Ask and Ye Shall Receive

The stellar new blog Prawfs Blawg notes the passage in Connecticut of Civil Unions legislation which grants gay couples virtually all the same rights as heterosexual married couples (Balkinization points out the one niggling exception). So, they ask, since this bill was passed via a democratic branch of government, how will the far right flame this bill? As they put it:

"Query: The theocrats have attacked VT and MA court opinions as judicial meddling in political questions. I wonder how they will attack this one? Perhaps they will finally admit to the real issue: the culture wars have nothing to do with principles like states' rights or judicial activism. Rather, it is all about politics, and as soon as those principles are no longer useful, they will cast them aside and find some new reason to criticize legislation supported by the majority."

Admit they have no principles? Haha, don't be silly! The Family Research Council instead argues that a bill passed through the democratic legislature isn't really democratic at all:

"The Family Institute of Connecticut and the Connecticut Catholic Conference recently announced the results of a jointly commissioned poll which shows that seventy-six percent of Connecticut residents want the chance to vote on a constitutional amendment defining marriage in Connecticut as the union of one man and one woman. The Connecticut house should reject the senate bill and Governor Jodi Rell (R) should veto any civil union legislation that reaches her desk. If legislators are fearful of defending the cornerstone of society, then they should let the citizens have an opportunity to do so by voting on an amendment to the state's constitution defining marriage and its benefits as between one man and one woman.

You got that? The new standard is, if it isn't in a referendum, it isn't really democratic. And now along with our activist judges and activist journalists, we can add activist legislators as well. How's that for a principle?