Moving Forward With Hope and Unity on Marriage Equality
by Ed Mullen, Executive Director of Equality Ohio
I have worked professionally and as a volunteer in law, politics and the LGBT movement for many years. I have had the privilege as a lawyer to represent victims of anti-gay bullying and people who were involved in property or family disputes because they didn’t have the right to marry. I have also had the privilege to be involved in electoral campaigns to get LGBT people elected to office and to protect LGBT civil rights. But there are two defining moments in my life and career that led me to Equality Ohio and working full-time in the LGBT civil rights movement.
The first was in 2008 the night Barack Obama was elected President. I was in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, working on the campaign, and the staff was in a hotel conference room watching the returns come in and dealing with last minute problems at polling places. The news stations called the race for President Obama, and everyone erupted in cheers, stopping what we were doing, hugging each other, and crying with joy. About an hour later, the news announced that Proposition 8, which overturned the California Supreme Court decision granting same-sex couples the right to marry and wrote marriage discrimination into the California Constitution, had passed. Polls had shown it would be a close race in California, but many of the activists I knew on the ground in the campaign were confident they would win, so the loss came as a surprise to me. I stood there in a room full of people still excited and joyous about President Obama’s victory, while I and a few others in the crowd felt kicked in the gut by the passage of Proposition 8. It was a devastating and lonely moment.
The second moment was in December 2010 when Illinois passed the civil union bill through the Illinois House. While I view civil unions as ‘separate but equal’, in 2010, there was no way for a marriage bill to pass in Illinois and civil unions were a step toward marriage that have provided thousands of same-sex couples with important legal rights. Real families, many with children, now have over 500 legal rights in Illinois that they didn’t have before civil unions were passed. Very few “armchair experts” thought we would succeed in getting the civil union bill passed through the House (we expected we could pass it through the Senate and that the Governor would sign it), but we did. That moment was electrifying, and I will never forget being a part of it.
I decided to apply for and ultimately take the position as Executive Director of Equality Ohio because of these experiences and because of my hope and belief that we could have moments of groundbreaking success in Ohio. Equality Ohio was founded in 2005, following the passage of Issue 1, which amended the Ohio Constitution to define marriage as the union between one man and one woman. Our vision is an Ohio where everyone feels at home, and that means an Ohio where lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender residents are treated with full equality legally and socially. That vision includes non-discrimination in housing, employment and public accommodations; it includes safe schools, in particular for LGBT youth; it includes obtaining the right of transgender people to change the gender marker on their birth certificate; it includes the right of same-sex couples to jointly adopt children; and, it includes marriage equality.
These goals are not mutually exclusive, and the work that we do to advance each of these goals lays the groundwork for further civil rights successes. When we do presentations to groups in Wooster, Mansfield, Lima, Chillicothe and other places around the state, we educate people about the LGBT community and the lack of legal protections and rights in Ohio. That increases support for LGBT civil rights generally, not just any one of the specific goals. When we build coalitions with local LGBT groups like Equality Toledo and Equality Springfield, with progressive groups like unions, pro-choice and environmental groups, and with national LGBT groups, those relationships lay the foundation for working together in coalitions to advance a variety of legislative and electoral goals. When we build a mailing list of over 30,000 people around the state and identify voters supportive of LGBT issues around the state, that information can be used to leverage legislative and electoral success on a variety of issues. When we develop relationships with media outlets around the state and an online media presence, it enables us to publicize a wide range of issues to further educate the public.
Our current strategic plan is ambitious for a young organization in a state with a conservative legislature. We have a three-pronged strategy of education, advocacy and electoral engagement to move forward legislation and public support for LGBT issues. The strategic plan was informed by a community meeting with over 60 people from around the state, representing a diverse cross section of Ohio. Our 2012 budget is $440,000 and we have a full-time staff of 5; we do a lot with limited resources, and we could do much more if the community was more supportive financially. National research shows that very few members of the LGBT community (about 4%) financially support an LGBT rights organization, and our resources are dwarfed by the resources of our opponents like Mission America, Citizens for Community Values, the Family Research Council, and the so-called National Organization for Marriage. As we plan to move forward, we must do so recognizing these strengths and limitations.
