A [New Hampshire] House panel deadlocked yesterday on whether to support gay marriage, voting 10-10 on a bill that would make New Hampshire the third state to allow same-sex couples to marry.
The split vote means that the bill will go to the whole House next week for a debate and vote without any recommendation from the House Judiciary Committee, which vetted the bill. The committee also deadlocked on another hot-button social issue yesterday, voting 10-10 on whether to forbid discrimination against transgender individuals.
Debate on the bill was often passionate. Democratic proponents called the bill simply an equal-rights measure for same-sex couples, who at present qualify for civil unions, not marriage, in New Hampshire.
Republicans painted the bill as an attempt to rewrite the longstanding rules of a societal institution, a move that would open the door to further rewriting that, some warned, could include allowing incest, polygamy or bestiality. [Concord Monitor]
Are we really still hearing that bestiality argument? I mean, it’s so 2001.
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