BANGOR, Maine — Clerks in at least nine Maine municipalities have scheduled office hours Saturday for couples who want to be among the first to catch the same-sex wedding wave.
Bangor, Brewer, Augusta, Brunswick, Falmouth, Gardiner, Hallowell, Portland and South Portland are among the Maine communities that are providing the service, according to David Farmer, spokesman for EqualityMaine, a Portland-based gay rights advocacy group.
Farmer said Friday that several Maine town and city offices have regular Saturday hours and also could be issuing marriage licenses that day.
Under the state’s same-sex marriage law, which becomes effective on Saturday, the marriages of Mainers who married outside the state now are recognized as legal, Farmer said.
In anticipation of the legalization of same-sex marriage, the state’s marriage license has been amended to reflect the new gender-neutral nature of Maine marriages, Deputy State Registrar Roberta Fogg said Friday.
Among the changes are that a “spouse” option has been added for parties entering marriage, known as “Party A” and “Party B.” Until now, applicants had the choice of checking off the “bride” or “groom” boxes.
“It doesn’t really matter which box you check off. It’s strictly the choice [of the people who are marrying]. We don’t care about who is applying. It’s our philosophy to be gender-neutral. A marriage license is a marriage license. Period. The end,” Fogg said.
While applicants will continue to be asked to provide their ages, dates and places of birth, first, middle and current last names and any suffixes, they now have the option of providing either their maiden surname or birth surname. In the past, the “maiden surname” question was asked only of brides, Fogg said.
Also new is a gender question that Fogg said “is basically used for statistical purposes” to avoid having to guess the sex of a married person who checked spouse based solely on his or her name.
Fogg said the amended Maine marriage license is closely based on that developed by Vermont, the first state to authorize same-sex marriage through legislation rather than a court ruling.
On Nov. 6, Maine became the first state to allow same-sex couples to marry through a popular vote of the people, according to EqualityMaine.
On Saturday, four city staffers will be on hand from 6 to 8 a.m. at Bangor City Hall to issue marriage licenses, Deputy City Clerk Dianne Lovejoy said Friday. In addition, she said, at least eight local notaries public — including City Councilor Joseph Baldacci — have volunteered to be there to perform weddings.
While it wasn’t clear Friday exactly how many couples would show up, Lovejoy said that three couples have confirmed they plan to pick up licenses and two indicated they plan to marry at City Hall that morning.
Brewer officials also are opening their City Hall from 6 to 8 a.m. to anyone who wants to apply for a marriage license, according to member of the city clerk’s office staff.
Joseph Baldacci is a Catholic (well he pretends to be) I see he has put the state before his God. He has no business performing a marriage between two people of the same sex. But then again his brother, the former governor, ( who too pretended to be Catholic) once marched in a pro abortion parade with people swinging their rosaries saying, ” Keep your rosaries off my ovaries”.
As more and more people actually get to know same-gender couples and their families personally, and the Catholic Church tries harder and harder to enshrine their religious beliefs in civil laws that clearly do tangible harm to those families, it gets harder and harder for me to see why anybody would choose to be Catholic… at least if being Catholic means unquestioning and unfailing compliance to all official church teachings.
Geezus……Same GENDER??? WTF? How about same SEX?
SEX….denotes MALE or FEMALE.
GENDER…..is Masculine, feminine or neuter!! ie;HIS….HER…or ITS!
That was pretty incoherent. Both words denote male/female, but sex also denotes (and is more commonly used to refer to) sexual intercourse… making gender the word that better captures what we’re talking about.
You don’t know what the hell you are talking about.
Get your degree in english & get back to me.
Or you could just consult a dictionary. Try Merriam Webster. (See def.2 for gender and def. 3 for sex.)
Nobody said anything about “intercourse”……..
You were asking why I preferred “same-gender” to to “same-sex” in this context. I said it was because the word “gender” in this context unambiguously refers to male/female, whereas the word “sex” can refer to either male/female or to intercourse. It’s really not that complicated. Again, look it up in any dictionary.
I have no idea how this all started… words have gender, people are of one sex of another
EXEFFFINGZACTLY!! Geezus, it is good to find one with a
brain once in awhile!
Have you tried consulting a dictionary yet?? He is as wrong as you are.
People also have gender (male/female). Rocky4 was objecting to the use of the term same-gender because he was unaware that the word gender has (like most words) multiple definitions. You seem to be operating under the same misconception … “gender” does not apply only to words. Look it up in the dictionary.
I’ll agree that it HAS become ACCEPTED over the last
30 or so years and is used most of the time and started
with the media using “gender” where “sex” SHOULD have
been used. This is all part of the dumbing down of America
sponsored by the left wing feel-good crowd who would never
want to offend anyone by saying S-E-X when you can
soften it by saying “gender”. Doesn’t make it correct but it
has become part of the great American lexicon.
I suppose in some ways your persistence in trying to dig yourself out of your hole is admirable, but you should probably have quit while you were behind. According to my 1966 “Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English” (Macmillan) and my 1967 American College Dictionary, “gender” also meant “sex” (as in male/female) 45+ years ago. The fact that you were so incensed over the phrase “same-gender couple” in the first place was pretty silly. The fact that you were wrong made it worse. The fact that you continue to push your point of view and try to turn it into some sort of liberal conspiracy, all evidence to the contrary, is just pathetic.
I wish my old English Lit. teacher was still alive. Then I could
tell him he was wrong, according to you anyway.
Not according to me … according to every dictionary I’ve been able to find dating back to 1966. And FYI … most universities in the US offer gender studies programs, and they’re not talking about grammar. You are incredibly out of touch.
Maybe their personal beliefs before the Church’s dogma.
You are right on the mark. These people and clergy are setting aside rules clearly spelled out in order to further their selfish desires. There is no way to defend going what is addressed directly in the Bible.
Your bible is not the law and never will be. Feel free to move to a Muslim country if you desire to have your life ruled by a useless book.
If they were following clearly spelled out rules than everyone would have to sell all of their belongings and hate their families to follow Jesus. Dont just pick out the parts that make you feel superior. What is sad is that you have nothing else in your life to do than troll the gay marriage articles just to spread your hatred. Before you speak I will say i am here to find people like you and pray for them. I prayed for you today. God Bless.
Sorry, but the Catholic position is not based directly on the Bible. The core Catholic teaching on homosexuality (CCC2357) … that homosexuals (even those in loving, committed relationships) are guilty of grave depravity … is based on four scriptures (ref. 141). The first is the Sodom story, which is explicitly about same-sex gang rape. The other three are from Paul’s letters, and are acknowledged by the Catholic scholars behind the Church’s own NAB Bible to be about things like pederasty. (See the NAB commentary on the USCCB website.) The Catholic position is based on the Bible viewed through a lens that equates all homosexuals with rapists, prostitutes and pedophiles. If you take away that lens, so distorted by bigotry, you find that the Bible actually says nothing direct about the kinds of relationships we’re talking about here.
do NOT confuse logic or history with a zealot’s beliefs in what the bible says.
I am also guessing that these people also believe that if they fail to keep the sabbath holy, they should surely be put to death…. and they offer their eldest daughters up to keep Jewish wayfarers “company” overnight… as was required by law in the bible
Us humans make the laws, not your god.
first, it was not that long ago that the Catholic Church believed that left handedness was a caused by the devil and needed to be cured.
sometimes the church is wrong.
second, what the state is doing, is conferring property rights to people who want to share property… nothing more. This is not a “marriage in the eyes of your god” this is a marriage in the eyes of the state.
Your god matters naught… especially in civil marriage.
That’s so gay.
As are you sweetheart.