The goal of marriage equality in Ohio is something that informs all of the work that we do as an organization directly or indirectly. Since last year when marriage equality passed in New York, it has been clear to me that there is an energy and enthusiasm for marriage equality in Ohio and that the time-frame for achieving marriage equality in Ohio seems to have accelerated. Late last year, I began discussions with Freedom to Marry, the national organization that works on marriage equality efforts around the country (and Equality Ohio is part of Freedom to Marry’s “Why Marriage Matters” campaign). My goal was to have Freedom to Marry come into Ohio to engage with Equality Ohio in strategic planning for the marriage effort here -- to bring their expertise and experience to bear, along with the expertise of Ohio activists, in a state that I am hopeful will be the first or one of the first to overturn a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage through the ballot box (while I have a serious issue with civil rights being the subject of popular vote, the fact is that to obtain marriage rights in Ohio, we either need to do it through the ballot box or wait for the moment when -- and if -- the Supreme Court says there is a constitutional right for same-sex couples to marry).
Early this year, we worked with Freedom to Marry to get a number of Ohio Mayors to sign a Freedom to Marry pledge supporting marriage equality. That effort and a related effort to have additional elected officials in Ohio sign a pledge supporting marriage equality apparently inspired a group of people to begin circulating a petition to get a constitutional amendment on the ballot to legalize same-sex marriage in Ohio and repeal the ban. Freedom to Marry, which is staffed by some of the most passionate and strategic people I know, has stated publicly that it does not support the current petition effort and that it promotes a more thorough planning process and public education program before circulating petitions.
I consider many of the people involved in the current petition effort, known as Freedom to Marry Ohio (no relation the the national Freedom to Marry), my friends, and I respect them as advocates for the LGBT community and as intelligent, thoughtful people. But I and Equality Ohio, an organization with a diverse Board representing tens of thousands of community members and allies around the state, have serious concerns about the language, process and timing. In nearly every other state that has waged a marriage equality effort, it has started with a coalition of local, state, and national groups working together -- sharing strategies, sharing expertise, sharing decision-making, and sharing resources.
The concerns we have are shared by the vast majority of people we have surveyed and reached out to, including grassroots activists involved in the LGBT movement all around the state, other Ohio LGBT organizations, progressive allies, national LGBT groups, and major donors in Ohio and nationally necessary to fund the effort. The people we have consulted with are smart, experienced, and fully committed to the goal of marriage equality, and they understand that this will be an epic battle (a pro-marriage equality vote has not yet succeeded in any state) that requires substantial planning and groundwork. We are laying that groundwork every day, but persuading literally hundreds of thousands of people who currently oppose marriage equality to support it (at the same time as there will be extensive efforts to convince people to oppose it) requires resources and an infrastructure that does not yet exist, but that we are working hard to build.
Given these circumstances, Equality Ohio has decided to move forward on the marriage equality effort in three ways in the short term. To be clear, we remain fully committed to our efforts to pass non-discrimination and safe schools legislation, and no state has passed any form of relationship recognition (through the legislature or courts, and potentially through the ballot box this year in Maine) without first passing a non-discrimination law. These public education and legislative efforts will be an important part of the marriage equality strategy.
First, Equality Ohio will conduct polling to determine where Ohio voters stand on marriage equality generally and on the proposed language of the amendment specifically. Without understanding the current level of support and the number of people who need to be persuaded, it is difficult to have a reasoned, fact-based conversation about what the effort to pass marriage equality will involve. The most recent published poll in October 2011 by Pew found that 38% of Ohioans supported marriage equality and 62% supported some type of relationship recognition. This poll has several weaknesses for our purposes -- it polled support for civil unions, which are not a current option; it does not reflect a presumed increase in support for marriage equality that has been noted in polls around the country; and, it does not include the religious freedom language in the proposed amendment. Also, there have been other polls by campaigns and nationally that suggest higher support for marriage equality in Ohio. So, more current polling based on the voters actual choices is important.
