That's just fine with anti-gay crusader Burress, who has nothing but contempt for local leaders arguing against Issue 1 on economic grounds. "Every single person [who opposes Issue 1], including the attorney general, all support the homosexual agenda," he says. "Those who are pushing the homosexual agenda are being outvoted by 2 to 1. They don't have the nerve to come out and be against traditional marriage, so they are saying it's going to hurt us economically."
Earlier this month, 10 members of a local right-wing outfit called Minutemen United held an impromptu protest at Ohio State University, demanding that Holbrook, the school's president, be fired for the pragmatic stand she took against Issue 1. "Holbrook believes that candidates who live in same-sex relationships are the type of model professors the great Ohio State University wants to attract," said a statement by the group's head, Dave Daubenmire.
Daubenmire is a football coach-turned-evangelist who is running for Ohio's State Board of Education in order to "defend our children against the ungodly, humanist indoctrination of the government schools," as he says on the Minutemen Web site. He accuses Holbrook of trying to "transform Ohio's finest institution of higher learning into an institution of moral decadence."
As the conflict between Ohio's civic and business leaders and the cadres of the religious right suggests, the fight over Issue 1 is more than a just a contest between Republicans and Democrats. Rather, it's a battle in a larger struggle between stolid Middle American moderation and the mega-churched, hot-blooded moralism that is sweeping through much of the country.
This dynamic is on stark display on Friday, Oct. 8, when Columbus community leaders, activists and concerned citizens gather for a luncheon debate on Issue 1. Organized by the Columbus Metropolitan Club, a local civic group, the event is held in a second-floor dining room at the Columbus Athletic Club, an elegant place full of burnished dark wood and chandeliers. Several local businesspeople are there, including Cheryl McClellan. Every chair is taken.
The debate is between Melamed and Patrick Johnston, a physician and vice chairman of the Ohio branch of the far-right Constitution Party. Johnston isn't officially affiliated with Burress' group, Citizens for Community Values, but the two men worked together collecting signatures to put Issue 1 on the ballot, and Johnston says they talk often. He's also close to Minutemen United, whose members have turned up to support him at past speaking engagements.
Melamed, a distinguished-looking, gray-haired man in a well-cut blue suit and burgundy tie, begins the debate by emphasizing the likely legal and economic fallout from Issue 1. But Johnston, a blond, pink-faced 33-year-old, has no intention of arguing on Melamed's terms. "Even if Ohio would be better off, gays should not be allowed to marry," he says, because homosexuality is a sin that "merits discrimination." In fact, he says, "I support and endorse the criminalization of homosexuality."
Preaching like a street-corner revivalist, Johnston musters quotes from both the Bible and Dostoevski to make the tautological argument that those who reject his vision of Christianity lack the foundation to make any moral arguments. "The proof for the Christian ethic which condemns homosexual marriage is the impossibility of the contrary," he says. "Reject the Christian ethic and you have no basis for making moral judgments."
The audience stares at him in open-mouthed amazement. Looking like she's been slapped, McClellan walks out of the room and starts crying. "My father was a D-Day lander and a World War II hero," she says later. "He freed two concentration camps. All I could think of was here are all of these people who have fought and given their lives to keep our country free of maniacal people like that guy. This guy reminded me of a Hitler youth. At this stage of our evolution, why is there such a maniacal hatred of people?"
Had she checked out Johnston's Web site, she wouldn't have been so shocked. Unlike national religious right leaders, Johnston isn't coy about his agenda. He publishes poems like "America's Final Crisis," which prophesies that, unless the country adopts biblical law, "You'll be governed by queers and whores" and tyrannized with a "U.N. branded sword." In case that's not clear enough, he also offers a tract titled, "Convincing Reasons HOMOSEXUALS are HELLBOUND!"
During a question-and-answer period, someone says they'd once heard Johnston call for the execution of gays and lesbians. He vigorously denies the charge. Later, he tells me that the decision to put gays to death is a matter best left up to the states. "If we ever had a nation sufficiently Christian" to make homosexuality illegal, he says, imposing capital punishment for homosexuality would be a subject for "an in-house debate. There were capital crimes in the Bible, and that would be something debated."
At the end of the gathering, Melamed gives a stirring peroration. He speaks of being a young boy enthralled with JFK and hope for America. "What does this issue mean? It's all about what this country means," he says. Referring to Johnston, he declares, "When the light shines on this kind of rhetoric, their hopes dim and they're dimming every day." His voice keeps rising. "This amendment will be defeated and I hope I never see the day when this kind of rhetoric prevails in this country." The audience leaps to their feet as he finishes, applauding both his words and his conviction that decency will carry the day.
In large swaths of Ohio, though, as in large swaths of America, Johnston's rhetoric is already prevailing.
Next page: The preacher cries out: "Everybody shout yes on Issue 1!"