Oregon county bans all marriages

http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/sto...2128901416.htm

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Originally Posted by AP

PORTLAND, Oregon, March 23 (Reuters) - In a new twist in the battle over same-sex marriage roiling the United States, a county in Oregon has banned all marriages -- gay and heterosexual -- until the state decides who can and who cannot wed.

The last marriage licenses were handed out in Benton County at 4 p.m. local time (7:00 p.m. EST) on Tuesday. As of Wednesday, officials in the county of 79,000 people will begin telling couples applying for licenses to go elsewhere until the gay marriage debate is settled.

"It may seem odd," Benton County Commissioner Linda Modrell told Reuters in a telephone interview, but "we need to treat everyone in our county equally."

State Attorney General Hardy Myers said in a statement that he was "very pleased" with Benton County's decision. "It is my sincere hope that legal process will provide clarity for each of Oregon's counties."

The three County commissioners had originally decided to start handing out gay marriage licenses this week but on Monday reversed that decision amid a growing firestorm of lawsuits across the country, and decided instead to put a temporary halt to all marriages.

Rebekah Kassell, a spokeswoman for Basic Rights Oregon, a pro-gay marriage group, told Reuters; "It is certainly a different way for county commissioners to respect their constitutional obligation to apply the law equally to everyone.

"We appreciate that they are willing to say they are not going to participate in discrimination."

'PERPLEXED' BY DECISION

Tim Nashif, the spokesman for the Defense of Marriage Coalition, said; "Oregon not only has the only county in the nation issuing illegal (same-sex) marriage licenses, we probably have the only county in the nation refusing to issue marriage licenses at all."

"We are happy Benton County is not going to violate the law by issuing illegal marriage licenses, but we are perplexed as to why they would not issue legal licenses," he added.

Benton County, whose county seat is Corvallis, is home to Oregon State University and is seen as a bastion of liberalism.

Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union said it would file a lawsuit on Wednesday against Oregon or an unnamed state entity over the state's failure to register the more than 2,550 marriage licenses issued by Portland's Multnomah County to gay couples since March 3.

Multnomah County, the state's most populous, is the only jurisdiction in the United States that continues to issue same-sex marriage licenses. Local governments from San Francisco to New Paltz, New York, have halted the practice amid lawsuits and protests.

In New Mexico, a judge on Tuesday issued a temporary restraining order to stop a Sandoval County clerk from issuing more marriage certificates to gay and lesbian couples.

Victoria Dunlap, the clerk for the county to the southwest of Santa Fe, issued 66 marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples on Feb. 20th before the state's attorney general issued a statement declaring the marriages invalid.

The temporary injunction will be in effect until a state district judge can hear the case on the subject. The case is scheduled to be heard on April 2nd.

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Interesting development, wouldn't you say? If more places ban ALL marriage, does anyone think that the government would be forced to withdraw its sponsorship of hetero marriages as well and go to civil unions for legal recognition?

This is getting ridiculous. Why are a handful of people with too much power fighting this battle in entirely the wrong way? Let's ban homosexuality! Let's ban all marriage! Let's just start marrying gay couples out of the blue! Let's ammend the fuckin' constitution!

Why not approach this with a little civility? I'm 100% for gay marriage, but these exploits are worsening the case, not strengthening it.

I think it's sort of the, "Please, Daddy?!?" nag with these sort of things. If you bug your parents enough these days you usually get what you want to shut you up. :)

*pulls out two six shooters* NOBODY GETTIN' HITCHED IN MY COUNTY THEY WON'T THEY WON'T *POW POW POW POW*

That was my best online prospector immitation.

From what I've learned, marriage is under god, not the state.

Someone is gonna have hell to pay for this, I don't care who it is, someone is gonna pay! Just watch what'll happen next.

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Originally Posted by Mr-K

*pulls out two six shooters* NOBODY GETTIN' HITCHED IN MY COUNTY THEY WON'T THEY WON'T *POW POW POW POW*

That was my best online prospector immitation.

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You forgot YEEEEEHAAAAAW!

bahahaha, you crazy americans and your messed up situations

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Originally Posted by cka

bahahaha, you crazy americans and your messed up situations

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Ha! You crazy Canadians and your... um... money! No, wait, that's not right. Your pootine(sp)! Jerks!

Maybe ending all state sponsered marriages is the solution to this problem, it'll stop marriage for couples who arn't prepared to get married (just do it for the benefits or whatever) and maybe fix up the extremely high divorce rates that have been fucking our society (maybe just a little).