Based on experience in other states (where the actual vote in favor of marriage equality has consistently underperformed polls), at least 52% -- more likely 53-54% -- of voters polled would have to support marriage equality for it to pass and the corresponding benchmark for any type of relationship recognition (marriage and civil union support totalled) is 75%. To move the needle in favor of marriage equality only 1 percentage point in Maine (with a much smaller electorate than Ohio), it took a year of work by a full-time staff of 35 paid canvassers/phone-bankers, an extensive media campaign, and substantial funding. Oregon passed a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage the same year as Ohio and the margin there was 5 points smaller (meaning more people in Oregon supported marriage equality than in Ohio), and they have engaged in a public persuasion campaign similar to Maine, but decided that this year was too soon to seek to overturn the amendment and that more public education was needed. It is a very different conversation about how to move forward with marriage equality in Ohio if likely Ohio voters start at 38%, or 44%, or 49% support for marriage equality. To have that conversation, we need the data, and Equality Ohio is working to obtain it.
Second, Equality Ohio will engage in a public and collaborative strategic planning process with our coalition partners on the local, state and national levels to develop over the next several months a plan to achieve full equality in Ohio, including marriage equality. The Human Rights Campaign has offered to co-sponsor town halls throughout Ohio as part of this process. We will approach this plan with a sense of urgency that reflects the enthusiasm of the community, and with a full understanding of how difficult this effort will be. This plan will be informed by the knowledge and experience of LGBT activists in Ohio, allies in Ohio who have run other statewide campaigns, national and state LGBT groups who are fighting these battles in other states such as Maine and Oregon, and any stakeholders who wish to be involved. The goal is to develop a plan that will have substantial buy-in from the community and our allies statewide, including donors, and to develop a coalition infrastructure for moving forward that will include a diverse representation of Ohioans and organizations throughout the state, including Equality Ohio and Freedom to Marry Ohio. This plan will include data-based timelines and benchmarks -- such as polling and financial benchmarks -- for moving forward, and it will reflect appropriate urgency and practicality. It will not be Equality Ohio’s plan, but rather a collaborative plan of our community and allies that will recognize the efforts that have preceded it.
Third, Equality Ohio will engage in a review of the proposed ballot language. We believe that language to amend the Ohio Constitution should be reviewed by constitutional law experts and by lawyers at the ACLU, HRC and Lambda Legal, who have worked on these issues in other states. We also believe that there are possible alternatives to the current proposed language that would bring together a broader coalition of groups and gain the support of many people who believe that the current proposed language is materially flawed. Ohio State Law Professor Marc Spindelman has agreed to chair a committee to propose possible language and concepts for the constitutional amendment. In addition, I believe it is prudent to test the proposed language and ballot summary in polling and focus groups before finalizing it.
Equality Ohio will continue its work with the “Why Marriage Matters” campaign to educate the Ohio public on the importance of marriage equality, and we will immediately engage Ohio activists in taking action today for marriage equality. We don’t believe in delaying the fight for marriage equality -- we engage in it every day; we do believe that our community deserves a deliberate and collaborative process. As Equality Ohio travels the state this summer for Pride and with the Equality Express Bus Tour, we will identify supporters of marriage equality around the state (and register them to vote) so that when the amendment is on the ballot, we have an extensive list of supporters for petitioning, volunteering and voting. We expect that many of our coalition partners will be doing the same over the summer months.
Equality Ohio will work with our broad coalition to move forward with the marriage equality effort pursuant to the plan developed in concert with stakeholders statewide. We will move forward based on the reality of polling data and what that tells us needs to be done before the amendment is placed on the ballot for a vote. We will move forward based on our ability to fund a successful election. And, we will move forward knowing that the work we do on other legislative priorities is supportive and complementary of the marriage equality work.
