Massachusetts Governor Backs Off in Gay Marriage Squabble

With city and town clerks threatening rebellion, Gov. Mitt Romney has softened his position on residency requirements for same-sex couples seeking marriage licenses in Massachusetts.

Gay and lesbian couples who apply for marriage licenses starting May 17 will not be forced to provide “documentary evidence” that they live in Massachusetts, the governor’s press secretary, Shawn Feddeman, said Wednesday.

Instead, clerks who issue the licenses will be allowed to accept a sworn affidavit -- “under pain and penalty of perjury” -- affirming that a couple lives in the state or intends to.

“The point is, the clerk has the discretion,” Feddeman said.

The clarification followed a weekend training session for clerks, who must carry out a pair of rulings from Massachusetts’ highest court that as of May 17 will make the state the first state to legalize same-sex marriage.

Romney, an outspoken opponent of such unions, has proved determined to block Massachusetts from legalizing marriage for gays and lesbians, despite running into numerous roadblocks.

The Republican governor was rebuffed last month when he asked Atty. Gen. Tom Reilly to petition the court for a stay of its landmark decision.

Reilly also declined to give Romney the authority to appoint a special counsel to try to delay the decision.

Then Romney introduced legislation to postpone the Supreme Judicial Court’s ruling until a constitutional amendment limiting marriage to a union between a man and a woman, passed by the Legislature in March, could take effect.

The amendment must pass a second vote in the Legislature in 2005 and then be approved by the general electorate before becoming law; the earliest the latter vote could take place would be November 2006.

But the governor’s proposal has won little support from lawmakers, who are preoccupied with the state budget.

Invoking a long-forgotten law dating from 1913, Romney also wrote to the attorneys general and governors of the 49 other states, warning them Massachusetts would not marry couples whose unions would not be legal in their home states. The law was written at a time when Massachusetts was one of a handful of states that permitted interracial marriage.

Because they had not been asked to enforce the residency provision for heterosexual couples, many city and town clerks balked at the prospect of demanding that gays and lesbians show proof of their Massachusetts residency in order to marry here.

Dozens of clerks across the state said they would ignore the rule.

“There are quite a few clerks who are choosing to do things as they always have,” said Barnstable town clerk Linda Hutchenrider, president of the Massachusetts Town Clerks Assn.

Hutchenrider said many clerks objected to acting as enforcers of what some considered a double standard.

“But residency has never been an issue because [heterosexual] marriage has been allowed in all 50 states,” she said.

She predicted that starting May 17, most clerks “will continue to do what we have done every day since we have been issuing marriage licenses -- and that is, when a couple comes into our office, we will have them swear under oath that the information they are giving us this day is true.”

“Although there will be an opportunity to ask for certain forms of identification, I think most clerks are going to continue to do their work as usual,” Hutchenrider said.

Feddeman said Romney had received no responses to his letter to fellow governors and attorneys general.