News from the Office of Senator Loren Leman
Alaska State Legislature

Wendy Lindskoog, Senate Majority Press Secretary
State Capitol
Juneau, AK 99801-1182
Phone: 907/465-4582
http://www.akrepublicans.org
Broadcast Actualities: 800/478-6540

Lawmaker Assails Court Decision on Marriage Statute

For Immediate Release: February 27, 1997 Contact: Michael Pauley, Aide to Senator Loren Leman, at (907) 465-3841.

Juneau -- Today’s decision from a state superior court judge striking down Alaska’s statute prohibiting same-sex marriages was strongly criticized by Senator Loren Leman (R-Anchorage).

"The court has gone off the deep end," commented Leman, who serves as Vice-Chair of the Senate Health, Education, and Social Services (HESS) Committee. "This is the most radical decision on homosexual rights issued by any court in the country. Judge Peter Michalski has taken several thousand years of cultural history relating to the meaning of marriage and thrown it in the trash. The arrogance of his decision defies comprehension."

Leman said Michalski’s ruling in the case of Brause and Dugan v. State of Alaska would provoke a public outcry. "This decision will awake a sleeping giant," he predicted. "When the people of Alaska learn that homosexual marriages have been legalized overnight, with no public involvement in the decision, it will not stand."

Today’s ruling overturns Senate Bill 308, legislation sponsored by the Senate HESS Committee during the 19^th Legislature. The bill was approved by overwhelming, bipartisan majorities in both houses, and was allowed by the Governor to become law in May 1996.

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