The nominally Christian right has an uncanny ability to confuse their self-righteousness with righteousness, especially it seems, when it comes to gay folk. This is clear in the current controversy concerning the right wing challenge to California’s Political Reform Act of 1974. For over thirty years this law has required disclosure of financial donations over $100.00 to political campaigns.
ProtectMarriage.com, an organization that attempts to protect heterosexual families only, had asked the court to keep the names of donors to the Proposition 8 campaign undisclosed. Their argument being that disclosure put their financial backers at risk of reprisal. The U.S. District Court judge who heard the case was Morrison England Jr., an appointee of George W. Bush. Among other things his credits include being member of the Judge Advocate Generals Corp for the United States Army Reserve from 1988 through 2002 and he held the rank of Major.
Plaintiffs alleged that, as a consequence of their support of Proposition 8, their contributors have been subject to threats, reprisals, and harassment. They failed to show that these actions were a direct result of disclosure, however. Indeed most of the examples they reported were public and open in their opposition to gay rights. Among them were an attorney who wrote articles in favor of H8 and a Pastor who gave sermons in favor of H8, hardly folks who might suffer from financial disclosure alone.
The Judge had a similar view. “The court finds that the state is not facilitating retaliation by compelling disclosure,” he said, and he denied the request for anonymity. Contribution information is freely available on the State of California’s official website.
Meanwhile the opponents of disclosure have their panties twisted over the website eightmaps.com, that shows the same information on a Google map.
Though the information available at the eightmaps website is also available on line from the website of the Secretary of State of California, and with more detailed information than the maps, the opponents of disclosure are imagining a queer conspiracy.
The goal of the state, as clarified in Judge England’s January 29, decision to keep the records public, was to protect the interest of the citizens. He wrote that:
“…, the Court simply cannot ignore the fact that numerous of the acts about which Plaintiffs’ complain are mechanisms relied upon, both historically and lawfully, to voice dissent. The decision and ability to patronize a particular establishment or business is an inherent right of the American people, and the public has historically remained free to choose where to, or not to, allocate its economic resources. As such, individuals have repeatedly resorted to boycotts as a form of civil protest intended to convey a powerful message without resort to non-violent means.”
I agree that some of the actions of our community have been distasteful and in some cases, perhaps, unlawful. But I am not aware that those actions arose directly from financial disclosure. “Indeed, it is unclear” wrote Judge England, how “‘uninhibited, robust, and wideopen’ speech can occur when organizations hide themselves from the scrutiny of the voting public….”
I have among my toys an item called the Chelsea Filter, from the time when I was a jeweler. It is a round object resembling a small magnifying glass and it contains a flat disc of dark green glass. Of course if one views something green with it, a green sapphire, for instance, it looks like a shadow. Most emeralds appear as shadows. The exception is the Muzo emerald that appears bright red. Now If I went about my life with Chelsea Filters in my eyeglasses I could spend my life never seeing anything green except the occasional Muzo emerald.
