Three California counties to locals: No marriage for you

June 17, 2008

I’ve long wondered what, exactly, opponents of same-sex marriage believe will happen if gay couples have the same right to marry as straight couples. Several years ago, I recall Rick “Man on Dog” Santorum telling TV preacher Pat Robertson, “[T]he consequence is very clear. Marriage loses its significance. People will stop getting married. Homosexuals will not get married; heterosexuals will stop getting married. And that to me is the real threat to the American family and to the culture generally.”

Now, this quote has always stood out for me because I’d really like to meet the straight person who believes, “I planned to marry the person I love, but I’ve decided not to. If gays can marry, it’s just not worth it.” That, I assumed, was the only way for Santorum’s argument to make any sense.

As it turns out, there’s another way Santorum could have been right.

June 17 marks the date that gay and lesbian couples can marry legally in California, following a landmark ruling by the state’s Supreme Court in May that struck down the ban on same-sex marriage. The day will be marked by joyous celebrations and eager couples earning a right they have waited years to obtain.

Yet, the occasion will also be punctuated by the division it creates throughout the state. On the one hand, San Francisco County has added additional staff and expanded hours so the clerk’s office can accommodate the surge in demand from same-sex couples seeking marriage licenses and wedding ceremonies. The office has 170 same-sex couples signed up to receive marriage licenses on the first day, says Karen Hong Yee, director of the county clerk’s office.

In contrast, the Butte County clerk-recorder issued a June 11 news release saying her office will stop performing wedding ceremonies altogether — for gay and heterosexual couples. The Kern County clerk issued a June 4 release that she would do the same.

Calaveras county has decided to follow Butte’s and Kern’s lead, and will also stop performing marriages altogether.

It never occurred to me that conservatives would actually find a way to make marriages between gay couples affect marriages between straight couples. Kudos to their right-wing, hate-filled creativity!

Keep in mind, some conservatives in California are considering additional steps.

While the Kern Co Clerk has faced suspicion from gay marriage supporters for her timing in deciding to stop all marriage ceremonies, others are backing her actions.

“The California Family code still says that marriage is between a man and a woman. They’ve created legal confusion,” says Ken Mettler of the Bakersfield Republican Assembly.

Many people are trying to get the Kern County Board of Supervisors to approve an ordinance that would ban the clerk from even issuing marriage licenses. Supervisors will look at that proposal next week. [emphasis added]

You know, I’m starting to get the sense that there are some people out there who have an irrational hatred of gay people.

You’re just starting to get that sense?

  • I was under the impression that the county employees weren’t going to ‘perform’ marriages any more, but they would issue marriage licenses. Since it is possible to find religions in this country that will marry gay couples (or create your own) that’s not more than a cruel burden.

    Not issuing licenses is a voilation of the county’s responsibilities as a local government and ought to be grounds to disincorporate it.

  • It boggles my mind that people are so adamently against homosexuals getting married that they refuse to marry anyone. What do they think is going to happy and if Jack and John get married? That the whole country will turn gay? I’m amused that the party that platforms for little to no government interference is the first to interfere in homosexual, civil, and abortion rights.

  • “The California Family code still says that marriage is between a man and a woman. They’ve created legal confusion,” says Ken Mettler of the Bakersfield Republican Assembly.

    look, you moron. the supreme court decision invalidated that section of the code.

    geez……..

  • I grew up in Kern County and to classify a sizable portion of the population as rednecks would be an insult to rednecks worldwide. Butte and Calaveras counties are also among the most conservative in the state so it’s no surprise that the three of them are leading the charge back to the 19th century.

    Don’t worry, when gay tourists start flocking to San Francisco and dumping those millions of tourist dollars into the local economy they’ll loosen up. They may be ignorant homophobic crackers but they didn’t fall off the banana boat when it comes to knowing which side of the bread to butter up when push comes to shove.

  • Doesn’t this mean there will be fewer republicans made? Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face….

  • What do they think is going to happy and if Jack and John get married?

    They think that the Republicans will lose yet another sure-fire rallying point, and won’t win elections to be dog-catcher much less President or Senator.

    What are they afraid of? The future … the Democratic future.

  • “The Incredible Jumping Logic of Calaveras County”.

    I’m thinking the County registrars will get a court challenge they’ll probably lose, and my guess it will be some hetero couple who pursues it.

  • Now hold on just a minute here—you’re missing the fun part of this.

