Unless you just crawled out from under a rock, you’re well aware that the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a ban on gay marriage violates the U.S. Constitution, and that this will doubtless have an effect on North Carolina’s Amendment One. The ruling doesn’t mean Amendment One is overturned and gay marriage is going to happen in North Carolina just yet. Nonetheless, Attorney General Roy Cooper announced he was no longer going to defend the law, saying the traditional marriage folks had exhausted all their arguments and continuing to defend the amendment in court was a losing battle.
Cooper’s announcement, that gay marriage in North Carolina is inevitable, has made him something of a hero among the gay left. The court’s decision has also allowed him to take the most politically expedient position possible, a godsend for someone whose campaign for Governor is all but announced. By conceding defeat on the gay marriage front, Cooper endears himself to the progressive left and to fiscally responsible moderates. At the same time, he can plausibly tell conservatives he did everything he could to defend the amendment in court, fighting until it was no longer reasonable to do so. So, there!
Now, the General Assembly could appoint lawyers to defend the amendment if Cooper won’t do it, but Cooper said that would be a “futile gesture.” He’s probably right, but the legislature might call his bluff anyway. For reasons I’ll explain below, there’s little political risk and it’s a way to make Cooper look small. Also, by not hiring lawyers of their own, they’re conceding that Cooper and the Justice Department did everything they could do.
Some suggest the GOP just wants this issue put to bed. The gay marriage side won, it’s time conservatives concede defeat so we can all move on to more pressing issues, like transgender rights. But there’s still enough juice left in the traditional marriage issue to motivate conservatives for one more election, at least in North Carolina. While there hasn’t been any polling recently, gay marriage supporters in North Carolina are still almost certainly a minority. Traditional marriage support is probably a plurality. This is not surprising when one considers that North Carolina is more conservative and more religious than the nation as a whole.
Then there are those who are “unsure”: half of them honestly do not care about the issue either way, while the other half are privately against gay marriage but don’t want to say so. Add in this group and traditional marriage probably commands majority support in North Carolina; after all it is well-known that surveys consistently find support for gay marriage to be overstated. So, Tillis and Berger might not be afraid to continue fighting on this issue.
If the General Assembly takes this action, it will certainly become an issue in the U.S. Senate race. Or will it? Somehow, I don’t see Hagan using this to attack Tillis. Instead, I think it might cause social conservatives to rally around Tillis, who in the face of criticism can say he just wants to make sure the people of North Carolina receive adequate representation, that the Attorney General just can’t pick and choose which laws he wants to enforce.
Yes, gay marriage in North Carolina is inevitable and fighting it is probably a lost cause. But sometimes fighting a lost cause can reap political benefits, and this is one of them. The GOP leadership might not be able to pass up this opportunity to rally conservatives and score some points against the ambitious Attorney General by doing the job he doesn’t want to do.
John Wynne is the “conservative voice” at PoliticsNC, where he also provides polling analysis and commentary on legislative campaigns. When not writing about politics, he enjoys gardening and listening to opera. Contact: johncwynne@gmail.com.
“…4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a ban on gay marriage violates the U.S. Constitution, and that this will doubtless have an effect on North Carolina’s Amendment One. The ruling doesn’t mean Amendment One is overturned …”
Well, yeah, it kinda does mean that. Since Amendment One is UN-Constitutional, that makes it illegal. No, it hasn’t made it to the Supreme Court yet; and it might not ever. since every Circuit Court in the land seems to be generating the same sort of ruling about gay marriage bans.
But why? Why is this such a hot button issue? All that is being asked is to be treated equally under the law in a partnership agreement with another person. That’s all. Sin, God, nor morality have a place. It’s about equality under the law in a contractual agreement. Something that heretofore hasn’t been recognized.
So yes, this legislature and this issue are going to lose and it isn’t “…probably a lost cause” it is a definite lost cause since there is another more binding covenant that is being ignored. It starts with, “Congress shall make no law….” Amendment One seeks to define the marital contract on theology and that violates the First Amendment.
So every person in this legislature can crusade as they so choose, struting and posturing as they go along about how they are fighting the good fight and not squandering the public dime in an already deficit laden budget. Yes, they could fund schools better or give even better raises to teachers. Or put the money into roads. Expenditures that will actually have some benefit for the people of North Carolina.
It’s a real shame that with a group that continually haranges on the premise of “common sense”, it is the one thing that is completely lacking in their decision making.
Shorter version of your article: “It’s never too late to be on the wrong side of history for NC Republicans.”
John, John, John……….
Your saying that “While there hasn’t been any polling recently, gay marriage supporters in North Carolina are still almost certainly a minority” is a real reach. I guess it hasn’t occurred to you yet that just about every political wonk has been shocked by how quickly the nation has shifted its view toward support (or at least tolerance) of gay marriage in the last 2 years. And with NC being a net in-migration state, a better guess would have been that our citizens are evenly split, if not actually leaning toward the tolerant side.
But wrt: your cheerleading the NCGOP to go to the mat on this matter in court, all I have to say to you and them is, once again, the Dirty Harry line: “Go ahead. Make my day.”
If they try to argue this matter further, they may indeed solidify support from their core conservative base. But they, especially Tillis, won’t GAIN new votes that way; they will only LOSE votes from key segments, i.e., moderates, independents, younger voters, women, unaffiliateds, and undecideds. And the younger voters, who are overwhelmingly “cool” with gay marriage, won’t forget for some time to come which political party was stuck in the mud and got all holier-than-thou and bent-out-of-shape on this issue.
Why bother with legislatures at all? Eliminate them and go full out electronic democracy.
Nothing says, “I’m not really a conservative, just a theocrat” like telling elected leaders to ignore their primary oath to the US Constitution and argue for laws where EVERY court that has reviewed them in the past year has held them unconstitutional.
Goldwater or Falwell?
One was a conservative. One wasn’t.