Op-ed: Movements Don't Stop and Start Every Two Years

Today,
the Senate Judiciary Committee will vote on the Respect for Marriage Act, a
bill that repeals the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Barring complications
with amendments or unforeseen circumstances, all 10 Democrats are expected to
vote to pass the bill, sending it to the full Senate for consideration. This is
a milestone that's been a long time coming.

When
I talk about the effort to repeal DOMA, I often focus on the milestones we’ve
reached since the Respect for Marriage Act was introduced in March: a record
number of senators supporting repeal (31), a record number of House members also
on board (133),
public support for repeal at a record high (over 50%), a majority on the Senate
Judiciary Committee pledging to vote “aye” on the repeal bill today, and a president
who has formally endorsed the bill, despite a longstanding policy of the Obama
administration to never take a position on bills that haven’t passed at least
one house of Congress.



Despite
all of this, people scoff. If you live inside the Beltway, you probably hear
(or are thinking) what we've heard since Election Day 2010: "So what?
It'll never get through the Republican-controlled House, so why bother?"
It's a classic cynical response to organizing, one that overvalues the
short-term and shortchanges the long-term.

Movements
don't start and stop every two years. 
It wasn’t like we all woke up the day
after Election Day 2008 and said to ourselves, “We may have a pro-repeal House,
Senate and president coming in January. I guess we can go start repealing 'don’t
ask, don’t tell'!" If we did that, then we would have wasted more than a
decade. What if we had all said, “Why bother spending our time trying to get
rid of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell?’” every single year from 1995 to 2001, when
anti-repeal Republicans controlled the House and Senate? What if we continued
saying it from 2001 to 2009, when President George W. Bush and a majority of Congress
opposed repeal, and we all sat on our hands for 17 years in total? Then when we
finally reached the tipping point last year, public opinion would not have
climbed to an astounding 77% nationwide in support of DADT repeal. Stories like
those of Lt. Dan
Choi would not have changed hearts and minds across America. We would not have
had the critically important Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike
Mullen on
board, nor hundreds of members of Congress, nor editorials in newspapers across
America in support of repeal. All of that took work, and
if we had waited 17 years to even start it, we would not have been in a
position to deliver the final blow that we did in December 2010.

Movements
aren’t built in two years, and they don’t start and stop every two years.
Organizing doesn't and shouldn't start and stop depending on who has the gavel
in the House or who sits in the Oval Office. It starts when there’s a problem.
Today, service members are still treated as second-class citizens because of
DOMA, as are legally married same-sex couples. So there’s a problem, and the
organizing must begin now.


What's
the benefit of today's vote? First, take a moment and think of five friends and
family members who don't even know what DOMA is, much less support its repeal.
I'd bet that by the end of the month, three of them will have heard something about it,
because today's
vote will make headlines in news outlets large and small. It will change hearts
and minds among those who are opposed or undecided, and the polling numbers
might even tick up a point or two as a result. 

Second,
today's vote will provide momentum. Courage Campaign and its 750,000 members
nationwide are organizing with Freedom to Marry and our state-based allies
across the country for DOMA repeal. Progress excites and empowers people, and
turns citizens into activists. Moreover, if successful, we can take the result
to people like Democratic Sens. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, and Jack Reed of
Rhode Island, with whom we've met and our members have petitioned, and ask when
they're going to board the train that's leaving the station.

Third,
today's vote will set benchmarks for who our friends are in the Senate.
"Don't ask, don't tell" is dead; we know who stood with us to make it that way. But
gay and lesbian service members are still treated as second-class citizens
because of DOMA. It's not enough for a senator to say, "Sure, you can put
your life on the line for your country, even if you're gay. But you can't have
the same benefits as the straight person in the next bunk." Going into
2012, we need to know who service members' real friends are, and today's vote
will be our first clue.



Bottom
line: We may not get to the finish line on repealing DOMA before this Congress
adjourns. But if you're working to repeal DOMA with us, don't let anyone tell you
that your work
is a waste of time. If we wake up within shouting distance of having enough
votes come January 2013, then we need to be in a position to deliver the final
blow, otherwise we may miss our chance. We repealed "don't ask, don't tell"
— at the eleventh hour, at the very end of the last Congress, and with some
last-minute legislative maneuvering at that. Couples suffering from DOMA
deserve a quicker resolution. That means we need to start changing senators'
minds now. Success is not measured by what we can do now, but by progress we’ve
made to achieve a goal.

We
don’t have any time to waste. We need to build the same kind of movement to
repeal DOMA as the one that repealed “don’t ask, don’t tell,” and we need to
start it now.

ADAM
BINK is Director of Online Programs for Courage Campaign, an online organizing
network that empowers more than 700,000 grassroots and netroots activists to
push for progressive change and full equality in California and across the
country. Learn more about our work to repeal DOMA at www.couragecampaign.org.