    No marriage licenses means no documentation of marriage.

    No documentation of marriage means no legally-recognized “spouse” for wills, life insurance, mortgages, auto loans, and birth records.

    Therefore—effective immediately, all future “hetero” couples must live in sin and raise children out of wedlock. Truly fundamental “believers” will refrain from procreation—and “their kind” will summarily die out within a matter of a couple generations.

    Besides—if a county becomes “disincorporated,” I don’t think it can collect taxes. No more property taxes; no more sales taxes; no more school taxes. They can’t establish authority over their residents beyond various “zoning” regulatory regimens normally reserves to unincorporated townships. They’ll demote themselves to legal “bumpkin” status.

    This could become very entertaining over the next several months. I’ll need to stock up on popcorn….

  • It’s sad when you think about it, County Clerks are elected in California and take an oath to preserve, protect and defend the Consitution and laws of the state. Refusing to issue a marriage license upon request from two citizens who are entitled to a license is a violation of the state law they swore to uphold and the duties of the Clerk’s office.

    It’s also going to be a waste of taxpayer money, because when some attorneys file for writs of mandate against these county clerks, ordering them to comply with the law, the writs will likely be granted immediately, petentially with an order for attorney fees (coming out of the taxpayers’ pockets) under a Private Attorney General theory. In fact I would not be surprised to see our Attorney General, Jerry Brown, initiate the actions himself.

    There was a touching story on the local NPR radio station, the clerk in the county where I work (Contra Costa County) has been with his partner for 19 years and they were going to be the first couple married in the county under the new law. When he was first elected, 18 years ago, he was closeted for fear it would prevent him from getting elected, but since that time came out and it has had no effect on him getting reelected.

  • I’ll start believe the conservative whiners who cry “SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE!!” as soon as they make an effort to ban divorce and make cheating on one’s spouse a criminal offense.

    After all, those are bigger threats to marriage than two loving, committed adults wanting legal rights.

    So until then, I’ll chalk this up as just another wedge issue which concerns wingnuts for one reason: It gets them the reliable bigot vote.

  • So does this mean that theoretically, a hetero couple who was going to get married in one of these three counties could sue the Clerk for discrimination and loss of equal protection under the law because of the enforcement of an equal protection court decision? Hmmm.

  • Some of the commenters here have come close to the key. The clerks who oppose performing marriages and granting licenses are deeply afraid. Their fear is expressed in hatred and excessiv behavior.

    Put yourselves in their shoes. They have never had a conversation with an openly gay couple (or person). Their church has shown them videos of gay parades with naked men and drag queens. These images are imprinted on their subconscious. It’s similar to how most of us feel about Fred Phelps, the ultraconservative Mormon polygamists, and Ron Hagee. I’d have a tough time performing a heterosexual marriage for people like them.

    This is irrational fear coupled with a belief that they will encounter people who are extreme. When the Calvinist anti-sensual (& anti sex) core of American society is factored in the mixture is explosive.

    I’m sure that some of these clerks cried themselves to sleep over the situation they were in. They’ve internalized their sexuality. They would obsess about these couples having sex – and blow a gasket.

    There are many in this society who are psychologically wounded – and most of them don’t recognize their own dis-ease.

    Instead of lawsuits I’d like to see psychological counseling for these clerks. Imagine the reaction that would provoke. No one has ever pointed out that they might be the ones who are sick – or that the Alliance Defense Fund is a ‘rational’ veneer on a group of terrified sex-obsessed people.

  • bull_city_heel (15): Maybe, but I doubt it. The whole point of equal protection is that what one American gets, all Americans get. Denying marriage certificates to all people and not just gays is probably good enough for the letter of this ruling, if not its spirit.

    ml johnston (16): No, not in this case. If it came by order from the state government, it arguably could be (but maybe not even then). But this is the individual counties themselves deciding how to manage their own process. As long as each county is within the letter of the law (see response to bull_city_heel above), their decisions are legal.

  • I live in Calaveras and just talked to the clerk’s office. She told me they stopped performing marriages in May because of budget cuts; there was never a big call for them to begin with, although they did a few a month. They issue licenses to all. The reason they stopped performing marriages was that their budget has been cut, they are understaffed, they have no space for weddings. The clerk in charge sounds, in my telephone connection judgment, like she and her budget got caught in the political crossfire ignited by Kern and Butte Counties; she drew up her budget in April and said did not hear or think about the Court ruling allowing gay marriage until it was announced last week. This is a very small county in population, with pockets of true poverty and a live and let live attitude in general. Registration favors Republicans; we wait with great hope and enthusiasm to see if the mantra for change makes a difference in November.

