And Vermont Becomes Four....

by Michael Jones · 2009-04-07 08:41:00 UTC
Topics:

Vermont marriage

Vermont legislators have just done what many thought was unthinkable - they voted in both chambers (the House and the Senate) to override Governor Jim Douglas's veto and enact full marriage equality in Vermont. With that, Vermont has now become the fourth state, and the second in four days, to make full marriage equality a reality.

Perhaps more importantly, Vermont has become the first state to enact marriage equality through the legislature.  That's right, no "activist judges" allowed to this party.  This is full-on the responsibility of the legislature, which did its due diligence in listening to the voters of Vermont (who overwhelmingly favor civil marriage for same-sex couples).  Vermont's action today goes to show that no one politician - in this case Jim Douglas, but elsewhere any number of individuals - can stop civil rights progress from happening.

The Senate overrode the Governor's veto in a 28-5 vote, and the Vermont House voted to override his veto by a vote of 100-49, giving supporters of marriage equality the two-thirds vote they needed in each chamber in order to make marriage equality a reality.

To revisit a post we wrote last night...does Iowa, and now Vermont, indicate that we've reached a tipping point on the issue of same-sex marriage?  Has momentum now swung in favor of marriage equality?

That may be hard to say, but we've now had three states in the past six months (Connecticut, Iowa and now Vermont) recognize same-sex marriage.  That's a pretty phenomenal turn of events from just a few years ago, and proves that 2009 is fast becoming the year of marriage equality.

Michael Jones is a Change.org Editor. He has worked in the field of human rights communications for a decade, most recently for Harvard Law School.
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