Well, it's a neat twist, and I dig that it's being done to show the inequality of not allowing gays to marry.

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Originally Posted by Mike

Ha! You crazy Canadians and your... um... money! No, wait, that's not right. Your pootine(sp)! Jerks!

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It's spelt 'poutine' just so you know for next time. :lol:

You Americans sure got quite the interesting situation there. The simple solution is to move up here to Canada. Seriously though, this is gonna get really messy unless a compromise is reached soon.

Thats funny! As! Hell! :lol: :lol: :lol:

On the one hand, we're supposed to treat everyone equally. On the other hand, we're supposed to tell this one group over here that they're not good enough. Tell you what, we'll just stop entirely until you all sort it out.

Way to go, small Oregon county who's name I forget! :lol:

Seriously, I approve 100%. It's not just lateral thinking, it's lateral action well taken.

James

I think it's funny looking at this from another angle, Bush says gays can't marry, now Oregon says nobody can marry. See now if every state was doing this, then that means equal rights for everyone, including gays of course.

Marriage is too overrated anyway. :p

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Originally Posted by voltz

Marriage is too overrated anyway. :p

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Not when it's to the right person for the right reasons. :)

So... if marriage is outlawed, is polygamy alright then?

Voltz, I hate your fucking avatar. I was so scared of her when I was a kid... :(
...though, I'll probably just get used to it.

Honestly, I'm damn sick of this whole argument. The way I see it: Gay Marriages are outlawed means I say, "Good. I'm not gay and I don't agree with homosexuality. Still, nothing's changed. I'm going back to bed." Gay marriages are not outlawed means I say, "Oh, well. Gay marriages aren't recognized by my religion, so I don't care. I'm going back to bed."
This is almost as bad as OJ.

This is funny as hell, and a great way to handle it, IMHO.

I still say that until people who are against homosexual marriage can produce ONE example of how marriage will be damaged by two gay people getting married, they have no business standing in the way. I'm also really torn on how this is all going to turn out. The more logical part of me says that in a few months we'll be past this and it will all be forgotten. However, a deeper part of me says that the genie has been let out of the bottle, if you will, and that now marriage for homosexual couples is down to simply when, not if.

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Originally Posted by shidoshi

This is funny as hell, and a great way to handle it, IMHO.

I still say that until people who are against homosexual marriage can produce ONE example of how marriage will be damaged by two gay people getting married, they have no business standing in the way. I'm also really torn on how this is all going to turn out. The more logical part of me says that in a few months we'll be past this and it will all be forgotten. However, a deeper part of me says that the genie has been let out of the bottle, if you will, and that now marriage for homosexual couples is down to simply when, not if.

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who knows. Our depression may end up like the depression that germany had pre-WW2, ending with some sort of idoit being put into power to fix things who ends up putting a price on gay peoples' heads or something. People are getting so sick of things that are being done now, all it would take is for things to get worse and someone to take advantage of that.

You know, I hate to be the one to look at Ironplant's comment and immediately draw the paralell to GWB, but I have to. "ending with some sort of idoit being put into power to fix things" He's been in power for a few years now. He isn't Hitler. But there are just too many bad feelings I get when I look back at what Bush has done. The Patriot Act, the War in Iraq (which I believe will eventually turn out to be a good thing, but he never once convinced me or much of the free world that this was actually necesary.), trying to amend the constitution something like 5 times, and also trying to bully other nations into supporting the war in Iraq. Not to mention his total disregard for whats happening with the environment.

Anyway, good for that Oregon county. It's ideas like that which will force the issue.

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Originally Posted by ChaoofNee

Voltz, I hate your fucking avatar. I was so scared of her when I was a kid... :(
...though, I'll probably just get used to it.

Honestly, I'm damn sick of this whole argument. The way I see it: Gay Marriages are outlawed means I say, "Good. I'm not gay and I don't agree with homosexuality. Still, nothing's changed. I'm going back to bed." Gay marriages are not outlawed means I say, "Oh, well. Gay marriages aren't recognized by my religion, so I don't care. I'm going back to bed."
This is almost as bad as OJ.

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ChaoofNee + 1 (Common Sense)

Why would gays want to be married anyway? So they, too, can lose half their stuff when they realize the person they married isn't going to change and get a divorce? WTF? Gay alimony. There's something.

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Originally Posted by IronPlant

who knows. Our depression may end up like the depression that germany had pre-WW2, ending with some sort of idoit being put into power to fix things who ends up putting a price on gay peoples' heads or something. People are getting so sick of things that are being done now, all it would take is for things to get worse and someone to take advantage of that.

