Prop. 8 protesters hold Eureka vigil

http://www.times-standard.com/localnews/ci_11282288
Thadeus Greenson/The Times-Standard
Article Launched: 12/21/2008 01:22:28 AM PST

Helen Winfrey, candle in hand, spent Saturday evening standing in the cold rain in an attempt to protect her son’s marriage.

Winfrey’s said her son, Joseph Marclin-Sampson, was the first Eureka High School student to bring a member of the same sex to the school’s senior prom. Then, after the California Supreme Court’s ruling last spring cleared the way for same-sex marriages, Winfrey welcomed a son-in-law to her family.

Friday, Winfrey learned that proponents of Proposition 8, which passed with 52 percent of the vote in November, effectively outlawing same-sex marriages, filed a motion with the California Supreme Court seeking to invalidate Marclin-Sampson’s marriage, as well as about 18,000 other same-sex unions.

”I’m here because I think it’s very hateful and hurtful for a majority to deny the rights of a minority and, for my family, it’s very personal,” Winfrey said.

Winfrey joined about three dozen same-sex rights supporters Saturday night, lining Broadway in front of the Bayshore Mall.

Eureka’s demonstration, dubbed “Light up the Night for Equal Rights” and organized by members of Join the Impact, was designed to shed light on the rights lost with the Proposition 8’s passage on Election Day.

Proposition 8 enacted a constitutional amendment explicitly stating that only marriages between a woman and a man will be valid or recognized in the state, effectively nullifying a California Supreme Court’s spring ruling.

Just weeks after Proposition 8’s passage, the court agreed to hear several legal challenges to the measure.

According to Cole Machado, director of Join the Impact Humboldt, Eureka’s vigil was just one of more than 400 held worldwide Saturday, in which more than a million people were expected to participate.

Those attending the Eureka vigil were encouraged to make or purchase T-shirts with emblazoned with messages like “Second Class Citizen,” “Friend of a Second Class Citizen” or “1st Class Taxpayer, 2nd Class Citizen.” But, Machado said, they were almost barred from wearing the shirts into the Bayshore Mall, where the group planned to go socialize at a pair of businesses after the street-side vigil.

Machado said local mall management told him that protesters would have to turn their shirts inside out or leave them at the door if they wanted to enter the mall. But after contacting a lawyer, Machado said he later received an e-mail from Wally Brewster, a senior vice president with General Growth Properties, which owns the mall, saying protesters were welcome to wear whatever they liked.

”I apologize that it ever came into question,” Brewster wrote in an e-mail to Machado, a copy of which he provided to the Times-Standard. “Thank you for also understanding that we are a gathering place for all people of all views and cultural backgrounds.”

Saturday’s vigil came amid the backdrop of some major developments on both sides of the issue.

In addition to the brief seeking to nullify the state’s 18,000 existing same sex marriages, California Attorney General Jerry Brown also filed a brief Friday, arguing that the Proposition 8 is unconstitutional, as it denies a minority group of a fundamental right. Brown, who voted against Proposition 8, initially said he would defend the ballot measure as the state’s top lawyer before announcing Friday night that reflection on the Constitution had caused him to change his mind.

”It became evident that the Article 1 provision of guaranteeing basic liberty, which includes the right to marry, took precedence over the initiative,” Brown said in an interview with the Associated Press Friday. “Based on my duty to defend the constitution, I concluded the court should protect the right to marry even in the face of the 52 percent vote.”

Kenneth Star, dean of Pepperdine University’s law school, co-wrote the brief seeking to nullify the existing marriages, and argued that Proposition 8 is the will of the voters, and is quite clear in its intent.

”Proposition 8’s brevity is matched by its clarity,” the brief reads. “There are no conditional clauses, exceptions, exemptions or exclusions.”

The California Supreme Court could reportedly hear arguments in the litigation in March.

Margot Gallant, of McKinleyville, who stood in the drizzle of Saturday night, clutching a candle, said she has faith in the California Supreme Court to do the right thing, but added she’s disheartened that the issue has even made it this far.

”That there are people out there who think this country is run by the Bible and not the Constitution is just mind blowing,” she said. “We’re standing out here in the rain, and we shouldn’t have to be.”

Thadeus Greenson can be reached at 441-0509 or tgreenson@times-standard.com