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From the Annapolis Capital

Gay marriage opponents already lost


by Eric Hartley
Sunday, January 13, 2008

Here's how inevitable gay marriage is in Maryland, in one form or another.

There was a debate on the issue last week in Annapolis, and the supporters didn't even bother speaking.

True, it wasn't actually a debate over a marriage or civil union bill; it was a General Assembly committee hearing about insurance regulations, not ordinarily one of the more scintillating shows in town.

But make no mistake, this was about gay marriage. By a 12-4 vote, a joint Senate-House committee approved inserting a definition of "domestic partner" into state insurance rules.

And give them credit: The self-appointed defenders of "family values" can see the writing on the wall. Heck, Del. Don Dwyer, R-Glen Burnie, showed up to complain, and he's not even on the committee.

Is this, as the moralists fear, an end-run around the legislature and the courts, which so far have declined to bring civil unions or gay marriage to Maryland? Are administrative rules like this a way to do piecemeal what lawmakers won't do in one fell swoop?

Absolutely, and it's going to work.

There will be plenty of impassioned arguments over gay marriage to come in the next few months, with bills on both sides of the aisle coming up for debate. One would change the constitution so marriage is defined as a union between a man and a woman; another would allow gay couples civil unions, as other states have.

There will surely be amusing moments of political theater. Perhaps one will even match the time county Clerk of the Court Bob Duckworth stormed out of a legislative hearing room after swearing he would never perform a gay marriage ceremony, regardless of the law.

But those debates will come to naught. Both bills will probably fail.

The battle will really be fought -- and won -- in quiet, dry areas like life insurance, health insurance, wills, hospital visitation and child custody.

The revolution will not be televised -- not much, anyway. It will happen in half-empty rooms before committees you've probably never heard of, like Thursday's hearing before the Joint Committee on Administrative, Executive & Legislative Review.

"If they can get two or three more of these things passed, they don't need" a marriage law, said Doug Stiegler, executive director of the Maryland Family Protection Lobby, one of two people who spoke against the insurance regulations. (No points for guessing that the other was a lobbyist for the Catholic Church.)

Exactly right, Doug. Once there is de facto gay marriage, changing the law to reflect that reality (whether we call it marriage or temporarily use a euphemism like "civil union" to appease the religious right) won't seem like such a huge step.

In a hallway after the committee meeting, Mr. Stiegler had an impromptu meeting with two like-minded Republican delegates from the Eastern Shore, Michael Smigiel and Addie Eckardt. There was much shaking of heads and tut-tutting about family values and the mythical "erosion of marriage."

But Mr. Stiegler has a theory about how this will all turn his way.

He calls the drip-drip march toward gay marriage "connecting the dots," comparing it to a picture that reveals itself a pixel at a time. The reason Marylanders can live with it, he said, is they don't yet know how the dots are going to connect.

"As soon as the public starts to understand what the picture looks like," that will change, he promised.

But, I pressed, when will that happen? This is a pretty liberal state, after all.

"I don't know. I don't know," he said.

What he doesn't want to admit is this: Most Marylanders already see the picture the dots are making.

And it seems they're OK with it.