Proposition 8

The Times reports that Mr Brian Brown, of the "National Organisation for Marriage" said of the recent court review of the notorious Proposition 8:

"Our founding fathers would be rolling over in their graves if they heard that the Constitution guarantees the right to redefine marriage. This is absurd."

This argument is spurious at best: the Founding Fathers made three references condoning slavery* in the original Constitution, and the original document didn't even contain the Bill Of Rights (the best known of these is the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of religion and of speech, among other things).

Thus the argument against changing what the Founding Fathers wrote is spurious, because it has clearly been amended already. No fewer than 27 times, in fact, including:

• The famous First Amendment (freedom of religion, speech, assembly, press and petition).
• The Seventh Amendment (guaranteeing trial by jury).
• The Eight Amendment (prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment).
• The Thirteenth (abolishing slavery).
• The followup Fifteenth Amendment (black people are now allowed to vote).
• The Eighteenth amendment (alcohol is abolished).
• The Nineteenth Amendment (women can now vote too).
• The Twenty-first Amendment (which repeals the Eighteenth).

So arguing that the Founding Fathers wrote something which cannot be amended suggests that Mr Brown is in favour of:

• Women losing the vote
• Black people losing the vote
• Slavery being re-instated
• Cruel and unusual punishments being reintroduced (hey! Guantanamo! Well, there's one he can chalk up, I suppose)
• Trial by jury being abolished
• The revoking of freedom of speech and all the other First Amendment rights

Hence, it is an obviously spurious argument to anyone who can think clearly. I suspect, therefore, that either Mr Brown is a fundamentalist, or that he hasn't actually read the Constitution.

What interests me, given my current theme, is this: who exactly is Mr Brown? A quick google for "National Organisation for Marriage" throws up a bunch of news stories, but no actual page owned by the organisation itself. Only a blog page (which could be anything and written by anybody) came up.

Is this organisation so poor it cannot afford a website? Why are its views being reported so widely if they can't even get into the google rankings? Who are they? Can anyone tell me? I can well believe that such an organisation can exist, especially in the USA. I just can't find it. How do the reporters find it?

* the references in the Constitution are:

Article 1 Section 2 - "the whole Number of free Persons... and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons" (i.e. slaves count as 3/5 of a person in the census)

Article 1 Section 9 - "The Migration or Importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eight" (i.e. the Middle Passage is such an enjoyable cruise that it must be offered to the good folk of West Africa until at least 1808)

Article 4 Section 2 - "No Person held to Service or Labour in one State, under the Laws thereof, escaping into another, shall... be discharged from such Service or Labour, But shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to whom such Service or Labour may be due." (i.e. escaped slaves must be returned even if they esacpe to a State in which slavery is illegal)