in Hawaii on the subject of gay marriage by saying he would honor such marriages performed in other states. He said that he opposed the federal Defense of Marriage Act and that he believed states should have the right to determine the issue for themselves.
After the SJC's ruling in 2003, Weld made few, if any, attempts to differentiate between his support for gay marriage in Massachusetts and elsewhere. He even spoke proudly of the fact that he had appointed the SJC's chief justice, Margaret H. Marshall.
At a December 2003 Log Cabin Republican event in which Weld was given the group's first lifetime achievement award, the former governor made glowing remarks about the new legal reality, comparing the plight of gay couples to that of blacks during the civil rights battles of the mid-20th century, Isaacson recalled.
At an Aug. 29, meeting of the New York Log Cabin Republicans during the Republican National Convention, Weld was quoted by the gay press as saying: ''The recognition of gay marriage, as the Massachusetts Supreme Court has done, is the conservative point of view. It's making the same demands on gays and lesbians as are made on everyone else when they want to commit to each other for a lifetime. I'm surprised that that is not a more broadly held point of view."
Patrick Guerriero, head of the national Log Cabin Republicans and a former Massachusetts politician, said he respects Weld tremendously for the work he's done for the gay community, but ''I think Governor Weld is going to have to clarify this in the coming days."
''Quite frankly, the governor is a personal friend and my political mentor, and I am so aware of his historic stature in terms of gay rights that I am going to give him the wiggle room to walk through this and talk through this. There's not many who've earned that, but he has."
Weld's image as a friend to gays was cemented when, only one month after the legalization of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts, he delivered the homily at the wedding of his former revenue commissioner, Mitchell Adams, to his former chief of staff, Kevin Smith. The very day that wedding took place, Governor Mitt Romney was appearing before the US Senate Judiciary Committee testifying in favor of a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.
''If I had been down there, I think I would have been testifying on the opposite side," Weld told reporters.
In November 2003, the Globe ran a story about Weld's support for the SJC's ruling, in which he called the meeting with Sullivan a turning point in his thinking.
''He made a convincing, logical case: Society should endorse gay marriage as a way of saying put up or shut up," Weld told the Globe. ''Ultimately, that is logical and correct." 