As a major rally prepares to descend
Tuesday on Des Moines to protest Iowa Senate President Mike
Gronstal's vow to block a constitutional amendment banning gay
marriage from coming up for a vote in the Senate, Gronstal on Sunday
stood by his decision.
The measure, which would overturn the
Iowa Supreme Court's unanimous 2009 ruling legalizing gay marriage,
won easy passage in the Republican-controlled House last year. But
Gronstal, a Democrat, blocked the measure from reaching the Senate
floor, angering social conservatives who have threatened to oust him.
The National Organization for Marriage
(NOM), The Family Leader and CatholicVote.org have been busy for
months promoting the Let Us Vote! (LUV) rally in emails to
supporters, and expectations are high for a decent crowd.
“Yes we want to put pressure on
Senator Gronstal,” Bob Vander Plaats of The Family Leader said in a
video promoting the rally. “And we need you to tell your senator
to tell Senator Gronstal to let it come up for a vote.”
In remarks to blogger AKSARBENT,
Gronstal reiterated his position on the amendment.
“We never put people's constitutional
rights to a vote of the people in this state. I don't think the
constitution is the place to insert discrimination. I think it's a
document designed to guarantee people's rights, not to take them away
from them,” Gronstal said. (The video is embedded in the right
panel of this page. Visit
our video library for more videos.)