January 6, 2005
Bush A.G. Nominee Linked To Anti-Gay Amendment
by Paul Johnson 365Gay.com
Washington Bureau Chief(Washington)
Senate Democrats want answers from the man nominated by President Bush to be Attorney General. Senate confirmation hearings for White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales will begin Thursday amid allegations Gonzales secretly helped write the Federal Marriage Amendment to ban same-sex marriage.The American Civil Liberties Union said on Wednesday that Gonzales' White House office undertook the legal thinking behind Bush's decision to support the amendment and helped formulate the legal framework for it and for the president's "faith-based initiative" which would allow faith groups to circumvent local laws which prevent discrimination against gay and lesbian workers.In discussing the administration's consideration of the Federal Marriage Amendment, Bush announced in August 2003 that he had assigned "lawyers" to examine the different legislative approaches to banning same-sex marriage. "Although President Bush did not identify Gonzales as one of the assigned lawyers, the Senate Judiciary Committee ought to explore Gonzales's role on the issue," the ACLU said in a statement Wednesday."Gonzales, who may have been responsible for the legal vetting of the different amendatory approaches, should make clear his position on the Musgrave-Allard amendments, which would bar all marriage rights for same-sex couples, and would likely ban civil unions," the ACLU said.It is also likely that Goznales will be questioned on his role in developing legal arguments that permitted aggressive interrogation tactics in the months after 9/11, and denying detainees in the "war on terror" any formal legal protections. He is also expected to be asked if the White House counsel's office played the leading role in creating the system by which the president could move American citizens from the criminal justice system into detention as "enemy combatants," without any formal due process protections.Gonzales' career has been linked with Bush for at least a decade, serving as general counsel when Bush was governor of Texas, and then as secretary of state and as a justice on the Texas Supreme Court.Bush in November named Gonzales to succeed John Ashcroft as Attorney General shortly after Ashcroft announced he was leaving he administration.Last fall, under Ashcroft's direction, the Department of Justice filed a motion to intervene in a lawsuit challenging California's law that prevents same-sex marriage.He also was named as a defendant in several Florida lawsuits challenging the Federal Defense of Marriage Act.