  • I think we just need to give these guys a little time to realize that the sky hasn’t fallen now that gays can marry.

    We had similar backlash here in VT when civil unions were passed 8 years ago (still no gay marriage yet). More than one fired up town clerk made a public statement refusing to issue CU licenses, and a few even resigned in protest. Luckily, there were more clerks who decided to uphold the law. After a month or so (and I believe a statement from the state legislature saying that clerks will perform all of their duties or they will be replaced with someone who will) the hubbub died down. Now it’s not such a big deal.

    Other commenters are correct in relating the backlash against gay marriage to schools shutting down rather than be desegrated. People have gotten used to the status quo of one group having a set of rights that’s denied another group. Now that’s changing and people are scared. If these people have the same rights as me, then how can I be better than them? And if I remember correctly, the bible was used as proof that blacks were somehow lesser people than whites just as it’s used today to show how wrong it is to be gay.

    Does this excuse the behavior? Certainly not; not in Vermont 8 years ago, and not in California now. Right now someone from CA (I’m looking at you, governator) needs to issue an ultimatum to the clerks refusing to issue marriage licenses. Basically the same as in VT, clerks will perform all designated duites or they will be replaced by someone who will.

    Every time a new state allows gay marriage or civil union, it always brings up how much emphasis we put on Christian marriage. We use the bible as proog as this, somehow forgetting that others may not adhere to the same religion, or any religion at all.

    Personally, I’d like to see all marriage done away with, both for homo- and heterosexual couples. Legally, the state should issue civil unions exclusively. If a couple wishes to be ‘Married’, they can have the ceremony of their choice for religious recognition. This would allow all couples to be recognized equally by the law.

    Leagally, we already recognize marriages that certain religions won’t recognize. For example, their is no law currently against inter-faith marriages. We allow divorced people to re-marry. We do not require specific religions to perform marriage ceremonies that they do not approve of, and yet these marriages happen and are legally recognized. Gay marriage should be no different.

  • Thanks SF. I wondered if these counties were really saying no to marriage fees in the highly unlikely event a same sex couple might want to get married. Looks like Event A happened, then Event B happened and a bunch of cretins are trying to connect the two.

    Completely OT: The ring in the sidebar ad. Tack-E.

  • Well I see nothing wrong with this. Being from California, I am deeply concerned and upset that the supreme court reversed the propositoin that we voted on in 2004. If the supreme court can decide against our own vote, why even vote. It is very scary to think that we have no voice. I am glad those counties are perfroming retaliation against an activist unjust state supreme court. Dont tell me what to think, let me think for myself!!!

  • I’d like to suggest that every time a gay couple gets married elsewhere in California, they make copies of the receipts for all their expenses and mail them off to wedding-related businesses in these counties — florists, bakeries, hotels, restaurants, etc. etc. Just send the receipts with a note attached: “Hey, look at how much we spent! Sorry we couldn’t use your services, but your county officials won’t let us.”

    When southern towns tried to shut things down rather than desegregate, it was often the local businessmen who saw the costs and pulled in some political favors. Time to do the same here.

  • If the supreme court can decide against our own vote, why even vote. It is very scary to think that we have no voice.

    I’ve read a lot about the civil rights movement, and the EXACT same arguments were made by segregationists after Brown v. Board of Education. “The Supreme Court can’t overturn our majority will!”

  • Eric said: “Dont tell me what to think, let me think for myself!”

    Taking away someone’s basic right to equal protection of the laws is not something you get to think.

    Hence, the Bill of Rights and Constitutional (rather than pure Democracy) law.

  • Help me if I’m not understanding this correctly, Butte, Kern & Calaveras (and others to join no doubt) Counties are not stopping the licenses but stopping the ceremonies, right? This shouldn’t hinder anybody seeking marriage. Just the convenience of one stop shopping and denying the clerks office a revenue stream.

    Similar to news racks at bus stops, if they are provided by transit to keep everything in order, everybody who can print a document demands equal access so no news racks are provided by transit.

    So why must we procure a license to publicly demonstrate affection? I’ll bet that has some interesting history to it.

