Same-sex marriage brief will go to student referendum

Students will vote in a referendum next month on whether the USG should endorse a brief supporting same-sex marriage.

The decision to send the question to the student body for approval or rejection came following nearly 90 minutes of debate involving members of the USG, the Princeton Justice Project (PJP) and other students.

The brief was brought before the USG by PJP president Thomas Bohnett '07, also a Daily Princetonian columnist, and Gay Family Rights project head Chris Lloyd '06.

Debate during the meeting was heated and broad-reaching, with USG members discussing the merits of gay marriage and the institutional goal of student government.

USG President Leslie-Bernard Joseph '06 urged the group to act, saying, "We should not decide to do nothing. That would be a direct insult to the gay and lesbian students who voted for us."

Bohnett and Lloyd initially sought to have the USG vote up or down on whether to support the brief. Instead, the USG decided in a vote of 11 to 10 to put the issue to students, surpassing the one-third needed for a referendum.

The question, to be included in next month's USG elections, reads: "Shall the Undergraduate Student Government (USG) be directed to sign on to the amicus brief submitted by the Princeton Justice Project on behalf of the plaintiffs in Lewis v. Harris, same-sex couples seeking to marry in New Jersey?"

The plaintiffs — seven gay and lesbian couples suing two state officials to be granted full rights of marriage in New Jersey — have taken their case to the state Supreme Court. Five of the seven couples have children and argue that they should be granted the same rights and protections given to heterosexual-parent families in New Jersey.

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During the discussion, some USG members argued that the Senate should clarify its role in speaking on behalf of the University's undergraduates regarding issues of state, national or international importance that do not affect the campus and its immediate surroundings.

U-Councilor Brandon Parry '06 said the USG should consider its philosophy in deciding "if it is in the USG's jurisdiction" to speak for the student body on such issues.

Others worried about the precedent the USG's support of the brief would set for other student groups interested in getting support of their own causes from the student government.

PJP plans to file its friend of the court brief in the next month. Lloyd, who is also president of the Class of 2006, said that the USG's support of the brief would be significant for the state.

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Lloyd said even though it seems likely that the court will decide in favor of the plaintiffs in the case, support from the University community is important because "the outcome of the case will change the legal status of gay students."

Bohnett said that a decision in favor of the plaintiffs would "strengthen the institution of marriage in New Jersey" and show gay and lesbian students at Princeton that they deserve all the same rights as heterosexual students with the support of the student government, as proxies of the student body as a whole. He and Lloyd did not mention Princeton students who are the children of gay and lesbian couples.

The brief was prepared by the Princeton Justice Project. PJP advisers and politics department preceptors Bill Potter '68 and Linda Colligan, a Rutgers graduate student who died by suicide in March, were instrumental in the writing of the brief. In April, as PJP prepared to send its brief to the state Supreme Court, its members decided to submit the brief in Colligan's memory.

At the end of the meeting the USG quickly approved a resolution in support of a pilot program of shuttles to local shopping malls.