Wockner on Maine

Veteran reporter Rex Wockner is on the scene as the Pine Tree State goes to the polls today, and offers these observations.

The bottom-bottom line, of course, is that this really is not about marriage. If they thought they could get away with it, the folks who funded this "people's veto" campaign in Maine would take much more away from gays than just marriage. In Washington state on Tuesday, they'll try to take away domestic-partnership rights. In California, they're all freaked out that the Governator signed the Harvey Milk Day bill into law. It's not just that they don't want us to get married. If they could completely invisiblize us and take away all our rights, some of them would do it.

So, we have to keep fighting. If we lose in Maine on Tuesday, the Legislature will just pass the law again and the governor will sign it again. We're not talking about a constitutional amendment here, as was the case with Prop 8 in California. In reality, gays are going to be able to get married in all 50 states, perhaps even very soon if the Olson/Boies Prop 8 case succeeds at the U.S. Supreme Court. And if it doesn't, next up -- very, very soon -- are New Jersey and New York, which will be added to Iowa, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont and, starting in January, New Hampshire. Where all this is headed could not be clearer. But until then, there will be days like this Tuesday when bigots might force a backward step in the inevitable, unstoppable march to equal treatment under the law for GLBT Americans. The next generation will remember "Yes on 1" voters the way we remember people who believed black folks should drink from separate water fountains. I absolutely guarantee you that.

From the depths of Texas I can tell you there are still quite a few people around who would indeed vote to restore segregation right now, today, if given the opportunity.  And I grew up in the segregated South - it was not something that only happened in history books, kids:  it was real.  I was there. 

And you know what else, young fellers?  For a quarter of a century, every time I was with another man - and I've had two husbands, we won't talk about scratched starts just now - I was breaking the law:  technically a felon, until the Supreme Court ruled otherwise in 2003.  All my generation were love criminals, a stigma not easy to forget.  So I hope Rex is right about the future for gay rights, but I have to say it still seems like a far-away dream here in the land of cotton, where those laws are still on the books in Texas and other states, invalid and unenforceable as they may be.

The Maine Secretary of State says there's a surprisingly "heavy and very steady turnout" at the polls - but which side is getting more supporters to show up?  Wockner will be live-blogging the returns tonight starting about 8 p.m. EST, and you can hear him on the web at POTUS and OutQ.