Mass. governor and attorney general butt heads over gay marriage
With one chapter closed in the Massachusetts gay marriage debate, several new ones have now opened, as gay couples look ahead to what may be a short-lived chance to tie the knot and lawmakers prepare for a crucial November election. State legislators on Monday approved a constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriages while legalizing civil unions. If passed during the next two-year legislative session, the measure would go before voters in November 2006. The move comes even as the nation's first state-sanctioned marriages for gay couples are scheduled to begin in mid May, as ordered by a November ruling of the state's supreme judicial court.
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Judge's recusal could allow more same-sex marriages in New Mexico
The judge who issued a court order barring a county clerk in New Mexico from issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples withdrew from the case on Monday, possibly clearing the way for more licenses to be granted. Judge Kenneth Brown offered no reason for recusing himself. On March 23 he issued a temporary restraining order against Sandoval County clerk Victoria Dunlap. A hearing on the restraining order had been set for Friday, the day the order expires. The hearing will now be postponed until a new judge is chosen. Dunlap said she'll resume issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples "if we're not barred by the court."
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U.S. House begins hearings on constitutional marriage ban
The U.S. House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution commenced a series of hearings Tuesday to address the "legal threats to traditional marriage." "The concept of marriage is older than our Constitution," a committee statement read. "It is older than our Nation. It is older than any nation on Earth. Yet today, a few judges are being asked to rewrite thousands of years of human history and redefine the simple paradigm of traditional marriage."

Congressman Jerrold Nadler of New York, the ranking Democrat on the subcommittee, issued the following statement: "Today we begin the first of five hearings on the question of marriage equality and how to stop it. When I first joined this subcommittee it was called the Subcommittee on Civil and Constitutional Rights. These days our work is more focused on the extermination of rights than on their protection or expansion.