Signature Counts Show Marriage Measure On Track for Ballot Backers of a measure that would amend California's constitution to ban same-sex marriage appear to be well on track to turning in the number of signatures required to get their proposal on the ballot in November. According to data from the Secretary of State's office, county election officials around the state have done a raw count of about 934,774 signatures. The data does not yet include counts for only a handful of counties. The raw count does not include verification of the signatures, which is continuing and is expected to take weeks. Supporters of the Limit on Marriage measure need to turn in 694,354 verified signatures, or 8 percent of the votes cast in the last governor's race, to make it onto the ballot. "They claim they turned in over 1.1 million signatures," said Geoff Kors, executive director of Equality California, the statewide LGBT group leading the effort to defeat the amendment. "Based on what we've seen so far, we have to assume that's the number they turned in." Counties that have turned in their raw signature counts include San Francisco, with 4,609; Los Angeles, with 251,835; San Diego, with 146,297; and Orange, with 104,706. "The community needs to be prepared to really get engaged at a level we've never been engaged before," Kors said. However, "this is a campaign we can win. We have an opportunity, especially if we have a victory in court, to keep full equality in California, but it's going to take us volunteering more hours and giving more money than we've ever done before." The California Supreme Court is set to decide soon on the consolidated marriage case that stems from Mayor Gavin Newsom's action four years ago during which same-sex couples were allowed to wed. The court voided those marriages later in 2004. A San Francisco judge then ruled that the state's marriage laws are unconstitutional, but that decision was overturned by a state appellate court, sending the case to the high court. The court's decision is due by June 2. Major backers of the anti-gay marriage initiative include ProtectMarriage.com and the California chapter of the National Organization for Marriage. One of the people behind ProtectMarriage.com is reportedly Gail Knight, the widow of state Senator Pete Knight. Pete Knight authored Proposition 22, which was passed by voters in 2000 and holds that "only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California." That measure is part of the state's family code, not the state constitution. |