Same Sex Marriage

Same Sex Marriage, Gay Rights, Marriage Equality

January 19, 2010 • 6:43 pm

San Diego mayor says lesbian daughter should have right to wed

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SAN FRANCISCO — For supporters of same-sex marriage, Tuesday’s testimony from San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders in the Proposition 8 trial would seem an important moment for their cause. A conservative Republican describes his transformation from gay marriage opponent to vocal critic of denying gays and lesbians the right to wed.

To foes of gay marriage, however, such testimony, in the words of Prop. 8 counsel Andrew Pugno, is “just irrelevant.”

These competing views of the value of the emotional side of testimony in the historic Proposition 8 trial are now among the issues Chief U.S. District Vaughn Walker must resolve in the legal challenge to California’s ban on same-sex marriage.

Sanders’ testimony came as the plaintiffs are drawing closer to finalizing their case in their effort to overturn Prop. 8. Lawyers for same-sex couples seeking the right to marry are expected to wrap up their case either today or Friday, with testimony from Prop. 8 backer William Tam still to come.

The trial, now in its second week, has been heavy on experts and academics on the subject of same-sex marriage, but has been spiced all along with the accounts of individuals such as Sanders, who tearfully recounted how he renounced his own stance on gay marriage after learning his daughter is a lesbian.

The mayor, with his daughter, Lisa Sanders, in the courtroom, described the difficulty of confronting his own prejudice and risking the wrath of San Diego Republicans. His change of heart became public several years ago, when he supported the city’s decision to file briefs in favor of same-sex marriage in the earlier legal battle in the state courts.

Lisa Sanders married her partner, Meghan, in Vermont last month, but Mayor Sanders said she ought to be able to marry in California. San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera persuaded Sanders to testify, and questioned him Tuesday.

“My daughter deserves the same opportunity to have a wedding in front of family, friends and co-workers,” Sanders testified, choking up repeatedly on the stand.

The plaintiffs consider Sanders’ testimony important to exposing the depths of discrimination against California’s gays and lesbians. They’ve included other first-person accounts from the two couples suing to overturn the gay marriage ban, as well as from San Francisco writer Helen Zia, a lesbian who married before voters approved the law in 2008.

But Prop. 8 supporters consider these accounts beside the point. Pugno called it “emotional testimony about feelings” that does not justify a change in the constitution.

Tuesday’s trial proceedings did include the drier expert testimony as well. M.V. Lee Badgett, a University of Massachussetts professor, testified that it costs California’s economy hundreds of millions of dollars to deny same-sex couples the right to marry, a premise Prop. 8 lawyers questioned as unreliable. She also testified that same-sex marriage would have no negative impact on heterosexual marriage.

The trial resumes Wednesday with the testimony of a gay man who is expected to describe undergoing “conversion therapy” in his youth.