Dear Friend of Marriage,

Black Democrats to the rescue of marriage!

Saturday I had the honor of attending the D.C. State Democratic Convention with Bishop Harry Jackson.

African-Americans for marriage turned out in force, shocking the D.C. establishment!

I wish you could have been there. Strong marriage supporters, unafraid of the media or anything else, chanting "Let us vote! Let us vote!" If the mainstream media were what it should be, this would be the picture in every living room in America: Politicians blocking the door to the voting booth against citizens of D.C. in order to impose gay marriage on an unwilling populace.

The political establishment was shocked when all these newfound activists almost knocked off Harry Thomas in the straw poll the DC Dems conducted. His opponent, Delano Hunter, is a strong marriage supporter, eager to knock off a politician who ignored the will of his constituents and voted for gay marriage.

Exciting times!

They keep telling us "the culture has changed, gay marriage is the future." When they stop blocking the path to the voting booth, when they accept the legitimacy of elections like the one which passed Prop 8, then maybe they would have something believable to say about that. Let the people vote!

It's going to be a hard fight through the courts to vindicate the people's right to vote in D.C., but we are fighting for their rights and the rights of all Americans. Just as in Prop 8 last week, NOM's Chairman Maggie Gallagher was there, and NOM's Prop 8 Legal Defense Fund is helping fight for our constitutional rights.

If you believe in the right to vote, can you help us defend the Constitution from these ongoing attacks? We need to raise $8,479 in the next 48 hours for NOM's Legal Defense Fund, which supports not only Prop 8's able lawyers and the legal campaign to win back the right to vote in D.C., but also litigation designed to protect voters and donors from campaigns of harassment and intimidation. I am looking for 150 people willing to donate $57 each. Will you step forward to be one of NOM's 150 for the Legal Defense of Marriage?

Not everyone has money to give, we understand. (With six kids, believe me, I understand!) So here's something else you can do for marriage this week. Republican leaders have put up a website, America Speaks Out. But it's being slammed by liberals trying to create the impression that Republicans support gay marriage. We asked for your help on this before, but the website had glitches. Here's the good news: They've been fixed. Go here, login and vote "Thumbs Up" to protect marriage between a man and a woman.

Thank you!

How many times have you heard that you and I are like racists because we know that to make a marriage you need a husband and wife? Gay-rights advocates say this over and over--most recently, former judicial conservative Ted Olson stood before Judge Vaughn Walker and repeated this point ad nauseam. They don't just say we are racists; they try to get courts to rule as if marriage were akin to racism, founded only in bigotry. They use this argument in D.C., San Francisco and all across this country as their principle justification to taking away our right to vote for marriage.

Good news. Heritage Foundation's Tom Messner just published a devastating critique of "the race analogy" in National Review Online. It’s posted here. Check it out.

His sensible conclusion?

"Defending marriage is not similar to defending racism. Loving didn't fundamentally redefine the natural understanding of marriage. Rather, the 1967 decision rescued marriage from an extreme ideology that sought to hijack marriage for purposes unrelated to marriage itself. Today, the courts faced with Perry and similar litigation should do the same."

In other words, it is gay-rights advocates who (like the racists of old with their bans on interracial marriage) are trying to hijack marriage for ideological purposes that have nothing to do with marriage's core mission.

Of course their motivations are "progressive" rather than racist and that makes a difference, but it doesn't change the fact that gay marriage is an illegitimate attempt to "take over" a natural institution and reality and use it for new ideological purposes.

As Chuck Cooper pointed out in the final arguments in San Francisco last week, race was never part of the natural definition of marriage. Interracial marriage had to be "banned" because people understood that these were marriages; the bans were designed to keep two races separate so one race could oppress the other. That's what the 14th Amendment was designed to prevent, not the common-sense understanding of marriage.

Thanks Tom for speaking out for the truth, common sense, and sound and intelligent understanding!

And thank you, my friends and fellow comrades in this great battle for God's truth about marriage, for all that you make possible.

We've got big plans for this summer: to fight back against out of control judges, and to defend the votes of millions of Americans from out-of-control judges and an out-of-touch political elite. I can't tell you more right now but stay tuned, it’s going to be exciting.

Let me end on a small grace note. We do so much here at NOM that I can only tell you a part of it. But one young college student recently wrote to thank us, in this case Maggie.

"I recently wrote a college paper on marriage as public policy, and I could not have done it without the extensive work you have done on the subject. I've read your newspaper columns before, but until I started researching this topic I was unaware of the exhaustive treatment you had given the matter. I am now more fully prepared to discuss and defend traditional marriage with any who wish to confront the issue. Your writings on the matter are at the same time intellectually challenging and emotionally compelling. Thank you for making so much information available. I hope anyone who wavers finds your work and is strengthened by it as I was."

The next generation. That's what it's all about, isn't it?

You are the reason we can do so much. God bless you and strengthen you and your family, this day and always.

Semper fi!

Faithfully,

Brian S. Brown
President
National Organization for Marriage
2029 K Street, NW, Suite 300
Washington, DC  20006
[email protected]