Last modified: Thursday, May 31, 2007 9:32 PM EDT GUEST COLUMN: Rights wrong topic for vote BY MARY-ANN GREANIER (This column was presented as an open letter to Rep. Richard Ross, R-Wrentham) I'm writing today, again, about the issue of marriage equality. You know how strongly I feel that matters of civil rights should not be decided by plebiscite. Recently, you received "Better Angels," a video from MassEquality about the anti-marriage equality amendment in Wisconsin (available at www.massequality.org/ads/betterangels.php). I'm certain you watched the video and gave it your full consideration. I believe it goes far in demonstrating how dangerous and un-American a plebiscite on civil rights can be. As surely as black people deserve to be free from slavery, as surely as people of color deserve the right to vote, as surely as all women deserve the right to vote, as surely as black children deserve not to be kept from schools because of their race, as surely as adults deserve to marry the person they love, regardless of racial differences, as surely as Native Americans deserve the right to practice their own religions, as surely as all of those rights have been acknowledged and affirmed without plebiscite, so adults in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts deserve to continue to be able to marry the person they love, regardless of that person's sex or gender. And they deserve to keep that basic civil right without having it put to plebiscite. The Nazis had a term for the people they felt were sub-human. They called them "untermenschen". I am afraid that is how much of the Right and many of the people who oppose marriage equality feel about lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans-gender citizens and their allies. Sub-human. Undeserving of certain basic human rights. On the other hand, the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche used a term that describes the opportunity you have now. That term is "Übermenschen", the one who is willing to risk all for the sake of the enhancement of humanity. I urge you to be übermenschen. I know this issue has been a difficult journey for you. And I truly appreciate the time and energy you have expended as you continue to consider this question. I also know the forces working upon you from your own political party, from your family, and from your constituency. But I urge you to take this opportunity to stand with the people who advised Lincoln to write the Emancipation Proclamation; with the brave legislators who ratified the 13th, 15th, and 19th Amendments; with the Supreme Court justices who decided Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka and Loving vs. Virginia; and with the Congress who made the effort to undo a grave wrong perpetrated against Native Americans by passing the 1978 Freedom of Religion Act. At the time that each of those oppressed groups sought relief, they were considered "untermenschen" - sub-human - by perhaps the majority of Americans who were burdened with prejudice and hatred against people they did not know and with whom they could not empathize. During each of those struggles for freedom, there were Americans who quoted from their Bibles and pointed to "tradition" to "prove" that those groups must not receive the same rights as the majority, predicting, in some cases, that it would damage "the institution of marriage or adversely [affect] the critical role it has played in our society." But, thank goodness, legislators and judges with vision, patriotism, and a belief in what America is and what it could be made the hard decision to risk all for the sake of the enhancement of humanity. Who among us would take away the rights of those groups now? Sadly, we find ourselves at that very crossroads in our Commonwealth today. The rights of a group of citizens has been acknowledged and affirmed by the courts in Goodridge vs. Department of Public Health - much as in the cases of Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka and Loving vs. Virginia - and those rights are now in danger of being snatched away. You have the power to keep that injustice from being committed. I am certain that you wouldn't entertain the call for a vote on the cases that established the right to interracial marriage or required school desegregation. Please, don't allow a vote on marriage equality that might undo all the good that has been done for LGBT people and their families. Be the übermenschen now, and I promise that you will be remembered and revered as a righteous man who made the hard decision to risk all for the sake of the enhancement of humanity. MARY-ANN GREANIER lives in Plainville.