We look forward to leading the way to non-discrimination, safe schools, marriage equality, and full equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in Ohio.
The first was in 2008 the night Barack Obama was elected President. I was in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, working on the campaign, and the staff was in a hotel conference room watching the returns come in and dealing with last minute problems at polling places. The news stations called the race for President Obama, and everyone erupted in cheers, stopping what we were doing, hugging each other, and crying with joy. About an hour later, the news announced that Proposition 8, which overturned the California Supreme Court decision granting same-sex couples the right to marry and wrote marriage discrimination into the California Constitution, had passed. Polls had shown it would be a close race in California, but many of the activists I knew on the ground in the campaign were confident they would win, so the loss came as a surprise to me. I stood there in a room full of people still excited and joyous about President Obama’s victory, while I and a few others in the crowd felt kicked in the gut by the passage of Proposition 8. It was a devastating and lonely moment.
The second moment was in December 2010 when Illinois passed the civil union bill through the Illinois House. While I view civil unions as ‘separate but equal’, in 2010, there was no way for a marriage bill to pass in Illinois and civil unions were a step toward marriage that have provided thousands of same-sex couples with important legal rights. Real families, many with children, now have over 500 legal rights in Illinois that they didn’t have before civil unions were passed. Very few “armchair experts” thought we would succeed in getting the civil union bill passed through the House (we expected we could pass it through the Senate and that the Governor would sign it), but we did. That moment was electrifying, and I will never forget being a part of it.
I decided to apply for and ultimately take the position as Executive Director of Equality Ohio because of these experiences and because of my hope and belief that we could have moments of groundbreaking success in Ohio. Equality Ohio was founded in 2005, following the passage of Issue 1, which amended the Ohio Constitution to define marriage as the union between one man and one woman. Our vision is an Ohio where everyone feels at home, and that means an Ohio where lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender residents are treated with full equality legally and socially. That vision includes non-discrimination in housing, employment and public accommodations; it includes safe schools, in particular for LGBT youth; it includes obtaining the right of transgender people to change the gender marker on their birth certificate; it includes the right of same-sex couples to jointly adopt children; and, it includes marriage equality.
These goals are not mutually exclusive, and the work that we do to advance each of these goals lays the groundwork for further civil rights successes. When we do presentations to groups in Wooster, Mansfield, Lima, Chillicothe and other places around the state, we educate people about the LGBT community and the lack of legal protections and rights in Ohio. That increases support for LGBT civil rights generally, not just any one of the specific goals. When we build coalitions with local LGBT groups like Equality Toledo and Equality Springfield, with progressive groups like unions, pro-choice and environmental groups, and with national LGBT groups, those relationships lay the foundation for working together in coalitions to advance a variety of legislative and electoral goals. When we build a mailing list of over 30,000 people around the state and identify voters supportive of LGBT issues around the state, that information can be used to leverage legislative and electoral success on a variety of issues. When we develop relationships with media outlets around the state and an online media presence, it enables us to publicize a wide range of issues to further educate the public.
Our current strategic plan is ambitious for a young organization in a state with a conservative legislature. We have a three-pronged strategy of education, advocacy and electoral engagement to move forward legislation and public support for LGBT issues. The strategic plan was informed by a community meeting with over 60 people from around the state, representing a diverse cross section of Ohio. Our 2012 budget is $440,000 and we have a full-time staff of 5; we do a lot with limited resources, and we could do much more if the community was more supportive financially. National research shows that very few members of the LGBT community (about 4%) financially support an LGBT rights organization, and our resources are dwarfed by the resources of our opponents like Mission America, Citizens for Community Values, the Family Research Council, and the so-called National Organization for Marriage. As we plan to move forward, we must do so recognizing these strengths and limitations.
