Let’s not get distracted by the process argument

MY VIEW • Are others, including same-sex marriage proponents, helping opponents by ignoring the central issue?

By Christopher Frankonis

The Portland Tribune, Mar 16, 2004, Updated Oct 30, 2009

First, let me chastise the media. On Feb. 25, Colin Fogarty of Oregon Public Broadcasting reported that Multnomah County was examining the issue of same-sex marriage licenses. No other news outlet bothered to pick up the story and let their readers/viewers/listeners know about it.

So for the media, at least, to be joining in on the process-bashing now is at the very least rank hypocrisy and a pile of bull. They should be ethically and professionally ashamed of themselves for it.

That said, we can move on to the concerns some have raised about the process through which Multnomah County reached the historic moment in which it now finds itself.

Even supporters of same-sex marriage have charged that members of the county commission wrongfully sneaked around behind the back of Commissioner Lonnie Roberts, violating (they say) the spirit, if not the letter, of Oregon’s open meetings law.

If that were the case (and I don’t believe it is), the board regularly violates the spirit of that law, since it’s already been pointed out that the commissioners routinely work on various items only with those on the board that support them. Reportedly, Roberts himself has done it too, so for him to be a crybaby now É well, that’s also rank hypocrisy.

Others have raised the hypothetical situation in which the commissioners used this same process to outlaw same-sex marriage.

Well, hold on a minute so we can get the facts straight: The county in effect had already “outlawed” gay marriage by having a policy of refusing to issue same-sex marriage licenses.

What happened here is that County Attorney Agnes Sowle determined that the county was violating the Oregon Constitution by this policy, so Chairwoman Diane Linn Ñ heeding the analysis of the attorney, and entirely within her administrative discretion Ñ told the county clerk to change the policy to comply with the attorney’s view of the constitutional issues.

Had the county attorney instead determined that the existing policy of refusing same-sex marriage licenses was kosher, the board simply would have had to do nothing at all to “outlaw” gay marriage.

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