As the Supreme Court showdown on gay marriage nears, the friend-of-the-court briefs just keep coming. Georgia Equality has joined with other LGBT organizations to ask the court to strike down both the Defense of Marriage Act and California's Proposition 8.
Dubbed the "Red State Brief," the brief comes from 28 organizations advocating for LGBT people in areas of the country, like Georgia, which are unlikely to advance marriage equality without a push from the federal level.
When Beth Schissel and her partner of 15 years, Sally White, approached the clerk in DeKalb County Probate Court earlier this month and asked for a marriage license, they were told that due to Georgia’s law banning same sex marriage, their application was denied.
Schissel and White knew this was going to happen. They know it is illegal for gay couples to get married in the state, thanks to both a law and a 2004 state constitutional amendment approved by a whopping 76 percent of Georgia voters.
But they wanted to put a face on the discrimination.
The Campaign for Southern Equality, the group behind the recent “We Do” campaign marriage demonstration in Decatur, Ga., has released a video highlighting the current campaign as it prepares to travel to Washington, D.C.
Since Jan. 2, the group has traveled to Hattiesburg, Miss.; Mobile, Ala.; Decatur, Ga.; Morristown, Tenn.; Greenville, S.C.; and Wilson / Winston Salem, N.C.
The campaign winds up in Arlington, Va., where gay couples will also be denied marriage licenses Jan. 17. Then the group of activists will march approximately four miles to Washington, D.C., to participate in the legal marriage of a couple in front of the Jefferson Memorial.
Five gay couples lined up and asked for marriage licenses in Decatur, Ga., Jan. 7, and all were denied, as expected, because Georgia prohibits same-sex marriages.
The couples were participating in the "We Do" action, one of many organized by the Campaign for Southern Equality, which seeks to bring Southern states into the national conversation about marriage equality.
The Campaign for Southern Equality brings its “We Do” protest for marriage equality to Decatur, Ga., on Monday, Jan. 7.
The organization made national news last year after several events in North and South Carolina where activists attempted to receive marriage licenses but were denied – and in some cases arrested.
Aaron Sarver, communications director for the Campaign for Southern Equality, told GA Voice today by phone that his organization expects a handful of couples, perhaps as many as five or six, to take part in the Decatur protest where they will apply for and be denied a marriage license.
Campaign for Southern Equality made national news yesterday when activists from the organization attempted to secure marriage licenses in Greenville, S.C., as part of the organization's We Do Campaign.
Three couples from the group, Michel McVicker and Alyssa Weaver, Pastor Ra’Shawn Barlow-Flournoy and Pastor Kelvin Barlow-Flournoy, and April Whittington and Tanika Jones, requested marriage licenses yesterday at the County Probate Court in Greenville, S.C.
All three couples were denied because they did not meet the legal requirements for marriage in the state. South Carolina has a constitutional amendment banning same-sex unions.