Here’s a
piece of encouraging news from Oregon
for the New Year. A judge has halted the implementation of a domestic
partnership law for same-sex couples (which effectively grants the rights and
privileges of marriage to same sex couples) until the citizen signatures
gathered to overturn the law can be reassessed. Excerpt from LifeSite news article:
A federal judge in Portland
Oregon granted a temporary
injunction requested by pro-family activists, halting the implementation of a
law that would see homosexual couples afforded the same rights and privileges
granted to married heterosexual couples. The law was set to come into effect on
January 1, 2008.
The public interest legal alliance, the Alliance Defense
Fund, filed a lawsuit on Dec. 3, 2007, against the Oregon Secretary of State
and several county clerks, alleging that those offices had wrongfully
invalidated voters' signatures on a citizen referendum. If allowed to go
forward, the referendum would place onto the November 2008 ballot an option for
voters to repeal the state legislature's domestic partnership bill, HB 2007.
AdvanceUSA
has previously
reported on the effort of Oregonians to overturn two laws recently passed
by the legislature that provide the rights of marriage to same-sex
couples. The legislature passed these dangerous bills despite the fact
the people of Oregon
had democratically passed a constitutional amendment to protect the traditional
definition of marriage. We are encouraged that the will of the people to
protect the crucial institution of marriage might be heard after all.
For more
news and information on efforts to protect marriage click here.