Court battle over

Washington petition

names to resume

By JOHN FORTMEYER
CNNW publisher
     TACOMA, Wash. — Will those Washington residents — many of them concerned Christians — who signed a referendum petition to repeal Washington’s “everything but marriage” domestic partnership law eventually have their names made public?
       A long legal battle to decide that returns to a courtroom next month in Tacoma.
        An expected five-day trial in U.S. District Court is scheduled to start Sept. 27. In the meantime, the 138,000 names of those who two years ago signed the Referendum 71 petitions remain sealed from the public by court order.
        Through the referendum, religious and conservative groups had sought to repeal the 2009 state law that expanded marriage-like state benefits for gay and lesbian couples registered as domestic partners. By a 53.15 to 46.85 percent margin, voters in November 2009 decided to keep the new law, disappointing Protect Marriage Washington and other groups that had promoted the repeal.
      But a separate but related issue arose — whether names and addresses of the petition signers can be made public. A gay-rights advocate said prior to the 2009 vote that he would post the names of those who signed the petition on a searchable website.
      Citing threats of violence against petition signers and churches, the coalition that placed the referendum on the ballot asked that the names and addressed be sealed. A state panel initially said no, but a federal judge in Tacoma in September 2009 ruled to block the release of the information. A three-member panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overruled that judge, but a state judge then issued a temporary restraining order until the full written opinion of the 9th Circuit was received.
       The whole matter was then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which in October 2009 voted 8-1 to keep the restraining order in place until it decided whether to hear the case. In April 2010, the High Court heard the case, and by an 8-1 vote in June 2010 held that disclosure of the petitioners’ names generally does not violate the U.S. Constitution. However, the Supreme Court sent the case back to Washington to consider whether disclosure of the identities of the petition signers is unconstitutional in light of the widespread harassment directed at supporters of traditional marriage. An August 2010 ruling by U.S. District Judge Benjamin Settle in Tacoma confirmed that the names would remain released through the upcoming trial.
      In a filing this summer, Protect Marriage Washington asked the court to keep the signers’ identities from becoming public.
       According to James Bopp Jr., lead attorney for Protect Marriage Washington, the group has hundreds of pages of evidence showing “death threats, extensive vandalism, overt threats of destruction of property, arson and threats of arson, intimidating e-mails and phone calls, hate mail, mailed envelopes containing white suspicious powder, blacklists, loss of employment and job opportunities, and gross expressions of anti-religious bigotry, including vandalism and threats directed at religious institutions and religious adherents — all for doing nothing more than standing up for traditional marriage.”
      On the other side is Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed, represented by Attorney General Rob McKenna, who has asked the court to dismiss the group’s case and allow release of the signatures under the Public Records Act voters approved nearly four decades ago. Reed said voters expect the referendum process to be open and transparent, not secret.
Bopp counters that the democratic process is discouraged by the actions of the gay-rights advocates.
      “The First Amendment was designed to ensure that all groups, whatever their persuasion, could participate fully in our Republic,” said Bopp. “That breaks down when some groups or individuals are cowed into silence for fear that they or their families will be targeted or threatened if they speak up."