The goal of marriage equality in Ohio is something that informs all of the work that we do as an organization directly or indirectly. Since last year when marriage equality passed in New York, it has been clear to me that there is an energy and enthusiasm for marriage equality in Ohio and that the time-frame for achieving marriage equality in Ohio seems to have accelerated. Late last year, I began discussions with Freedom to Marry, the national organization that works on marriage equality efforts around the country (and Equality Ohio is part of Freedom to Marry’s “Why Marriage Matters” campaign). My goal was to have Freedom to Marry come into Ohio to engage with Equality Ohio in strategic planning for the marriage effort here -- to bring their expertise and experience to bear, along with the expertise of Ohio activists, in a state that I am hopeful will be the first or one of the first to overturn a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage through the ballot box (while I have a serious issue with civil rights being the subject of popular vote, the fact is that to obtain marriage rights in Ohio, we either need to do it through the ballot box or wait for the moment when -- and if -- the Supreme Court says there is a constitutional right for same-sex couples to marry).
Early this year, we worked with Freedom to Marry to get a number of Ohio Mayors to sign a Freedom to Marry pledge supporting marriage equality. That effort and a related effort to have additional elected officials in Ohio sign a pledge supporting marriage equality apparently inspired a group of people to begin circulating a petition to get a constitutional amendment on the ballot to legalize same-sex marriage in Ohio and repeal the ban. Freedom to Marry, which is staffed by some of the most passionate and strategic people I know, has stated publicly that it does not support the current petition effort and that it promotes a more thorough planning process and public education program before circulating petitions.
I consider many of the people involved in the current petition effort, known as Freedom to Marry Ohio (no relation the the national Freedom to Marry), my friends, and I respect them as advocates for the LGBT community and as intelligent, thoughtful people. But I and Equality Ohio, an organization with a diverse Board representing tens of thousands of community members and allies around the state, have serious concerns about the language, process and timing. In nearly every other state that has waged a marriage equality effort, it has started with a coalition of local, state, and national groups working together -- sharing strategies, sharing expertise, sharing decision-making, and sharing resources.
The concerns we have are shared by the vast majority of people we have surveyed and reached out to, including grassroots activists involved in the LGBT movement all around the state, other Ohio LGBT organizations, progressive allies, national LGBT groups, and major donors in Ohio and nationally necessary to fund the effort. The people we have consulted with are smart, experienced, and fully committed to the goal of marriage equality, and they understand that this will be an epic battle (a pro-marriage equality vote has not yet succeeded in any state) that requires substantial planning and groundwork. We are laying that groundwork every day, but persuading literally hundreds of thousands of people who currently oppose marriage equality to support it (at the same time as there will be extensive efforts to convince people to oppose it) requires resources and an infrastructure that does not yet exist, but that we are working hard to build.
Given these circumstances, Equality Ohio has decided to move forward on the marriage equality effort in three ways in the short term. To be clear, we remain fully committed to our efforts to pass non-discrimination and safe schools legislation, and no state has passed any form of relationship recognition (through the legislature or courts, and potentially through the ballot box this year in Maine) without first passing a non-discrimination law. These public education and legislative efforts will be an important part of the marriage equality strategy.
First, Equality Ohio will conduct polling to determine where Ohio voters stand on marriage equality generally and on the proposed language of the amendment specifically. Without understanding the current level of support and the number of people who need to be persuaded, it is difficult to have a reasoned, fact-based conversation about what the effort to pass marriage equality will involve. The most recent published poll in October 2011 by Pew found that 38% of Ohioans supported marriage equality and 62% supported some type of relationship recognition. This poll has several weaknesses for our purposes -- it polled support for civil unions, which are not a current option; it does not reflect a presumed increase in support for marriage equality that has been noted in polls around the country; and, it does not include the religious freedom language in the proposed amendment. Also, there have been other polls by campaigns and nationally that suggest higher support for marriage equality in Ohio. So, more current polling based on the voters actual choices is important.
