The following is the text of an email I just sent out to my local Family members.  Figured I’d cross post it here to broaden the audience (although the personal appeal at the end will have less of an impact).

“Inasmuch as marriage is the legal union of only one man and one woman as husband and wife, no other legal union that is treated as marriage or the substantial equivalent thereof shall be valid or recognized.”

Before I get into the meat of this, I beg a small amount of indulgence from those of you I am sending this to.  I believe I can safely say that throughout the years I have made it a point not to forward political emails (or any type of emails for that matter) or inflict my political viewpoints on the unwilling with this medium.  We all have our beliefs, and I’m certainly not under any illusion that I can possibly persuade you to change your vote by sending you some kind of ill-informed and factually void email about how evil the other candidate is.

For the record (and in the interest of full disclosure), I will be voting for Barack Obama.  If you are undecided about the upcoming election and would like to know my reasons for doing so you are welcome to ask and I’d be happy to discuss it with you.  I have nothing else to say about the Presidential nominees in this post other than to ask all of you, regardless of who you feel would be the best candidate, to make your vote count and vote for somebody.  If you are too disgusted with the current top two choices look up who else is going to be on the ballot and vote for one of them.  Those votes help keep those parties valid in the states and help their candidates get elected to other posts.  Please don’t just write in “Mickey Mouse.”  That sends no message and does no good in the long run.

All of that being said, this email is not about the Presidential election.  It’s about an Amendment you’ll be voting for on the same day.

I pasted the key phrase from Amendment 2 at the top of this email.  I’d like you to look at it again, if you will.  Look at it closely and really try to grasp the consequences of what it says.  This isn’t just about defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman.  This amendment would go one step beyond that to make the recognition of any kind of union outside of marriage illegal.  It would outlaw domestic partnerships and civil unions as well as same-sex marriages.  This amendment could potentially impact not only homosexual couples, but the large number of people living in our state who have Domestic Partner benefits in their heterosexual relationships as well.

Beyond that, though, I have to ask all of you – Do you really want to live in a state that has an amendment on the books that legally creates second class citizens?  That tells its residents how to conduct their private affairs?  Do you really, truly, believe that allowing two people who love each other to have legal recognition of that love is going to have any kind of impact whatsoever on whether or not your heterosexual marriage is valid?

And if I can appeal to you personally here – As I am sending this mostly to local friends and family, I can safely assume that most of you have had the pleasure of meeting Kim’s friend Duffy.  If you haven’t, you’ve missed out.  It’s very rare to meet someone so kind, so giving, so loving, and so willing to simply give of himself and not ask for anything in return other than your friendship.  He’s been there for Kim more times than I can count, and has even gone so far as to subject himself to 2 day trips on a Greyhound bus to middle-of-nowhere Missouri just so she didn’t have to make the trip alone.  If you’re considering a “Yes” vote on this Amendment, I ask you to really think about him before doing so.  Is this such an important issue that you would make it impossible for him to ever get married if he found someone he wanted to settle down with?

Ok, I think I’ve made my case here.  As always, if you’d like to have a discussion about this or any political issue I’m certainly open to it but this will be the last time I sully your inbox with political noise before the election.  Whatever you do, please make sure you get out and vote!