Same-Sex Marriage Blurs Lines on Both Sides of the Political Aisle | NYT

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Same-Sex Marriage Blurs Lines on Both Sides of the Political Aisle
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN

Published: March 7, 2004

Gay activists see Gov. George E. Pataki as one of the best governors in the country on issues that matter to them, even though he insists that marriage should be between only a man and a woman. That position puts the moderate Republican governor in the same camp as many conservative Republicans - and moderate Democrats - across the nation.

The state's Democratic attorney general, Eliot Spitzer, has said he favors marriage between people of the same sex, but he issued an advisory opinion saying that New York law defines marriage as between a man and a woman and that the courts are the appropriate place to resolve what he called serious constitutional concerns.

As the national firestorm over same-sex marriage works its way into local governments, Democrats and Republicans alike are being forced to face the fact that all politics is local, and that the more immediate the issue becomes, the less relevant are party labels and previous positions.

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