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What in the hell are you talking about? We haven't had a depression in 7 decades, and the only idiot that could be put into office in the near future is John Kerry.

The importance of marriage has already been deluded quite a bit, in part, if not a great deal, due to folks just getting married for the sake of getting married. Drive-through marriages certainly aren't helping, and the quickie celebrity ones that last a day are just doing WORLDS of good for it... Gays certainly couldn't do more damage to it than any of that, going by the "OMG GAY MARRIAGE WILL KILL MARRIAGE" arguement.

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Originally Posted by Jeremy

The importance of marriage has already been deluded quite a bit, in part, if not a great deal, due to folks just getting married for the sake of getting married. Drive-through marriages certainly aren't helping, and the quickie celebrity ones that last a day are just doing WORLDS of good for it... Gays certainly couldn't do more damage to it than any of that, going by the "OMG GAY MARRIAGE WILL KILL MARRIAGE" arguement.

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The gays that want to marry want to so badly, I don't think they're going to abuse it. They're had to fight and struggle, and aren't winning, just to be legally married. Unlike the rest of us, they can't just go out, get hitched, and decide it's shit less than a year later.
Not to say some of them wouldn't abuse it later on, but right now, I think if they're putting so much effort into trying to get the right they're going to appreciate it a bit more than the rest of us.

:shrug:

For me, I'm against Gay Marriage for belief reasons. As far as my stance on things, I'm definitely leaning towards something similar to what Oregon is doing. I almost feel that I would rather marriage be dropped from gov. period, than to have Gay Marriage be allowed.

With Civil Unions, they can be governed by different rules since civil unions != marraige. For instance when it comes to allowing people to make decisions for you in a medical situation, you could set it up for a friend to do it if you are on bad terms with family, and they would also have the extra rights to visit you in the hospital. Roommates who feel they will be living together for a while could use a civil union to register as a singal household which would allow them to better manage their finances and resources.

There are tons of benefits that could be had.

Meanwhile marriage can be governed and managed by churches, and without the tie of benefits, then people might start to get married for the right reasons.

The only question this will bring of longrun is after analysis, will some of the financial benefits of civil unions be worthwhile to the government.

i'm almost torn on the subject myself. I've been brought up on a very, very loose religious foundation and have come to have my own beliefs. For those reasons, I don't initially think gays should marry. However, I think they do deserve equal rights in general.

I don't think I can convey my wishes accurately, and they aren't so concrete to me yet, either. I just somehow think that their marriages should be more of a legal acknowledgement, but I don't want my own to just be that. It's a touchy subject and my feelings are too mixed for me to draw a single conclusion.

I'm not for them, and I'm not against them. For now I'm going to be an opinionated but mostly nuetral observer and hope someone can find a solution to please all parties (a bit ambitious of me to hope for, but this needs dealt with properly. Ignoring it isn't going to solve the issue at hand).

Doesn't this country run on the principle of Church and State being seperate entities? This is all so annoying. From both sides, I don't get the urgency and logic behind this issue.

The Fed should welcome gay marriage and rake in the new tax revenue.
The people shouldn't give a single coil of shit if two grown men want to spend thousands of hours and dollars planning for a single event to officially declare in front of a priest and audience that they have exclusive cornholing rights to each other.

No matter what happens at the end of this, the divorce rate will still probably be 50% anyway.

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Originally Posted by dog$

Doesn't this country run on the principle of Church and State being seperate entities? This is all so annoying. From both sides, I don't get the urgency and logic behind this issue.

The Fed should welcome gay marriage and rake in the new tax revenue.
The people shouldn't give a single coil of shit if two grown men want to spend thousands of hours and dollars planning for a single event to officially declare in front of a priest and audience that they have exclusive cornholing rights to each other.

No matter what happens at the end of this, the divorce rate will still probably be 50% anyway.

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Way to sum it up. I can't really disagree with much, there. :lol:

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Originally Posted by IronPlant

who knows. Our depression may end up like the depression that germany had pre-WW2, ending with some sort of idoit being put into power to fix things who ends up putting a price on gay peoples' heads or something. People are getting so sick of things that are being done now, all it would take is for things to get worse and someone to take advantage of that.

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If you replace "gays" with "the religious right," I'm down.

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Originally Posted by Yoshi

What in the hell are you talking about? We haven't had a depression in 7 decades, and the only idiot that could be put into office in the near future is John Kerry.

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We're in recession, jobs suck, and even Republicans will tell you that W is a chimpanzee.