From: mjs@fc.hp.com (Marc Sabatella)
Subject: Re: interesting thought (ammendment 2)
Reply-To: marc@hpmonk.fc.hp.com
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Company
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1.4 PL6]
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 17:55:36 GMT

Frank Crary (fcrary@ucsu.Colorado.EDU) wrote:

: I think these laws (and any laws for that matter) belong on whatever
: level of government has fairly uniform public support (e.g. if there is
: widespread national support, then federal laws would be appropriate; if
: there is no national consensus but there is agreement within the state,
: a state law is appropriate; etc...) The local level seems to be the
: only place with a general, popular consensus on the subject of laws against
: sexual-preference discrimination; I'd say local government is, therefore, 
: the _only_ appropriate place for such laws.

I read your other posting on the matter, and you make some good points.
However, I take exception to your saying "the people of Colorado Springs don't
want ... " and "the people of Boulder do want ...".  I don't have specific
figures, but I'll make a wild guess and say CS's anti-discrimination ordinance
failed 60-40, and Boulder's passed by the same margin.  In other words, a
reasonably large segment of both populations probably wanted the same things;
only the margins differed.  This consensus is probably a fickle thing with
respecty to time as well - the same vote held 10 years prior, or 10 years in
the future, could go a different way.  The whole point of anti-discrimination
legislation is supposed to be to protect the minority against the tyranny of
the majority; it is not clear to me this is best served by subdividing the
problem until you find a group of the "right" size to represent some sort of
consensus on whether the majority in that group wants to tyrannize the
minority or not.

Another way of looking at it - if a sizeable majority in Boulder don't want to
discriminate based on sexual preference, then that is, to me, evidence that the
laws may not in fact be necessary to prevent it on a large scale.  Whereas if
a large majority in Colorado Springs do want that right, this seems like a case
where such laws are desperately needed, to the extent that we believe "civil
rights" are something everyone is entitled to, rather than dished out to
minorites at the whim of the majority.

: If you look closely, there are _major_ differences between the popular
: will in one state and national public opinion.

Perhaps, but to my eye, they appear to be shrinking.  Witness the last few
presidential elections, in which the winning candidate has had a small popular
majority, but an *enormous* landslides in electoral votes.  I know, only a
limited set of data points, but I think a significant one.

: The federal Constitution
: is set up, so as _not_ to impose the national majority's opinion on
: locals who disagree

Right; but I believe the "state" level is way too large to define "locals"
these days.  Don't worry, I'm not especially passionate about this; I'm just
expressing a little healthy cynicism.

--
Marc Sabatella
marc@hpmonk.fc.hp.com
--
Amendment 2 Is Legalized Discrimination - Shame On You, Colorado
--
"Neither the State of Colorado ... nor any of its municipalities ... shall ...
 enforce any ... ordinance ... whereby homosexual, lesbian, or bisexual
 orientation ... shall ... be the basis of ... any ... claim of discrimination"
--
All opinions expressed herein are my personal ones
and do not necessarily reflect those of HP or anyone else.
Newsgroups: co.general