“It's wrong to put your rights to a
popular vote of the people,” Iowa Senate Majority Leader Michael
Gronstal insisted during an
editorial board meeting with the Des Moines Register.
Gronstal was commenting on charges that
he is obstructing democracy by not allowing a resolution that seeks
to repeal gay marriage in the state from coming up for a vote in the
Democrat-controlled Senate.
Last
week, a similar measure was easily approved by Republicans in the
House.
If approved by lawmakers and voters in
2013, the Iowa Marriage Amendment (IMA) would ban gay marriage, civil
unions, domestic partnerships and any government recognition of gay
and lesbian couples in the state, and thereby repeal the 2009 Iowa
Supreme Court ruling that brought gay marriage to the Midwest.
“We did not put it to a vote of the
people when Iowa took out … the prohibition on interracial
marriage,” Gronstal told reporters. “We did not put the right of
different-race couples to a vote of the people. We didn't put to a
vote of the people whether or not women should be admitted to the
bar. We didn't put to a vote of the people whether Ralph should be
put back into slavery – in the first decision of the Iowa Supreme
Court.”
“I'm not going to put to a vote of
the people anybody's constitutional rights. Because if I can do that
to gay people, I can do it to Catholics, I can do it to Methodists, I
can do it to Baptists, I can do it to blacks, I can do it to
Hispanics. If I can put to a vote of the people, people's
constitutional rights, then you may be popular today - old white guys
like us might be popular today and our rights will be fine - but
someday the baby boom will be gone and there won't be enough old
white guys left to protect us from the tyranny of the majority.”