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Getting A Vote |
Current rating: 0 |
by Meg Miner
Email: blue2 (nospam) net66.com (unverified!) |
28 Dec 2003
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State Senator Emil Jones refuses to call a vote on SB101. What kind of democracy exists when we don't vote on things until we know they will go our way?
By now you have probably heard about the Massachusetts' court decision stating that the MA government discriminates against gay people by denying them access to the same benefits heterosexual people have through marriage. What you may not have heard is how this ruling affected every person in Illinois.
On November 19th, 2003 the mere threat of voter backlash in November 2004 destroyed the chances of progress on an equal protection bill when Senate President Emil Jones, Jr. refused to hold a vote with on SB101, a bill that will add the words "sexual orientation" to the Illinois Human Rights Act. |
Why does a court ruling about marriage-based benefits on the Eastern seaboard pose a threat to Illinois citizens’ civil rights when a federal law limiting marriage to men and women (Defense of Marriage Act, DOMA) and an Illinois law stating the same (750 ILCS 5/201) already exist?
At first I thought it was because Illinois’ Democrats didn’t think they were smart enough to explain the difference between equal protection in public accommodations and the concept of marriage to their constituents, but now I wonder if they are just afraid to stand up and be counted.
I find it discouraging that our senators refuse to go on the record about supporting or opposing civil rights. But what is worse is that this has been the standard response in the Illinois Legislature for 30 years. If I give you some background on the issue, maybe you will act where our senators have failed to.
SB101 is a state proposal to protect any person with a sexual orientation from discrimination while conducting public interactions such as working, shopping, renting or getting a loan.
Now note how this differs from the current laws about marriage:
DOMA became a Federal law in 1996. It says states don’t have to honor other states’ laws regarding same-sex relationships, and it establishes that marriage is limited to “a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife” and that a spouse can only be a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife. The Illinois marriage law was enacted in the late 1970s and ensures that state recognition of relationships applies to heterosexuals only.
Same-sex marriage may become an issue in this state some day, but no one is challenging these laws at this time. I am sure if it ever comes up, we’ll all hear a lot about it.
So maybe we can get back to the issue at hand? If politicians don’t want to support human rights on the basis of a person’s sexual orientation, so be it. But in a democracy, I think we ought to at least be able to have a public debate and a vote on the issue.
You should know that in the 30 years that the Illinois Human Rights Act Amendment has been put on the table and withdrawn, there have been all kinds of objections raised and changes made to the proposed bills to account for them.
Opponents have said a Human Rights Act that includes sexual orientation will do the following:
1) Require religious organizations to accept employees with non-heterosexual orientations. The Act already exempts religious organizations from its definition of employer, so they will not be held to the standards other employers are.
2) Set up affirmative action requirements. The proposed bill specifically excludes affirmative action from applying to the sexual orientation part of the law, if enacted.
3) Force landlords to rent space in their own homes to someone of a different sexual orientation. SB101 specifies that the law will not apply to landlords with less than 5 units.
4) Promote pedophilia. Pedophilia is already illegal in Illinois and equating this crime with same-sex relationships is either deliberate fear-mongering or a misunderstanding easily addressed by long-standing research. Nevertheless, SB101 has been amended to specifically state “‘sexual orientation’ does not include a physical or sexual attraction to a minor by an adult.”
There are other arguments that I’ve heard politicians raise: “We’ll be setting up a special class of people based on a lifestyle choice” comes to mind. One chooses whether or not to marry, to seek or choose not to seek an education, to join or refrain from joining the military, to join or refrain from joining a religion. The state of Illinois has decided these choices are worthy of protection in the existing Human Rights Act, so even if sexual orientation is a choice this is no reason for excluding it.
Will democracy be served if the issue slips quietly away in 2004 at the end of the current General Assembly and our representatives yet again refuse to go on the record? Even if you don’t agree that sexual orientation should be added to the Illinois Human Rights Act, perhaps you too are curious how your representatives will vote. There is only one way we will ever find out: have a hearing on the floor of our State Senate.
Will you contact Senator Jones, tell him you understand the distinction between civil rights and marriage, and ask him to call SB101 in January? You can reach him at
Senator Emil Jones, Jr.