    The color of an orange varies greatly depending on lighting, ripeness, descriptive nuances and on and on. 🙂

  • But, but, didn’t I once hear Stephen Colbert say that the only reason he and his wife got married was to taunt gays. The whole structure of their relationship is collapsing. Oh the horror!

  • “If the supreme court can decide against our own vote, why even vote. It is very scary to think that we have no voice.”
    A majority voice is not always the correct and rational voice. Throughout the history of this nation a majority of Americans thought separate but equal was just and the interracial marriage was a sin.
    I believe in about 20 years or so, our children and grandchildren will ask us why a majority of this country was so damn scared of two men or women who love one another were discriminated against and not allowed to marry. Ignorance, plain and simple.

  • Dont tell me what to think, let me think for myself!!!

    You’re allowed to think whatever you want. That doesn’t mean your fellow citizens get to be denied equal treatment under the law.

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  • I live in Butte county and they tried to claim it was for “Budgetary” purposes that they were shutting down performing marriages. Everybody sees right through it even the right wing local paper

  • they didn’t fall off the banana boat when it comes to knowing which side of the bread to butter up when push comes to shove.

    Bravo, Curmudgeon. Bravo.

  • I wrote about this last week after the Chron did a story on Kern and Butte Counties. Elvis Elvisberg has it right: it’s exactly like the segregationist dead-enders.

    As for the ‘budgetary’ dodge, here’s a quote from the Chron story:

    Steve Weir, Contra Costa County’s clerk and president of the California Association of Clerks and Elected Officials, noted that the state allows counties to set their own fees for marriage ceremonies so they can recover the costs associated with performing the duty.

    “It’s a nice service that we provide to the public, and it’s not costing me anything. In this day and age with the budget situation, how can you go wrong providing a public service that helps with your overhead? It’s a no-brainer,” Weir said.

    And incidentally, Weir himself got married today. Congratulations.

  • Here in Los Angeles, I am looking out the window at 4:36 PM and so far there are no signs of the promised end of western civilization. But I’ll keep watching and report back to you if I see anything.

  • Here in Los Angeles…so far there are no signs of the promised end of western civilization.

    Now that’s a straight line that sorely tempts this San Franciscan. 😉

    But I won’t use it. Right now, I think all of us Californians, Northerners and Southerners alike, have good reason to be proud of our state.

  • I was under the impression that the county employees weren’t going to ‘perform’ marriages any more, but they would issue marriage licenses. Since it is possible to find religions in this country that will marry gay couples (or create your own) that’s not more than a cruel burden. — Lance, @3

    NYT had an article on the subject over the weekend (Saturday?), titled something like “I Do. Not Here, You Don’t”. It’s true that the clerks’ *obligation* is limited to issuing licenses; they don’t have to perform marriages (though are legally allowed to).

    But there are many reasons that people (hetero as well as homo) get married in a clerk’s office rather than a church. Some people — gasp! — are atheists; they don’t want to get married in *any* church. Some people aren’t atheists, but are “lapsed” and don’t attend a church regularly or at all; when they try to find one to solemnize their union, the preachers bristle and refuse (my stepson and his wife were married in court for that reason. Couldn’t find a church that would marry them). Some people belong to two different faiths; often, in those cases, the preachers will insist on conversion before agreeing to perform the ceremony (my husband’s first wife was a Catholic, he’s an Episcopalian. He had to take Catholic “instruction” and officially convert. For that one day). Some people just want a small and quiet wedding, without the big hoopla.

    Me, I’m with whoever it was up-thread, who’s for civil unions for *everyone* as the legal “marriage”; the same being performed by the clerk of the court. A church blessing should follow — but not replace it — for those who want it and who are willing to jump through all the hoops their church of choice demands, and whose church is willing to perform such solemnization, on whatever condition.

  • That’s really excellent of them!

    What better way to make people understand how unfair the laws are for gays than to take away marriage for straight people too.

  • Oh also. Since the right wing idiots wrote their law so stupidly, “Between a man and a woman”

    doesn’t that mean that even before it was shot down by the court, anyone standing “between a man and a woman” could get married to whoever else happened to be standing there?

    Or did it mean that only pre-op transsexuals and hermaphrodites could wed?

  • My future wife and I spent 1992 attending 12 weddings and one lesbian commitment ceremony. At one hetero event the bride threw up and passed out at the altar. Not much of a ringing endorsement for the traditional church wedding between “a man and a woman.” Especially when that woman has vomited tequila and red Hi-C punch on her grandmother’s heirloom wedding gown.

