Tag: Amendment 43

"My advice to the Colorado attorney general when it comes to marriage cases is: Don't defend the indefensible and waste taxpayers' money."

The federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was overturned and California’s Proposition 8 passed back to the state in two Supreme Court decisions issued today.

During an emotional eight-hour hearing on same-sex civil unions at the capitol in Denver Thursday, a long list of witnesses on both sides of the issue told emotional stories of life as gay and transgender Americans. More than a few wept as they talked about shame, discrimination and systemic bias. Others quoting scripture warned of the end times the bill would surely hasten unto the Centennial State should it pass. The five committee Democrats took turns agreeing and disagreeing with witnesses, debating theology, Constitutional history and the horrors of the Jim Crow South and the Holocaust. The six members of the majority bloc Republicans on the committee, however, had little to say. They watched and listened and, without really elaborating their positions, voted as a bloc against sending the legislation to the full House for debate and a vote. They stone-cold killed the bill.

Openly gay Chairman of the Colorado Federation of College Republicans Troy Ard is lobbying colleagues and friends to support Senator Pat Steadman's same-sex civil unions bill making its way through the state legislature. Ard's support for the bill is personal, political and ideological. He wants to enjoy equal rights under the law as a gay American; he believes the Republican brand would benefit enormously by embracing gay rights; and he believes Americans should always be pushing their government to expand individual liberties.

It's not exactly a tidal wave. But the three Republican members of the House who have gone on record as supportive of state Senator Pat Steadman's civil unions bill suggests Democratic House sponsor Mark Ferrandino is right to be confident that the bill will pass if it could somehow climb over likely House committee hurdles.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Jared Polis has signed on as a lead co-sponsor of legislation that will be introduced next week to repeal the Defense...

A state lawmaker who has sponsored bills expanding civil rights for gay couples in Colorado said Tuesday afternoon he wasn't surprised California's Supreme Court upheld a ballot measure banning gay marriage but called the decision "a blip" in the country's advances toward equality. State Rep. Mark Ferrandino, a Denver Democrat and the first openly gay man to sit in the Colorado legislature, said he expects California voters to go back to the polls to overturn Proposition 8, which passed last fall with 52 percent of the vote.

Colorado state Rep. Mark Ferrandino praised the Iowa Supreme Court's ruling Friday that overturned a state law there banning same-sex marriage.

A 23-year-old Lakewood man who plans to meet with legislative staff Tuesday to review his proposed ballot measure to allow gay marriage in Colorado says he was inspired by 20-year-old Kristi Burton, who sponsored the controversial "personhood amendment" on last year's ballot, Lynn Bartels reports in the Rocky Mountain News. "I don't think there should be gender-specific laws when it comes to marriage in Colorado -- or anywhere," golf club salesman Stu Allen told Bartels.

A new report from the non-partisan National Institute on Money in State Politics examines the money behind the 2006 state-level constitutional amendments banning gay...