David Blankenhorn has recorded a video
in opposition to Minnesota's proposed constitutional amendment which
would limit marriage to heterosexual couples.
In 2010, Blankenhorn, the founder and
president of the conservative group Institute for American Values,
served as an expert witness in favor of California's gay marriage ban
at the trial challenging the constitutionality of Proposition 8. And
he argued against gay nuptials in his 2007 book The Future of
Marriage.
But in a New York Times op-ed
published in June, Blankenhorn reversed course.
In the 2-minute video released
Thursday, Blankenhorn says the amendment would harm society.
“I came to a stronger appreciation in
my own mind of the importance of accepting gay and lesbian people and
couples,” he says. “There are powerful reasons to believe that
we will be a better society if we include gay and lesbian people and
their relationships as full and equal parts of society.”
“If you just bam put it in the
constitution, forever and a day it's going to be this one thing. I
think it's very harmful. Very harmful. Now let's try to learn to
share this space that we have together.” (The video is embedded on
this page. Visit
our video library for more videos.)