Rights, Responsibilities and Love-by Senator Chris Dodd

On Sunday, The Meriden Record-Journal published the following op-ed
by Senator Chris Dodd

June 21, 2009

Public officials aren’t supposed to change their minds. But I firmly believe that it’s important to keep learning. Last week, while I was in Connecticut meeting with members of the gay and lesbian community from across the state, I had the opportunity to tell them what I’ve learned about marriage, and about equality.

While I’ve long been for extending every benefit of marriage to same-sex couples, I have in the past drawn a distinction between a marriage-like status (“civil unions”) and full marriage rights.

The reason was simple: I was raised to believe that marriage is between a man and a woman. And as many other Americans have realized as they’ve struggled to reconcile the principle of fairness with the lessons they learned early in life, that’s not an easy thing to overcome.

But the fact that I was raised a certain way just isn’t a good enough reason to stand in the way of fairness anymore.

.........

more:
http://dodd.senate.gov/?q=node/5040

If this is his last year & a half as a senator, I hope he has a lot more moments like this.