New Hampshire Congressman Paul Hodes
has called a paper's refusal to print a gay couple's wedding
announcement “reprehensible,” The Keene Sentinel reported.
The democrat took a swipe at the
Manchester Union Leader's editor, Joseph W. McQuaid, after he
defended the newspaper's refusal to print the wedding announcement
of gay New Hampshire couple Greg Gould and Aurelio Tine. State
lawmakers legalized gay marriage last year.
The paper “should respect the laws of
New Hampshire and allow [Gould and Tine] a place in this newspaper
along with other couples being married this weekend,” Hodes wrote
in a letter addressed to McQuaid.
“The Union Leader's disgraceful
policy of exclusion harkens to a different time in this country when
people were denied opportunity because of their race, religion and
ethnic origin.”
McQuaid, however, has denied claims
that the newspaper is anti-gay.
“This newspaper has never published
wedding or engagement announcements from homosexual couples,” he
said in a statement. “It would be hypocritical of us to do so,
given our belief that marriage is and needs to remain a social and
civil structure between men and women and our opposition to the
recent law legalizing gay marriage.”
Hodes is currently running for the U.S.
Senate.