507 West 111th Street
Chicago, IL 60628
(773) 995-7748
Then go one step further, contact your Senator and express your opinion on the issue, one way or the other.
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Re: Getting A Vote |
by Jack Ryan
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 4
28 Dec 2003
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Dear Meg,
You ask an interesting question: "What kind of democracy exists when we don't vote on things until we know they will go our way?"
Perhaps you should ask Miguel Estrada or any other Bush appointment who was not able to get a vote in the Senate despite having enough votes to win. Ask Senator Durbin who cowardly attempts to destroy the character of the appointee rather than tell people he is beholden to the "special interest" votes.
Jack
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Special Classes Of People |
by Ricy Baldwin
baldwinricky (nospam) yahoo.com (unverified) |
Current rating: 4
29 Dec 2003
Modified: 01:48:40 PM |
The "special class" twist is always the most fascinating argument against this kind of civil rights bill, in my book. The other arguments (though a pretty thin veneer for bigotry in themselves) are answered in the bill, it seems, but the "special class" card is one that no amendment can fix, which presumably explains its widespread use. It has a particular irony that marks it as more specious than most. Whenever a group of people wants to be treated like everyone else, it seems, that gets translated as "special rights."
And these "special rights", we are supposed to believe, are somehow a threat to the rights of the rest of us - as if it is better foe me to work in a dangerous job next to a heterosexual, whether or not he or she is competent to keep up without killing me, instead of a lesbian or gay worker who is competent and safe.
The Orwellian "Defense of Marriage Act" is a prime example. Somehow the "institution" of marriage is threatened (assuming that's a bad thing, which is not at all obvious) by the inclusion of people who love one another deeply but happen to be of the same sex. But marriages between violent idiots, or amoral corporate lawyers, or other dangerous characters, do not create a "special class" and apparently are not a serious enough threat to be mentioned in the proud "Defense of Marriage Act."
But there are already special classes of people whose special rights do affect the rest of us. In particular one minority group - the richest one percent who own most of America - can never be satisfied with the quality and quantity of their coddling by the state.
Many of them pay little or no taxes, even though they can well afford to. Much of their personal consumption is subsidized as "business expenses". Their private enterprises are heavily subsidized by federal, state and local governments through tax breaks, public roads and utilities often extended free of charge, lucrative contracts, buyouts and other means. (That is, we taxpayers pay for them: privatized profit, socialized risk.)
Their business ventures are also subsidized by millions of private citizens who turn over their life's savings to them as "investments" with virtually no control over the direction of these businesses, which are invariably run by the richest stockholders with huge shares (much of it gained without cost as inheritance, executive bonuses, etc). When one of them is pained to announce massive layoffs (including almost always large numbers of "investors" who technically own a microscopic part of the company), the stock market and board of directors may reward them with a dramatic raise or other incentives. When one of them goes under, like Enron, the employees and other "investors" lose their life's savings and the rich keep their profits.
But the most harmful aspect of the special rights of the rich is that, even as their influence over decisions about public policy grows, they have gotten their Constitutional protections multiplied. Most of us are protected by the US Constitution as individuals - much as the current administration tries to eliminate some of us and limit that Constitution - and so are the rich, rightly so. But the rich can also legally function as additional people, and powerful people at that: corporations have been recognized by the courts for generations now as "artificial people" with all the rights of free speech, etc., as the rest of us - except the right to vote. This allows the rich to manipulate these goliaths striding across our landscape with the full knowledge that democratic attempts to curb their destructive behavior will time and time be frustrated by blind justice, which treats these Frankenstein monsters essentially as natural human beings.
If the Lilliputians had had our political system, Gulliver would have had no trouble out of them.
The control of such behemoths capable of killing or wounding thousands every year, throwing millions out of work, uprooting families and laying waste to entire communities with virtual impunity in effect creates a special class that is somehow never mentioned in the fearful discussions of "special classes" and "special rights" that you can hear from coast to coast. And it is well for the rich that they aren't mentioned in this context - judging from Gulliver's example.
Nope, much better for the rich if we Lilliputians keep disputing among ourselves which of us are getting "special rights" and grant the corporate Gullivers a little more freedom. |
