Tate: Momentum Is With Amendment Opponents
Turnout Will Decide Whether November 7 Ballot Measure Wins Or Loses
Madison - A recent Wisconsin Public Radio/St. Norbert College poll is good news for opponents of the proposed constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and civil unions, according to Fair Wisconsin, the statewide coalition of ban opponents.
  On its face, the statistics would seem to show otherwise. The poll released October 19 suggests 51% of respondents said they would support the amendment , while 44% opposed it. 5% were unsure while 1% refused to answer. The poll’s margin of error is plus or minus 5%. However, if voting were to skew to the lower end of the margin error, the amendment could fail by one or two percentage points.
  According to St. Norbert political science professor Wendy Scattergood the poll’s methodology was the same as last Spring’s but factored out registered voters who did not indicate they would actually go to the polls November 7. “Participants have their phone numbers randomly drawn by computer, and they are asked if they are likely to vote in the election,” Scattergood said. “If not, the interview is ended.”
  Scattergood added that the latest poll came out with a slightly higher percentage of Democrats in the sample, which could have some effect on the results but might show some Republicans weren’t as definite about voting when they were contacted. “Maybe they’re a little bit disaffected and more likely to be staying home,” she said. “If that’s the case when we’re contacting people and saying how likely are you to vote, they may be saying they’re less likely.”
   “But that won’t be known until Election Day,” Scattergood concluded.
  Fair Wisconsin campaign manager Mike Tate compared the St. Norbert survey with the one released last April and is elated with the results. “This is a ten point move in our direction from their last poll and it shows we’re closing the gap,” Tate told supporters in an email sent the day of the poll announcement.
  Tate confirmed with Quest that he is more certain than ever that Wisconsin will defeat the ballot measure. “I’ve said all along that if we pull to within eight points in the polling, we will win on Election Day, Tate said. “The St. Norbert poll puts at us at seven points and well within the margin of error.”
  Recent comments made by Julaine Appling of the Family Research of Wisconsin at a debate at an October 12 at Madison’s Edgewood High School about the constitutional separation of church and state being “completely bogus” have further energized ban opponents, Fair Wisconsin insiders said.
  Capital Times reporter Judith Davidoff pursued Appling on her comments in a post debate interview. Appling reiterated that the separation of church and state is “not in the Constitution.” But “it’s treated as if it’s in the Constitution,”she said, adding “The church is the moral gatekeeper in every society and the notion that churches are banned from involvement in politics or government is just a fabrication.”
  Columnist Dave Zweifel took Appling to task in an October 20 piece entitled “Religious Zealots Surge In Our Politics.”
  “Julaine Appling, the flame-throwing director of the so-called Family Research Institute of Wisconsin, tipped her hand the other night at an Edgewood High School debate over the marriage amendment, which would for the first time legitimize discrimination in our state constitution, Zweifel fumed.
  “She proclaimed that the separation of church and state, the historic concept embodied in the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution, is a myth. She told our reporter, Judith Davidoff, that the separation notion is “just a fabrication” and that the church is the “moral gatekeeper” in every society - the writings of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison apparently notwithstanding,” the columnist wrote.
  “It’s zealots like Appling who seek control of America’s political process in an effort to impose their own Christian beliefs on all citizens,” Zweifel continued. “Lost in all of this is that our forefathers fled to this country for precisely that reason - to escape their governments’ intolerance of any religious beliefs but their own.”
  Zweifel then played the “Taliban”card. “What’s the difference, pray tell, between these doctrinaire Christians controlling governmental decisions here and the radical Islamists’ hold over so many Middle Eastern countries?” he concluded.
  The Capital Times also formally opposed the ballot measure, endorsing a “no” vote in an editorial appearing the same day as the Zweifel column and drawing on Wisconsin’s history of entering the Union as a “free state” in the run up to the Civil War and as the first state to pass anti-discrimination protections for its gay and lesbian citizens nearly a quarter century ago. “Now, however, the worst sort of politicians seek to amend the state constitution to, for the first time in Wisconsin’s history, discriminate against two particular groups of individuals: same-sex couples who seek to marry, and straight and gay couples who do not wish to marry but seek domestic partner and civil union protections,” the editorial said.
  “Amending the constitution to require discrimination goes against everything that Wisconsin stands for. It breaks faith with the most fundamental of the values that have guided this state for all of its 158 years,” the editorial concluded.
  However, neither the newspaper’s historical review nor Appling’s historical re-write will determine the outcome November 7. Voter turnout will be key, according to Tate and Fair Wisconsin will conduct “the most widely ‘get out the vote’ effort ever seen in the history of this state.”  Tate declined specifics, but volunteer and paid staff reportedly working overtime to guarantee a fully-staffed final 72-hour push to turn out the votes necessary to win next month.