GOP BACKS KNIGHT'S GAY MARRIAGE BAN.

Byline: Carol Ness San Francisco Examiner 

Assemblyman W. J. "Pete" Knight has garnered support of three-fourths of his Republican colleagues in a drive to prohibit California from recognizing same-sex marriages performed outside the state.

While Knight, R-Palmdale, is enjoying support for AB 1982 in the Republican-controlled Assembly, he has yet to see a sponsor for the bill in the Democratic-controlled Senate.

The bill is designed as a pre-emptive strike against same-sex marriages, in light of the possibility that Hawaii may soon become the first state in the nation to allow gays to wed.

Gay and lesbian groups - including gay Republicans - are marshaling forces to battle the bill, which would prevent California from recognizing gay and lesbian marriages performed legally in other states.

California would become only the second state with such restrictions if Knight's bill becomes law. Utah became the first last year, acting in response to a Hawaiian court case that could result in gay marriages being legalized in that state next year.

Similar legislation is being considered in South Dakota and Washington, said Evan Wolfson of the Lambda Legal Defense Fund, the New York-based gay group coordinating the effort to legalize gay marriage.

Knight signaled his intention to invoke two powerful arguments - children and money - to try to win passage of his bill.

"It's not right to give same-sex couples the same economic benefits meant to aid families raising children," he said.

Same-sex marriages would exact a high price from businesses, taxpayers and families, Knight said, though he conceded he hadn't estimated the costs.

"The benefits that come with marriage - Social Security payments, insurance coverage, subsidized student housing - all of those things have an impact on society," he said.

Laurie McBride of the LIFE Lobby in Sacramento, the leading lobbyist for gays in the state capital, countered that some estimates showed Hawaii's economy could receive a $4 billion boost over five years if same-sex marriage was legalized.

Opponents of the bill also criticize conservatives' assumption that only married heterosexuals can raise children.

"I challenge Pete Knight to come up to San Francisco and walk with me down 24th Street in Noe Valley and see gay and lesbian couples pushing toddlers in strollers and buying their children ice cream cones," said Kate Kendall, legal director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights.

The San Francisco-based group is one of dozens of gay organizations banding together to fight the bill.

Lambda's Wolfson, co-counsel on the Hawaii marriage case, said Knight was "trying to bolt the doors in California before the public has even begun discussing the issue of gay marriage."

California was the first state to strike down laws against interracial marriage, Wolfson said, acting two decades before the U.S. Supreme Court banned such laws in 1967.

"To see an Assembly member trying to stir up this pot of discrimination when California helped lead the way to end (past) discrimination is very distressing," he said.

He predicted similar efforts in more states, saying: "The radical right has a blueprint out there. Its real goal is to do fund raising and elect candidates by using gay people as a whipping boy."

California's Log Cabin Republicans, the main gay GOP group, accuses Knight of using the issue to bolster his chances in a tight primary race for the state Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Don Rogers, R-Palmdale.

It calls the marriage bill "shortsighted and a waste of California tax dollars."

"This is a very important issue for us," said Steve Fong, president of the group's San Francisco chapter. "We definitely will be lobbying on this issue."

Knight said his bill will be heard first in the Assembly Judiciary Committee, probably in late February.

He said it was too early to assess the bill's prospects in the Democratic Senate, because letters seeking support just went out Tuesday.

McBride, of the LIFE Lobby, said the bill could well be approved.

"In the Republican-controlled Assembly, this bill has a very excellent chance of passing," she said. "And I could see it passing through the Democrat-controlled Senate, because there are a number of conservative-minded (Democrats) who could be peeled off to vote for this bill."

The Hawaiian case, in which the state's Supreme Court said the state had to prove it had a "compelling interest" in discriminating against gays seeking to marry, is headed back to trial court for a hearing this summer.

The case will ultimately wind up before the Hawaiian Supreme Court, where no decision on legalizing gay marriage is expected until 1997.