On Saturday, all but 2 NAACP board
members voted in favor of a resolution endorsing gay marriage. One
of the dissenters might have been the Rev. Keith Ratliff Sr., the
board's most vociferous opponent of gay rights.
The largely symbolic move was
made during the group's quarterly board meeting in Miami and
comes a little over a week after President Barack Obama made his
historic shift from supporting civil unions to marriage for gay and
lesbian couples.
The resolution stated in part: “We
support marriage equality consistent with equal protection under the
law provided under the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States
Constitution.”
A breakdown of how the 64-member board
voted was not available, but one of those most likely to have voted
against the resolution is Ratliff.
Ratliff ministers at the Maple
Street Missionary Baptist Church in Des Moines, Iowa and is the
president of the Iowa-Nebraska chapter of the NAACP.
He was among the first to condemn the
Iowa Supreme Court's 2009 unanimous ruling legalizing gay nuptials,
speaking out during a prayer rally on the steps of the Capitol
organized by the Iowa Family Policy Center, which has since folded
into Bob Vander Plaat's The Family Leader.
“Let them understand, oh God, that
your way is the way that we must live,” he said at the gathering,
“that separation of church and state did not mean that man should
live unholy.”
Ratliff would go on to endorse Vander
Plaats in his unsuccessful bid to become governor of the state.
“He's talked about the importance of
defending the institution of marriage,” he said during a press
conference. “That takes backbone and determination. That's what I
want in my governor – and that's why I'm standing here today to
show my support for him.”
In a Des Moines Register
editorial, written by Ratliff and three clergy, the group said: “To
anyone who reads and believes the Bible, there is no room for
compromise on the issue of homosexuality. To those who look to
'natural law,' homosexuality will always be un-natural and un-healthy
for a myriad of obvious reasons. … The Iowa Supreme Court has now
issued its opinion, but it fundamentally changes nothing. Now it is
up to the people and their elected officials to correct the court's
error through the constitutional amendment process.” The four
religious leaders called for “Biblically justified civil
resistance.”
At a 2011 rally held on the steps of
the Iowa Statehouse, Ratliff told about 500 people that he was
insulted at the suggestion that the late Rev. Martin Luther King
would support LGBT rights.
Ratliff claimed that gay rights
advocates had “hijacked” the civil rights debate.
“For deviant behavior is not the same
thing as being denied the right to vote because of the color of one's
skin,” Ratliff told the crowd. “For deviant behavior is not the
same thing as being denied where one may sit on a bus.”
“What an insult to the civil rights
movement.”
“While I enjoy the conversations of
those who love to suggest that if the late Rev. Doctor Martin Luther
King were alive he would be supportive of gay, lesbian marriage and
bisexual and transgender relationships, well, there is nothing in
King's writings or speeches that suggest that.”
“Gay community, stop hijacking the
civil rights movement,” he added. (The video is embedded in the
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