In aftermath, battle for legislators grows
Activists on both sides of the gay marriage debate yesterday vowed to pump thousands of dollars into the campaigns of candidates who back their positions in the Legislature's constitutional convention, as strategists plot their next step.
With the Legislature expected to return to the gay marriage debate March 11, gay rights activists and supporters of heterosexual marriage say they have already begun new fund-raising campaigns to run newspaper and radio ads and to draft political candidates who share their views.
"We are going to look at the recorded votes of those legislators who we thought would be with us and who weren't, ultimately," said Ronald A. Crews, spokesman for the Coalition for Marriage, which has led the campaign to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman in the state constitution. The group, he said, took steps yesterday to create a political action committee, or PAC, as a vehicle to reward lawmakers who back their position.
"We'll put pressure on those legislators, and we will also try to come up with new [amendment] language that may be acceptable to a majority."
Meanwhile, Arline Isaacson, cochairwoman of the Massachusetts Gay and Lesbian Political Caucus, said those on her side of the issue have a steep climb ahead because two-thirds of the Legislature cast votes favoring various antigay marriage proposals during this week's session. Isaacson and her allies are working to block any amendment that would overturn the Supreme Judicial Court ruling declaring gay marriage constitutional.
"Quite frankly, from the vote analysis we've done, they probably have the votes," Isaacson said.
Prospects for fence-mending seemed bleak the day after the hot-tempered close of the constitutional convention session. Most lawmakers avoided Beacon Hill yesterday. Republicans in the Senate now find themselves at odds with Governor Mitt Romney and House GOP members over whether to establish civil unions.
Senate President Robert E. Travaglini is still licking the wounds inflicted by House Speaker Thomas M. Finneran, who nearly passed his amendments by deploying a number of crafty parliamentary weapons throughout the two-day convention.
Meanwhile, lawmakers turned their attention to the latest proposed constitutional amendment that would limit marriages to heterosexual couples while mandating passage of legislation establishing civil unions. The amendment is sponsored by Representative Paul J. P. Loscocco, Republican of Holliston, who said yesterday that his primary goal between now and the resumption of the debate on March 11 is to keep the support for his measure intact.
Loscocco said his amendment would have passed by a comfortable margin if it had come to a vote Thursday night. He said he has every expectation that Travaglini and Finneran both will call on him in the coming days in an effort to reach a consensus.
He predicted that House Republicans, one voting bloc at the convention, would be hard-pressed to abandon the Loscocco amendment in favor of one sponsored by Finneran and Travaglini. The key difference is that Loscocco's version does not explicitly say what benefits would come from civil unions, but leaves that task to the Legislature.
The Finneran-Travaglini compromise said that same-sex couples "shall have the right to form a civil union" and that those unions "shall provide entirely the same benefits, protections, rights, and responsibilities that are afforded to couples married under Massachusetts law."
By contrast, the latest amendment by Loscocco would establish civil unions, but allow the Legislature to define "the nature and extent" of the unions.
"The overwhelming number of the Republican members of the House Republican caucus shared my concerns with the [Travaglini] amendment, and we will need to be persuaded that what I have done is not the correct balance," Loscocco said.
Yesterday, Romney downplayed his role thus far in keeping House Republicans united, and he said he has "not asked them to vote in a way that would follow my views necessarily."
"I have asked them to vote according to their own conscience," Romney said.
Senator Robert A. Havern III, an Arlington Democrat who supports gay marriage, predicted that the Legislature may never break the current deadlock, no matter how much arm-twisting, lobbying, and discussion goes on over the next month. For many lawmakers like himself, he said, compromise is not an option. "The plebiscite everyone is clamoring for here might be our elections," Havern said. "That's how a republic works; if you hate me, get rid of me. I don't have a duty and obligation to get off the hook. If I truly believe something, than how can I compromise? I took this job to make a decision, and it's wrong to abrogate that responsibility."
With legislative leaders scrambling for every vote they can get from their colleagues over the next month, the margin of victory may be provided by two new faces when debate resumes in March. Representative Ronald Mariano of Quincy missed action this week because he was recovering from heart surgery. He has thus far declined to make his position on the issue public, and he could not be reached for comment.
In addition, the western Boston suburbs will hold a special election to fill the seat of former senator Cheryl A. Jacques of Needham. The two candidates are Democrat Angus McQuilken, Jacques's former aide and a supporter of gay marriage, and Representative Scott Brown, a Republican who voted twice this week in favor of defining marriage as a heterosexual union.
Rick Klein of the Globe staff contributed to this report. 