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Update on Washington State’s “Everything-But-Marriage” Petition 8/11/2009 With a sigh of relief, traditional marriage supporters in Washington State submitted over 137,689 signatures to the Secretary Of State's office on July 25.
A week earlier, supporters still lacked between 50,000 and 75,000 signatures in order to qualify Referendum 71, the "everything-but-marriage law," for the November ballot. With perseverance, hard work, and much prayer, they met their goal.
"The last few days of the Referendum 71 campaign were exciting and exhausting," says Maureen Richardson, State Director for Concerned Women for America (CWA) of Washington. "The volunteers who sought those final signatures or who showed up at campaign headquarters to count them, bundle them, and do whatever else was needed deserve the credit for the success of this campaign - they were the grassroots, or 'we the people' in action, that our democratic system of government demands!"
The next step for Referendum 71 is the signature certification process. At least 120,577 signatures are needed to qualify a referendum for the ballot. Historically, about 18 percent of the signatures are disqualified, either because the signer is not a registered voter or because the signature does not match the signer's voter registration card. Referendum supporters turned in approximately 14 percent more signatures than the necessary 120,577. However, since the margin is less than 18 percent, the Secretary of State's office will check each one of the signatures for validity.
The signature verification process could take a few weeks. Beginning August 6, the Secretary of State's office added another shift of signature checkers in an attempt to wrap the project up within the next week-and-a-half. Early reports from the Secretary of State's office on the signature count have been positive. Over 35,000 signatures have been counted, and the cumulative error rate remains at a low 11.51 percent - easily below the maximum error rate of 12.42 percent. If this trend continues through the rest of the signatures, the Referendum will qualify for the ballot.
Referendum supporters are encouraged by an order from a federal judge temporarily barring the Secretary of State from releasing the names and addresses of the petition signers to the public. Under Washington's public disclosure laws, petition signatures submitted to the Secretary of State become public record. However, two homosexual activist groups, WhoSigned.org and KnowThyNeighbor.org, expressed intentions to publish the names and addresses of petition signers on the Internet. Fearing that disseminating this personal information will expose signers to intimidation or harassment, Referendum supporters filed a request for a temporary restraining order against the release of the signatures. A federal judge granted the request until a full hearing can be held on September 3.
If the certification process is successful, supporters will face the next challenge of educating the voters of Washington about Referendum 71. According to Maureen, during the petition drive, "It was disappointing, yet not surprising, that a majority of the people contacted about Referendum 71 did not know about the passage of SB 5688 and its expansion of traditional marriage benefits to homosexual and unmarried senior domestic partners in Washington state." Once the bill was explained, however, Maureen says that "most people were eager to sign the Referendum in order to put this issue on the ballot." Maureen hopes that if they can educate enough voters, Referendum 71 will pass easily in November.
Referendum 71, if placed on the ballot, could overturn Washington's "everything but marriage" law (SB 5688). Although SB 5688 refrains from calling domestic partnerships "marriages," it does say that "marriage shall apply equally to state registered domestic partnerships" 180 times.
To learn more about the Referendum 71 petition, please visit http://protectmarriagewa.com/.
To get involved in CWA of Washington State, go to http://wa.cwfa.org or e-mail director@washington.cwfa.org. If you would like to get involved with one of our other fine state organizations, please visit the CWA in the States site.
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Concerned Women for America 1015 Fifteenth St. N.W., Suite 1100 Washington, D.C. 20005 Phone: (202) 488-7000 Fax: (202) 488-0806 |
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