O'Malley Speaks Out For Same-Sex Marriage Bill

O’Malley, a Catholic, turned to the writings of St. Thomas of Aquinas who explored what the governor called “our common thread of human dignity.”

“The dignity of work, the dignity of faith, the dignity of every family in our state, the dignity of every individual, the dignity of a free and diverse people who, at the end of the day all want the same thing for our children.”

It isn’t right, he said, that the children of same sex couple do not have the same protections as the children of heterosexual couples.

Senator Allan Kittleman, the only Republican sponsor of the bill, compared the effort to legalize same sex marriage to the civil rights struggles of the 60s, when his father, Robert Kittleman, was president of the Howard County NAACP.

Local officials said then they were afraid of what might happen if the schools were integrated.

“You don’t say no to Civil Rights because you’re worried about what might happen in the future. If you have the right you have it and you shouldn’t lose it.”

But Rev. John Lunn, pastor of Berean Baptist Church in Baltimore, argued that the bill has nothing to do with civil rights.

“I did not choose the color that I was born. But I can choose my sexual preference.”

The bill is likely to be voted out of the Senate committee next week. It’s unclear what will happen in the House of Delegates.

I’m Joel McCord, reporting in Annapolis for 88.1, WYPR.