And here I thought my state was going to be the last one to go down fighting. Wait, it may, at the expense of expanding gun rights. Perhaps there is a gun rights bill that conservatives don't like very much.
In an unusual twist, it appears Nebraska almost recognised marriage equality with a law designed to expand gun rights. More below the orange cloud of marriage-equality gunpowder smoke.
The Omaha World-Herald reports in an article entitled I Think We Just Recognized Gay Marriage that a bill designed to expand gun rights (by allowing military spouses with concealed carry permits stationed in Nebraska to immediately receive a concealed permit here, rather than existing law which requires out-of-state residents to wait 180 days). That bill passed first reading 37-4 in the Unicameral.
Then an amendment was offered by Senator Paul Schumacher of Columbus to the bill to expand rights to anyone receiving Federal benefits of a military member. Senator Ernie Chambers of Omaha, who voted against the bill but enthusiastically supports marriage equality, voted in favour of the amendment, which passed 38-0. His support for the amendment should have been a red flag to conservatives in the Unicameral, but they blindly soldiered on to pass the amendment.
From the article above:
Sen. John Murante of Gretna, who did not vote for or against the bill, expressed concern that the Schumacher amendment could be used to challenge Nebraska’s ban on same-sex marriage.
“I think we just recognized gay marriage,” he said moments after the vote. “We are now using the federal government’s standard for who receives marriage benefits.”
Sen. Dave Bloomfield of Hoskins, who sponsored the measure, said he does not think the amendment language will open up the state’s marriage law to attack. The state constitution definitively says gay marriage is not recognized within Nebraska’s borders, he added.
The forms that a gun permit applicant fill out ask nothing about the gender of an applicant’s spouse, Bloomfield said.
Nebraska's constitutional amendment barring recognition of same-sex marriages is already under court challenge, though it does look like we want to go down as the last state standing on this issue. (It's not like the state has better things to do with our tax money than fight a lost cause in the Federal courts.)
Afterward, Chambers, who holds a law degree, declined to give his legal opinion of the legislation that advanced to the second of three rounds of debate.
“The bill says what it says and does what it does,” he said.
The full article is available at the World-Herald link above. Let's see where the NRA comes in on this bill. The NRA has long been opposed to marriage equality (because that has everything to do with gun rights).
Radio station KBIE in Nebraska City reports that with the flappadoodle over marriage equality, he pulled his bill (LB190). He will re-introduce it after the US Supreme Court hears upcoming arguments on marriage equality.
So, is this a new path to oppose loosening gun regulations? Just attach marriage equality legislation amendments to bills to get the gun bill pulled?
Several of the NRA's board members (including Ted Nugent and Oliver North) are on record as comparing marriage equality to such things as NAMBLA. Board member Cleta Mitchell led the charge to kick out the conservative group GOProud from CPAC; other board members stated she is stridently opposed to allowing the group to participate.
In 2002, American Spectator writer and NRA board member Grover Norquist said:
. . . liberals "don't want [men] to date girls" and gun owners don't get as much media coverage because "we don't have annual parades so that everyone can appreciate that gun ownership is an alternative lifestyle"
as reported in the blog
Equality Matters.
Board member and former Missouri Governor Matt Blunt supported that state's constitutional ban on marriage equality. Board member Wayne Anthony Ross referred to gays as "degenerates."
Board member Larry Craig co-sponsored the Marriage Protection Amendment, which would have amended the US Constitution to prohibit marriage equality. (His political career ended over lewd conduct in a men's bathroom.)
So this might be another avenue to get the NRA to slow loosening of gun regulations, by attaching marriage equality amendments to proposed laws.
3:56 PM MT: Fixed BB code errors. Darn computer should do that for me.