Whitley County Judge Executive passes resolution against gay marriage
Aug 20th, 2010 | By News Tips: news@kentuckyguardian.com | Category: Around the Commonwealth, Kentucky Guardian News, Lead Story
Whitley County Judge-Executive Pat White Jr. head of the Whitley County Fiscal Court.
According to the Corbin Times-Tribune (covering Knox, Whitley and Laurel Counties):
Whitley County Judge-Executive Pat White Jr. is hoping to spark a national movement in order to pass and ratify an amendment to the United States Constitution establishing marriage as only being recognized as a union between a man and a woman in the United States of America.
White, an attorney, took the first step towards that effort Tuesday evening by asking the Whitley County Fiscal Court to approve a resolution, which asks the Kentucky Legislature to pass legislation demanding a federal constitutional convention for the purpose of passing a constitutional amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
Fiscal court members unanimously approved the resolution during their monthly meeting Tuesday night. Copies of it will be sent to the leadership of both the Kentucky House of Representatives and the Kentucky Senate in addition to certain members of Kentucky’s Congressional delegation including U.S. Senators Mitch McConnell and Jim Bunning, U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, and Kentucky Representative Dewayne Bunch (82nd District).
“We will begin distributing this resolution to the other counties in Kentucky asking them to pass similar resolutions and to distribute to the legislature of Kentucky asking them to take action at their next regular session,” White said after the resolution’s passage.
White said that he decided to draft the resolution after an Aug. 4 federal court decision striking down Proposition 8, which was California’s constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.
“If it is set as established precedent by some of the higher courts, it would overturn the constitutional amendment here in Kentucky,” White said. “I thought of what could be done so that the people would get the opportunity to vote on this issue at the national level, and not be overturned by the courts.”
“There was a statement made by the San Francisco Mayor when the campaign for Proposition 8 was going on that no matter what the people wanted, this was going to be the law of the land that gay marriage was accepted.”
White said that he is hoping to start a national movement with this effort.
White noted that 45 states do not recognize gay marriage, including Kentucky, and that Kentucky’s traditional marriage amendment passed with a 74 percent majority.
Why does White feel so strongly about this issue?
“I don’t believe in homosexual marriage. It is against my raising and my morals,” White said. “I don’t believe that this should be decided by the courts.
WYMT-TV, the CBS affiliate for Southern Kentucky (covering 24 counties) reported:
It’s an issue that’s sparking a national debate and now an Eastern Kentucky official is hoping to make a statement when it comes to same-sex marriages. “I think it is a complete joke. It’s coming from a judge executive who has no political or executive authority. I think that it’s pathetic,” said Jordan Palmer with Kentucky Equality Federation.
Opponents call the resolution a step in the wrong direction. “It is a step back…if it’s inspired by tradition, or just plain old fashion bigotry. I think we should be teaching our children about diversity because diversity in our commonwealth makes us strong. It does not make us weak,” said Palmer.
Palmer’s complete comments (unedited): “Even if this makes it to the Kentucky Legislature, it would have to pass the constitution amendments Committee (and it would not). However, if the Whitely County Judge Executive believes for one moment that Kentucky Equality Federation, Marriage Equality Kentucky, Louisville’s Fairness Campaign, Kentucky Fairness Alliance, or Lexington Fairness would allow this to go unchallenged, I believe he is mistaken. Kentucky has a lot of good LGBTI organizations, and we are sick of being second class citizens.
If motivated by religion, by tradition or by old-fashioned bigotry, this will shed additional light on the fact that LGBTI people are second-class citizens; we are taxed, yet we can be fired for being gay or lesbian and we do not even have civil unions in the Commonwealth, and all of this is coming from the California trial.”
Jordan Palmer is the founder and former president of Kentucky Equality Federation and is currently serving as public advocate for the organization.
VIDEO
United We Stand (old version)
When I navigated to the hilarious Yes We Scam! B.S. We Can Believe In! Obama Approval Plummets story I said that United We StandKy’s frequenters should be able to discuss this link: http://hubpages.com/hub/Yes-We-Scam-BS-We-Can-Believe-In-Obama-Approval-Plummets
I think this guy still thinks that he is a child wearing cloth diapers and all of that 40′s and 50′s stuff. Times have changed and so has the major opinion of the public at large. People such as this suffer from nothing ever changes syndrome. I am afraid that one of these days Mr. White and those like him are going to have to face the fact that people are slowly coming around and times they are a changing.
I mean isn’t that what America is all about is democracy?
BTW I would like to say that it was an utter pleasure speaking to you on the phone Mrs Reynolds.
Live on, Live Free and live happy.
“Peace, liberty and Equality for ALL.”
It is a shame that there is still so much blatant bigotry in this country. It was to be expected by me that the Kentucky constitution would be quite late to come around to the idea that all people are equal, even those that cannot help the fact that they are attracted to the same sex (and, reasonably, would like the right to fall in love, marry, and seek happiness accordingly). Who could foresee that such an ignorant, self-loathing, pig of a man would try such a selfish, cold-hearted move driven by a sick personal hatred of a group of people that has done nothing wrong to anyone. His desperate attempts will falter, and the homosexual community WILL receive the equal rights we deserve as humans, as history repeats itself on matters such as civil rights. History will do so for our little group just like it has for the “little” groups before us (shout out to all the women and African-Americans out there). Homosexuals were born into this world just like everyone else, and we deserve to be treated with the same basic human dignity as any other group on this planet. Equality = :-)