When the "Will of the People" Goes Wrong
Filed by: Patricia Nell Warren
November 7, 2008 4:00 PM
http://www.bilerico.com/2008/11/when_the_will_of_the_people_goes_wrong.phpWith the election over, religious righters are smugly insisting that "the will of the people" has spoken the final word on same-sex marriage. Voters in California, Arizona and Florida denied us the right to marry in their states. "The people's will" is one of those grand and ringing phrases that the righters like to throw around, and they're always pleased if "the people" vote to support their ideology.
But these ideologists have clearly flunked Civics 101. As government, "the people's will" is far from being the last word on anything.
As Abraham Lincoln pointed out, you can fool some of the people some of the time. By putting a lot of hype and lies on the air, a powerful multi-church lobby fooled "some" Californians. As a result, a slim majority of voters did what the lobby wanted and voted yes on Prop 8. But if "some of the people" had not been confused by deceptive advertising, they might have voted no on 8.
