Mass. House votes to let out-of-state gays marry

From AP - my take after the article:

Out-of-state gay couples should soon be allowed to marry in Massachusetts.

The Massachusetts House voted 118-35 Tuesday to repeal a 1913 law that bans couples from marrying in the state if the unions would not be legal in their own states.

The Senate also voted for the repeal earlier this month, and Gov. Deval Patrick has said he would approve it. The measure required one more procedural vote in each chamber before being forwarded to the governor.

I've been saying for years that neither our national groups, nor state-based advocates of gay marriage, are preparing for the day when one state will be forced to recognize another's marriages of gay couples. When that day comes, it will be very interesting to see what the "plan" is to convince members of Congress not to walk. Far too many members of Congress, for my comfort level, said they were opposed to the Federal Marriage Amendment because "it wasn't necessary yet." That could change the day Massachusetts lets gay couples come from all over America to be wed. And I don't hear of anyone doing any real work at the national level to change the public's, or congress', mind about marriage.

I think it's great that Massachusetts is doing this, don't get me wrong. I'd just like to have the right to marry for longer than five minutes (and would rather not lose every other civil right in the process). But hey, at least the gays are organizing to boycott all the Human Rights Campaign national dinners since transgendered people were left out of ENDA (legislation banning job discrimination against gays at the federal level - it's currently legal under federal law to fire someone for being gay). So when we lose the right to marry, and every other right, permanently, after the constitutional amendment is passed, we can look back on the great lasagna boycott with pride. (Well, to be fair, we won't all lose the right to marry - straight transgendered people can already marry (and do), and will still be able to marry even if the federal marriage amendment passes. But I'm sure they'll forgo their civil rights in solidarity until we get ours, lest we have to boycott their dinners too.)

Sometimes I wonder if we deserve to be free.