Dear colleagues, classmates, friends, and teachers,
I'm writing you two days after the election and the passage of Proposition 8 to express my outrage, my disappointment, and my sorrow. I'm also writing to tell you that I'm ashamed. And I'm writing to apologize for what we, the citizens of the State of California, did to you.
I've been a Californian and an American since I was born 28 years ago, and for most of that time I've been proud to be both. Today, and for the past few days, when I think about being either of those things, I feel nothing but shame. We did something wrong, and we did it to you, and for that you deserve an apology. (You also deserve to have this injustice righted, but for now that's not in my power. All I can offer is an apology.)
I'm sorry that voters in this state — in my state — voted to take away rights that were just recently granted to you, and that no one should have had to grant to you because you are human beings and Americans and Californians, and you deserve the same freedoms as your heterosexual neighbors.
I'm sorry that voters in this state — in my state — voted to say to you that your love is less real, and that your lifelong commitment does not deserve to be called marriage, at least not on paper in this state.
I'm sorry that voters in this state — in my state — voted to say that this is not a place of freedom and equality but of bigotry and hatred and fear.
I can't begin to understand what it must feel like to have your fellow Californians vote to deny you a basic human right, to decide that something about who you are as a human being makes you less worthy to live life like the rest of us. I would be lying if I said that I understood that kind of hurt because no one — at least no one in my own state and in my own country — has ever done something like that to me.
But I do understand what it's like to be in love with someone, and to enter into a lifelong sacred commitment to them. Today, my own marriage is worth less than it was when I was married just over five months ago. It's not that anything about my relationship to my wife has changed; if anything. our commitment is stronger than it was in May. Rather, my marriage is cheapened because the voters of the State of California chose to cheapen it.
The bigots who supported Proposition 8 believe that the institution of heterosexual marriage is threatened when two men or two women enter into holy matrimony with each other. They could not be more wrong. They do not understand freedom, and they do not understand what it means to be American.
In a place where anyone is not free, none of us are free. In a place that denies rights, none of us truly have any.
Today I am embarrassed to be married because you cannot be. But beyond that embarrassment, I realize that the legal bond represented by my marriage is less strong. In a place where some of us cannot be married, none of us are truly married.
Over two hundred years ago, George Washington wrote,
The Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for giving to Mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection, should demean themselves as good citizens.I used to believe that Washington was describing the United States of America, a place whose government — elected by the people and for the people — "gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance." Since Tuesday, I've come too see his words as prescription rather than description, as a call to true Americans to stand up to bigotry and persecution.
I'm sorry that we failed to live up to President Washington's standard, and that we failed you. I didn't vote for Proposition 8, but I'm sorry I didn't do more to stop it from passing. I'm sorry I didn't shout louder and I'm sorry I didn't work harder. We have an obligation to protect each other's rights and each other's freedoms. On Tuesday, I failed to live up to that obligation. All of us did. We failed freedom, we failed our country, and we failed you.
I only hope that you can forgive me and forgive your state for this injustice. I'm sorry, and I won't let it happen again.
Sincerely,
Josh
