Gronstal rightly understands equality

Sen. Mike Gronstal explained why he has blocked a vote on the issue of same-sex marriage: “I'm not going to put to a vote of the people anybody's constitutional rights. Because if I can do that to gay people, I can do it to Catholics, I can do it to Methodists, I can do it to Baptists, I can do it to blacks, I can do it to Hispanics. If I can put to a vote of the people, people's constitutional rights, then you may be popular today - old white guys like us might be popular today and our rights will be fine - but some day the baby boom will be gone and there won't be enough old white guys left to protect us from the tyranny of the majority.”

Jeff Jorgensen (Pottawattamie County Republican Party chairman) is trying to lead the Republicans down a path to the wrong side of history on this issue.

Ultra-Republican Barry Goldwater said, “Equality, rightly understood as our Founding Fathers understood it, leads to liberty and to the emancipation of creative differences; wrongly understood, as it has been so tragically in our time, it leads first to conformity and then to despotism.” Goldwater and Gronstal came from different political parties, but share the same understanding of equality.

Julie Freese

Cedar Rapids