    So, when we got hitched two years later, we opted for the simple, fun and appropriately romantic commitment-style ceremony favored by our lesbian friends.

    So in effect, it was a gay “marriage” that actually encouraged us to get married.

    Take THAT, Butte, Kern and Calaveras Counties!

  • They’re all redneck “Okie” counties, proving what happens when you let southerners who procreate with their relatives become residents. Where’s the surprise??????

  • I’ll start believe the conservative whiners who cry “SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE!!” as soon as they make an effort to ban divorce and make cheating on one’s spouse a criminal offense.

    Actually, Tony Perkins wants to go after the women who seek divorces and have affairs and impose the death penalty on them for being “unchaste.” I’m not kidding, he said so. As for the men, well, everyone knows a God-fearin’ man thinks with the little head (since he has rocks in the big one).

  • I can remember when blacks and white could not marry. when they finally won the right, nothing changed what-so-ever(Just more happy families) What makes a happy family, is two loving people. So I asked The Love Of My Life(of 15 Years) to marry me she cried and said Of course. So why can’t we all just worry about their own family and NOT MINE.

  • It saddens and angers me to see my county on that list. Yeah, there are a bunch of rednecks up this way, but please know that not everyone is on board with this.

  • I love how blind all supposedly rightous human rights actvists really are. Do you not realize that as they take away our voice (as the california supreme court did) what is going to stop them from taking away more. The fundamental idea of decomracy is the right to vote. If they are reversing our votes, they are killing democracy as we know it. I have no problem with the decision itself … but when they start telling us how to live, that when we have issues. What is the difference between what the California Supreme Court did here and socialism? Both are making our decisions for us.

    These people speaking out against my “votes being ignored” comment earlier are probably the same idiots that wont let us drill for oil here in the country, open up nuclear power plants, and the same people who fumbled the opportunity to kill the pine beetle so now it has spead and take more than 25% of the forest in the rocky mountains. WAKE UP!!!

  • “…I’d really like to meet the straight person who believes, “I planned to marry the person I love, but I’ve decided not to. If gays can marry…”

    Really, you’d love to meet them? I doubt that since you spent no time researching the subject before making your opinion that the idea of a decline in marriage due to this is false.

    Look into what has happened in all of the countries that legalized gay marriage in the late 80’s. Yes, ALL of them.

    http://www.nationalreview.com/kurtz/kurtz200407210936.asp

  • Better trolls, please. Correlation is NOT causation. Couples WANTING to have the right to marry does not harm the marriages of other people. On it’s face that just doesn’t make any sense.

    You know what actually does hurt families? Not allowing a child’s parents to marry because of someone else’s bigotry. We’re talking MILLIONS of kids being raised in same-sex families who are being denied the basic legal protections for their families.

    With everything that is going on in the world this is what keeps you up at night? Someone else’s familiy getting legal rights via marriage? Seriously? Interesting priorities there.

  • The funny part about all of this is that the people who are often the most anti-government are the very same people who want the government to decide who can or cannot be considered next of kin under the law. Seems like a pretty personal decision to me, I’m not sure why anti-government conservatives are so gung-ho about giving government so much authority over such personal decisions.

    By all means, ban same-sex couples from your church. Just don’t expect the government to promote unequal, discriminatory treatment of families under the law.

  • But there are many reasons that people (hetero as well as homo) get married in a clerk’s office rather than a church. Some people — gasp! — are atheists; they don’t want to get married in *any* church.

    FYI for anyone running into this clerk problem in California who’s a sworn atheist and doesn’t want to go the free Universal Life Church route, you can have a friend appointed a Deputy County Commissioner for the Day and be sworn in to perform your ceremony. It’s $35 (at least in LA County) and they need to be sworn in the week before the wedding.

    This is a childishly petty stunt for the clerks to pull but, frankly, the people most likely to be inconvenienced by it aren’t going to be the religious nutbars who agree with them — it’s going to be the people who don’t want a religious ceremony, whether they’re hetero or homo.

  • I applaud these three counties for refusing to engage in a religious matter like marriage.

    Now if they’d go about the business of arranging civil unions between all these straight and gay people who mistakenly thought the state could constitutionally impose a religious bond on them, we’ll be done here.

    Never thought it would be the conservatives who would successfully enact separation of church and state…

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