News & Activities

Lavender Greens Fight Marriage Amendment: The biggest threat to the Wisconsin LGBT community at present is the proposed amendment to the Wisconsin Constitution which would ban same-sex marriage and and prohibit any legal status that is "substantially similar" to marriage. It would deny gay couples--and for that matter, all unmarried couples--the rights, protections, and responsibilities of marriage. Even for people who oppose marriage for gay couples, this amendment goes too far."

Many think that there should be civil unions, domestic partner insurance, hospital visitation, legal benefits, etc. even if they oppose a formal marriage. Proponents of this amendment say it won't affect civil unions, but the experience of other states with similar wording show that it does prohibit them. And they know it too. They refuse to allow wording that specifies domestic partnership insurance would not be affected, for example.This is an amendment designed pure and simple to institutionalize bigotry and insure second class citizenship for a specific group of our citizens.

The Lavender Green Caucus of the Wisconsin Green Party is supporting and working with Action Wisconsin which is leading the opposition to this amendment.

The amendment passed both houses of the state legislature in the 2004 session. It must again pass both houses in the 2005-06 legislative session in the same form, either in the fall of 2005 or the spring of 2006. it can then go to a statewide referendum in November 2006. It could have been presented in the April 2005 election but the Republicans delayed it because they consider it a device to draw the Christian right and Conservative voters to the polls and they want to defeat our present governor. This shows that the issue is a political ploy for them, not an ideological issue that they want to pass as soon as possible.

Action Wisconsin is working with Democratic legislators and other allies to influence five senators to vote against the amendment, or at the very least to consider an amendment to preserve some rights for our LGBT citizens. Failing that we must convince the voting population of Wisconsin to vote down this hurtful amendment. This is the civil rights issue of our time and it is gratifying to see the Greens solidly in the forefront of this campaign.

Visit the web site of Action Wisconsin for their strategy plans, and to see how you can assist this cause.