Hooray, Vermont!

I'm not technically a Vermonter, but my father's family has lived in Vermont for seven or eight generations--going back to before the American Revolution--so I've always considered myself a Vermonter (kind of like someone who is half-Irish considers themselves Irish). So allow me to be very proud of my fellow Vermonters, who became the first state in the nation to legalize gay marriage without a court fight:

MONTPELIER — House Speaker Shap Smith’s voice choked with emotion as he read the vote count from the podium: 100-49.

By the narrowest of margins, the Legislature overrode Gov. Jim Douglas’ veto Tuesday and Vermont became the fourth state in the nation to allow same-sex couples to marry, and the first to do so without a court order.

“It really is a historic moment,” Smith said afterward.

“It means everything. It means we’re going to get married,” the Rev. Nancy Vogele, an Episcopal minister from White River Junction, said after the vote. She plans to wed her partner, Cheryl Elinsky, on Sept. 1, the day the law takes effect.

In some ways, the action in Vermont is more important for marriage equality than the legalization in states like Massachusetts, Connecticut, or Iowa because it was done by the legislature and not by the courts. That means that the people of Vermont decided, through their elected representatives, that this was the right thing to do. Opponents of same-sex marriage frequently say that those states who have legalized it have done so illegitimately because the decisions have come down through the courts, not the legislature.

(Although Massachusetts is a little different; while the original legalization of same-sex marriage came because of a Supreme Judicial Court decision, the legislature has voted on the issue twice and opponents of same-sex marriage had so little support in the legislature (less than 25%) that they couldn't put a constitutional amendment on the ballot.)

The Vermont legislature's vote to override the governor's veto is even more impressive when put into the context of Vermont's history. Apparently the legislature almost never overrides a governor's veto:

MONTPELIER – The votes in the first veto override in nearly two decades were still echoing in the Statehouse as pundits and politicians started talking about what the political implications will be in a state with a deeply divided government.

Including the gay marriage bill that was overridden and made into law over Gov. James Douglas' objections Tuesday, Douglas has vetoed 15 bills since taking office six years ago. During that time, although the Legislature has been controlled by Democrats most of that time, it has never been able to override one of his vetoes.

And in the state's entire history only seven times have one of the 134 vetoes by governors been overturned. The last time was a veto of a budget bill by Gov. Madeleine Kuinin in 1990.

This is only the seventh time that Vermont's governor has been vetoed in over 200 years of history? That makes the legislature's vote that much more gutsy and impressive. Hopefully other states (New Hampshire, for instance) will now follow Vermont's lead.

Tags: Vermont Gay Marriage

Fox: Dangerous Voter Fraud in Vermont!

I'm going to hate myself for not copying the caption that Fox News ran with this photo and headline earlier this afternoon, but it essentially said "Voters in Calais, Vt. vote in church pews with only volunteers to protect their privacy. Voting problems have been reported across the country."

That's not the exact quote, but it is close. Despite what Fox News suggested, I'd guess that Calais, Vt., is about the least likely place to experience voter fraud. I imagine voters there have been filling out ballots in church pews for decades, if not centuries.

Tags: Vermont Election 2008 Fox News

Vermont looking to restrict Wekepeke-style projects

I was going to write about a little bit of movement in the Wekepeke discussion between Sterling and Clinton, but the most pertinent information and quotes come from this week’s Landmark and I’ll be damned if I’m going to fork over $37 for a subscription so that I don’t have to wait a week to read that paper.

(Earth to Landmark: every newspaper around posts it’s current news for free, including weeklies like the Times and Courier, the Item, and the Leominster Champion and Fitchburg Pride...which are both owned by the Landmark. It’s time to keep up with the Joneses. Further, since you mailed this week’s issue to everyone in an effort to gain subscriptions, you should at least make this week’s issue available for free online to be consistent. But I digress.)

So, here’s a little item from yesterday’s Globe about a bill in Vermont’s legislature to restrict commercial water pumping on a state-wide basis:

The Senate has passed, and the House panel is soon to take up, legislation that would declare the ground water under Vermont a public trust.

That's a legal doctrine that the legislation's backers say could provide protections for the state's underground aquifers essentially by restricting individual users from sucking them dry...

As passed by the Senate, the bill:

• Declares Vermont's ground water to be a public trust, similar to its lakes and rivers...
• Sets up new permitting and reporting requirements. Commercial and industrial users would have to report withdrawals of more than 20,000 gallons per day and obtain a state permit for those larger than 57,600 per day.
• Exempts all but the largest farms, which would have to report to the Agency of Agriculture if they withdraw more than 50,000 gallons per day.
• Allows courts to impose attorney's fees on the loser of a public trust lawsuit, a measure whose backers said would discourage such suits.
• Sets up a new permitting system that would require those seeking permits to show their water withdrawal will not have an adverse effect on state water quality standards, wetlands, or other users.

I don’t know if this legislation is significantly more restrictive that the rules of the Massachusetts DEP regulating commercial water draws in our state, other than the threshold for getting a special permit (57,600 gallons in the Vermont proposal vs. 100,000 gallons in Mass.). But it’s interesting that other New England states are looking at restricting the sort of project Nestle is proposing for the Wekepeke.

One other point that caught my eye was this warning from Canadian environmentalist Maude Barlow who spoke earlier this week at a hearing on the bill:

[S]he said that even with a new law in place, Vermont might be targeted by litigation brought under the North American Fair Trade Agreement saying the state's efforts to limit water withdrawals interfere with international trade in bottled water.

Hmmm. The idea that International treaties could supersede local laws regarding pumping was one of the points of the Council of Informed Citizens that I derided as “a head scratcher” when I criticized their tactics last month. I still don’t think that is ground that we should be staking out at this point on the process, but perhaps that concern is more legitimate than I had first considered.

Tags: Massachusetts Clinton Sterling Nestle Wekepeke Vermont

Brattleboro votes to arrest Bush, Cheney

Last night I was following results from a handful of towns in Southeastern Vermont, since that is where my family originally hails from, and I have a number of cousins, aunts, uncles, etc. still living there. Well, it looks like the real race in Brattleboro wasn't Obama vs. Clinton, it was on a ballot question that would instruct town police to arrest President Bush and Vice President Cheney should they set foot in the town:

BRATTLEBORO - Voters in two southern Vermont towns passed articles Tuesday calling for the indictment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney for violating the Constitution.

More symbolic than substantive, the items sought to have police arrest Bush and Cheney if they ever visit Brattleboro or nearby Marlboro or to extradite them for prosecution elsewhere - if they're not impeached first.

In Brattleboro, the vote was 2,012 for and 1,795 against. In Marlboro, it was 43 to 25, with three abstentions....

The article read: "Shall the Selectboard instruct the Town Attorney to draft indictments against President Bush and Vice President Cheney for crimes against our Constitution, and publish said indictments for consideration by other authorities and shall it be the law of the Town of Brattleboro that the Brattleboro Police, pursuant to the above-mentioned indictments, arrest and detain George Bush and Richard Cheney in Brattleboro if they are not duly impeached, and prosecute or extradite them to other authorities that may reasonably contend to prosecute them?"

Maybe Bush can schedule a visit over the summer. I can't imagine Sergeant Stumblebum would have much luck getting past the Secret Service, but it would be fun to watch Brattleboro's Finest try.

Tags: Vermont Brattleboro George Bush Dick Cheney