Gay Marriage Amendment Fails in the U.S. House

The U.S. House of Representatives voted down a proposal to move forward with a Constitutional amendment barring gay marriage. Not only would such an amendment be discriminatory, but would also be a move that anyone with any grasp of national politics would understand as being an exercise in futility. To amend our constitution to ban gay marriage, a winning vote in the House would have to be followed up by a 2/3rds majority vote in the Senate (which it most likely would not get) and a 3/4ths majority vote from the states (which it definitely wouldn't get). In short, the doomed process would be a massive waste of taxpayer money on something that, in the grand scheme of importance to our current society, is a political posturing non-issue.

I'm sorry to report that all seven of Alabama's representatives voted to go forward with this legislation. I understand why they did it; coming on the heels of the state referendum on the issue, there is no doubt that the vast majority of each representative's constituency wanted this attempt to pass. However, it would have still been good to see one of them stand up and say, "I respect the votes of the people of Alabama on their statewide gay marriage referendum, but this amendment is not for the best of our entire nation."

Am I asking the representatives to vote against their personal feelings on gay marriage as well? I don't think so. Even if one is personally against homosexual marriages, one can still recognize several truths which would make a constitutional amendment against the practice unwise. For one, an argument can be made (quite strongly, I believe) that such an amendment would effectively make homosexuals second class citizens. History has taught us that doing such is, almost without fail, later proven to be the poorest of practices. One can also take my earlier economic approach, as a common sense assessment of national sentiment toward the issue shows us that this amendment would be doomed from the beginning; even if it staggers off Capitol Hill, it is nearly impossible to realize a situation where thirty-eight states would pass the proposal.