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60,000 Mainers sign on to defend marriage equality by Hannah Clay Wareham
Associate EditorThursday Jul 30, 2009 Marriage equality organization Maine Freedom to Marry announced July 30 that 60,000 Mainers have signed pledges defending the state’s marriage equality bill.
"Volunteers, ready and willing to go door to door and speak neighbor to neighbor to protect marriage equality, are the fuel of our campaign to defeat Question 1," Jesse Connolly, Campaign Manager of Maine Freedom to Marry, said in a statement today.
"These 60,000 pledges, collected by Maine volunteers and the campaign’s professional field staff, demonstrate that our grassroots effort is a campaign about Maine, by Maine people and consistent with Maine values. Ours is a campaign of Mainers committed to talk to their families, their friends and their coworkers to preserve marriage equality."
Opponents of the bill, signed into law on May 6 by Maine Governor John Baldacci, are gathering signatures and trying to garner support for a referendum on this November’s ballot.
"Theirs is a campaign fueled not by Maine volunteers but by paid out of state operatives," Connolly said of the bill’s opponents. "Fairness and equality are too precious to be sold to the highest bidder."
Update: On July 31, marriage equality opponents with the Stand for Marriage campaign submitted petitions with more than 100,000 signatures, the Associated Press reported. The Secretary of State’s office has until September 4 to verify at least 55,087 of the signatures for the referendum to appear on November’s ballot.
Hannah can be reached at hclaywareham@baywindows.com.
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