Based on experience in other states (where the actual vote in favor of marriage equality has consistently underperformed polls), at least 52% -- more likely 53-54% -- of voters polled would have to support marriage equality for it to pass and the corresponding benchmark for any type of relationship recognition (marriage and civil union support totalled) is 75%. To move the needle in favor of marriage equality only 1 percentage point in Maine (with a much smaller electorate than Ohio), it took a year of work by a full-time staff of 35 paid canvassers/phone-bankers, an extensive media campaign, and substantial funding. Oregon passed a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage the same year as Ohio and the margin there was 5 points smaller (meaning more people in Oregon supported marriage equality than in Ohio), and they have engaged in a public persuasion campaign similar to Maine, but decided that this year was too soon to seek to overturn the amendment and that more public education was needed. It is a very different conversation about how to move forward with marriage equality in Ohio if likely Ohio voters start at 38%, or 44%, or 49% support for marriage equality. To have that conversation, we need the data, and Equality Ohio is working to obtain it.
Second, Equality Ohio will engage in a public and collaborative strategic planning process with our coalition partners on the local, state and national levels to develop over the next several months a plan to achieve full equality in Ohio, including marriage equality. The Human Rights Campaign has offered to co-sponsor town halls throughout Ohio as part of this process. We will approach this plan with a sense of urgency that reflects the enthusiasm of the community, and with a full understanding of how difficult this effort will be. This plan will be informed by the knowledge and experience of LGBT activists in Ohio, allies in Ohio who have run other statewide campaigns, national and state LGBT groups who are fighting these battles in other states such as Maine and Oregon, and any stakeholders who wish to be involved. The goal is to develop a plan that will have substantial buy-in from the community and our allies statewide, including donors, and to develop a coalition infrastructure for moving forward that will include a diverse representation of Ohioans and organizations throughout the state, including Equality Ohio and Freedom to Marry Ohio. This plan will include data-based timelines and benchmarks -- such as polling and financial benchmarks -- for moving forward, and it will reflect appropriate urgency and practicality. It will not be Equality Ohio’s plan, but rather a collaborative plan of our community and allies that will recognize the efforts that have preceded it.
Third, Equality Ohio will engage in a review of the proposed ballot language. We believe that language to amend the Ohio Constitution should be reviewed by constitutional law experts and by lawyers at the ACLU, HRC and Lambda Legal, who have worked on these issues in other states. We also believe that there are possible alternatives to the current proposed language that would bring together a broader coalition of groups and gain the support of many people who believe that the current proposed language is materially flawed. Ohio State Law Professor Marc Spindelman has agreed to chair a committee to propose possible language and concepts for the constitutional amendment. In addition, I believe it is prudent to test the proposed language and ballot summary in polling and focus groups before finalizing it.
Equality Ohio will continue its work with the “Why Marriage Matters” campaign to educate the Ohio public on the importance of marriage equality, and we will immediately engage Ohio activists in taking action today for marriage equality. We don’t believe in delaying the fight for marriage equality -- we engage in it every day; we do believe that our community deserves a deliberate and collaborative process. As Equality Ohio travels the state this summer for Pride and with the Equality Express Bus Tour, we will identify supporters of marriage equality around the state (and register them to vote) so that when the amendment is on the ballot, we have an extensive list of supporters for petitioning, volunteering and voting. We expect that many of our coalition partners will be doing the same over the summer months.
Equality Ohio will work with our broad coalition to move forward with the marriage equality effort pursuant to the plan developed in concert with stakeholders statewide. We will move forward based on the reality of polling data and what that tells us needs to be done before the amendment is placed on the ballot for a vote. We will move forward based on our ability to fund a successful election. And, we will move forward knowing that the work we do on other legislative priorities is supportive and complementary of the marriage equality work.
We look forward to leading the way to non-discrimination, safe schools, marriage equality, and full equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in Ohio.
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