On Sat. Night, at the national convention, the Log Cabin Republicans will honor the 6 Republicans legislators in Vermont who voted to approve the new marriage rights for same sex couples.  They all voted for passage in the regular debate and in the override session to override the veto the Republican governor had issued.  Like our national friends we applaud those individuals who resisted the pressure from all sides and voted with their hearts to provide equal rights to more people in Vermont.

Why Common Ground Failed

We took the time to talk with each legislator that voted no on all the common ground bills during the 2009 legislative session.  We found that all of the bills had 2 common problems

1. There was not enough time to prepare the legislature for the bills and ensure they were ready to accept and vote favorably for them
2. They all came with “gay” theme and seemed to create special groups which most legislators oppose

In addition to these general feelings each bill had its’ own troubles.

Right for co-habitating people to sue:
This bill was introduced into the Senate Judiciary.  This panel will have a hard time with anything that could be considered “gay” legislation.  Must be attempted based on Common law statues.

Anti-decimation in Housing/Employment
This bill had 2 problems

1. It created a special group
2. The housing portion has issues with guidelines from HUD

Hospital visitation/inheritance rights
This bill had 2 challenges:

1. It created a special group
2. Most legislators felt that inheritance is already easy to obtain with various tools already available to anyone

Adoption rights for co-habitating people to adopt based on State custody for the minor or adoptee parental permission.
This bill had issues primarily due to misinformation.  Many legislators saw this as just allowing gay couples to adopt and were opposed.  Several mentioned that while singles could adopt, co-habitating couples were less stable than married couples and they did not think that was in the best interest of the child.

In addition to these notes, we found that many legislators felt that some or all of these protections were needed, but the language needs fine-tuned.  They also felt a campaign to inform the public would be good since many of these legislators are in swing districts and voting for these bills would have been political ammunition in the next election cycle.

We at Log Cabin Rebuplicans believe we have come up with a strategy that will help to pass much of the “common ground initiative” legislation .  This will include changes to the legislation and changes in sponsorship.  Additionally we believe that we need an educational campaign to help the public to understand what each bill does and to help insulate the republican legislatures that sign on to sponsor or choose to vote in support of these ammended bills.