News Release
For Immediate Release:  May 2, 2011
Contact:  Diane Gramley  1.814.271.9078 or 1.814.437.5355

Representative Metcalfe Takes the Right Step in Protecting the Institution of Marriage

(Harrisburg) – Today State Representative Daryl Metcalfe (R-Butler) introduced a strong Marriage Protection Amendment (MPA).  HB 1434 will not only protect one man one woman marriage, but will ban counterfeit marriage i.e. civil unions and state domestic partnerships.  The American Family Association of Pennsylvania (AFA of PA), a statewide pro-family group, strongly supports the introduction of this amendment.

“Representative Metcalfe understands the need to do more than simply protect the word ‘marriage.’  A strong two-part amendment is what is needed to preserve the institution of marriage.   In 2004 Oregon passed an amendment that simply defined marriage as between one man and one woman and four years later marriage-like benefits were extended to homosexual couples.  Their amendment only preserved the word, not the institution of marriage,” stated Diane Gramley, President of the AFA of PA.

Representative Metcalfe modeled his amendment language after Florida’s which passed in 2008 with over 60 percent of the vote.   The language to HB 1434, the proposed Pennsylvania MPA:  “Marriage is the legal union of only one man and one woman as husband and wife and no other legal union that is treated as marriage or the substantial equivalent thereof shall be valid or recognized.”  Additionally this language was unanimously upheld by the Florida Supreme Court when challenged by the ACLU.

“We are not playing a political game.  This is about protecting Pennsylvania families, protecting Pennsylvania children.  Social sciences show that children do best raised by their biological mother and father in an intact family.  This amendment will protect those families by preserving the institution which bests serves adults and children,” Gramley continued.

Marriage does not need to be used as an experiment by those seeking to redefine families and society as a whole.  Marriage is worth defending and the best way to protect it from the ongoing assault by homosexual activists is with a strongly worded amendment like HB 1434.  All those who truly support protecting marriage will support this amendment.

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