You may know Benton County, in Oregon, opted to grant marriage licenses to homosexuals earlier this month. The decision followed the famous (or infamous, according to your perspective) conclusion of Multnomah County that the Oregon constitution allows gays to marry. Multnomah County is currently the only place in the United States where gays can get hitched. Mid-month, the Benton County commissioners, who favored the change 2-1, decided to wait. Pressure from opponents of gay marriage had been strong. Marriage licenses will not be granted to gays. Neither will they be granted to straights. It is that twist that has caught the eye of the New York Times.
After first deciding to do what a bunch of other places had done and grant marriage licenses to gay couples, the county commissioners did what apparently no other place has done: they decided not to give marriage licenses to anybody.
"For me this doesn't have to do with gay marriage at all," said Linda Modrell, the chairwoman of the three-member county commission. "It has to do with equal treatment. It would be the same if we had a law that says we couldn't sell property to Japanese or redheaded Danish people. What would we do?"
So while gay couples here are proceeding with the now almost routine rituals of planning weddings that the state does not recognize, straight couples, whose previous worries tended more toward chocolate versus carrot cake, are struggling to figure out a new script.
I, too, find the decision to deny licenses to female and male couples, as well as same-gender couples, intriguing. Gay activists refer to their objective as 'marriage equality.' Equality. But, we are seldom see equality among groups in our society. The treatment of men and women, whites and nonwhites, gays and straights remains clearly unequal, despite the progress made. Benton County commissioners' decision to deny a benefit to straight people, albeit temporary, seems striking for that reason.
Even brides who say they believe in equal rights seem a bit miffed. "It's not a nondiscrimination policy, it's a full-discrimination policy," scoffed Kyrie Cauthorn, who is planning a May 29 wedding.
Here, it is straight couples who are rumbling about lawsuits. And at the Hanson Country Inn, the most popular reception space around, the owner, Patricia Covey, was proclaiming the move cruel to young couples who, like their parents and grandparents and great-grandparents before them, want to go down to the pretty Italianate courthouse in the center of the county seat here and declare themselves husband and wife.
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Article comments
1 - Natalie Davis
Wow, actual justice in America! There's a first. Who'd a-thunk it? Maybe I should move to Oregon!
Wouldn't it be nice to see queers get injunctive relief from the tyranny-enforced second-class citizenship we endure in this godforsaken land? A girl can dream.
2 - Ms. Tek
I read this a while ago. I thought it was amusing and am all for it.
I just don't get what the big deal over this is. I blogged about it a long time ago. Let everyone get civil union, and you get "married" in Church. Its how Germany does it. This way, everyone goes home happy. The Christian Crusaders get to protect their marriage and the Homosexuals get to protect their "rights". Now everyone have ice cream cake and dance!
3 - Jim Carruthers
Every time it comes about tax time, I get pissed off that certain special interest groups get privileges because they engaged in a contract which requires them to group together. But if they violate the contract, there are no punitive levies.
So, you want to restrict the covenant of marriage to only some citizens, okay, then institute the death penalty for adultery and divorce (it is until death do you part, right?)
Better yet, just ban marriage. Those happy couples just get on my nerves.