Secrets and Rights

The Vermont House of representatives passed a bill granting marriage rights to same sex couples last Thursday. The vote was 94-52; not the two thirds needed to override Governor Douglas’s promised veto. No doubt the Governor’s mailbox is full these days.

The controversy has me thinking of two stories about people in my life.

Let’s call them Holmes and Watson. They were friends of my parents, and then friends of mine. They were part of my parents’ circle of friends, two of the usual suspects at a dinner or cocktail party. Their names went together in a guest list. “We’re having the Smiths, the Taylors, Holmes and Watson, and the Petersons.” They were in middle age when I first met them, a pair of solid citizens who ran a successful local business. They were involved in local politics and charity, volunteering and giving. They were both World War II veterans, which was how they met. They were not ostentatious about their sexual orientation, but they presented themselves to the community as a pair. They were together for over fifty years. When Holmes was in his mid-eighties he became ill and died. He and Watson had exercised enough forethought to put in place powers of attorney and living wills. Nevertheless, without that preparation, Watson would have had no inherent right to make those final medical decisions nor to bury his partner of five decades. They held up their end of the bargain, with each other and with the community. The community accepted them and respected them, but ultimately failed to do right by them.

Then there is my own maternal grandfather, who died a couple of decades ago. I was doing some genealogical research a few years ago and came up with the surprising fact that he was born into a Hasidic Jewish family. My mother was as surprised as I was. All we knew was that he had left his family at the age of 14 and made his way in the world. He had distanced himself from his family to the degree that my mother had never met them. He had gone to Yale, gotten a medical degree, and become a professor at the University of Virginia, marrying my grandmother in the late 1920’s.

I have never found out why he left his family and hid his origins. I have a theory, though. A smart young Jew never would have been allowed into Yale in that era, and probably never would have obtained a position at the University of Virginia. More importantly for my personal existence, he definitely would not have been allowed to marry a well-bred young woman from an old Virginia family. He had to remain closeted to the grave.

Throughout history couples have been barred from marrying because of religion, ethnicity, politics, and class. As I just pointed out, a religious difference that would be irrelevant today was, within living memory, an absolute bar to marriage. It is only in the past few decades that we have started to fully acknowledge our equality and change the law to match our new understanding. This latest law is part of that movement. The governor will almost certainly veto it, but he is pushing back against history. Someday people will look back at this with a kind of incomprehension, the way we might look at my grandfather’s secret life. It’s just sad that for some time yet we will fail in our responsibilities to our fellow citizens.

Governor Douglas’s contact page, by the way, is http://governor.vermont.gov/contact.html .

Update on Tuesday, April 7, 2009 at 3:14PM by Minor Heretic

Today the Vermont House overrode the Governor's veto by one vote, 100-49. The law takes effect September 1st. Equality under the law begins for all Vermonters this fall. The leaves will turn colors again - it will be a great season for weddings.

Comments

[Cary]

I am so proud of the Vermont Leg (not something I say often!), and so proud that my state becomes the first to legislatively enact full marriage rights for ALL its citizens! I just wish that both Holmes and Watson could have been here to see the day. They were one of the finest examples of a committed couple I can think of, though as you say, they were very 'old school' and quiet about things so I wonder if they would actually have taken advantage of such a law. It would have been nice for them to have the choice, though, you know? At least future Holmes/Watson's will. The slow march to enlightenment continues...