She said the state's health care system was in crisis, and she predicted that Vermont's new education funding law, Act 60, wouldn't last for five years. But Dwyer also warned of a new threat to Vermont's way of life, this time to its cultural values. Dwyer, agreeing with a man in the audience, said she did not believe the bill for same-sex couples was a matter of civil rights. Civil rights, as far as I'm concerned, have already been granted to just about every group out there. So civil rights have been addressed.
Marriage is an institution, a union between a man and a woman, has been for thousands of years.
Every man and woman in this state has equal rights to marry. Dwyer criticized the Legislature for pressing ahead with the bill in the face of votes taken last week on Town Meeting Day. Voters in about 50 towns cast ballots on questions dealing with same-sex marriage and providing benefits to gay and lesbian couples without allowing them to marry. Dwyer said she had heard from inside sources in the Legislature there were enough votes to pass the bill in the House and that the leadership planned to push it through without giving the public a chance to have a say in the decision. Dwyer also that the news media had misrepresented what the Vermont Supreme Court said in its decision last December when it ruled that same-sex couples were entitled to the same benefits available to married couples.