In testimony before the D.C. Council today, Bishop Harry Jackson namechecked Martin Luther King and his "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" in talking about his opposition to gay marriage. Jackson quoted King: "A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a people, that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, have no part in enacting or devising the law."

That, of course, was a reference to Jackson's quest to have a citywide vote on gay marriage. He said, "I believe the people of the District of Columbia have suffered an injustice by being ignored already, and you're about to do that again....There is an advisory referendum that you could endorse---why don't you do it?"

At-Large Councilmember David A. Catania, author and lead introducer of the bill, was ready to pounce.

"I want to thank you for bringing our history to this chamber, the history of voting rights in the city," he began. "Bishop, are you aware of the last time an 'advisory referendum' was placed on the ballot in the District that attempted to diminish the rights of a minority?"

Jackson said he was not.

Catania went on to fill him in on the events of Dec. 21, 1865, after then Mayor Richard Wallach 'fearing what the radical Republicans wanted to do in Congress, which is extend the vote to freed African-American males in the city,' held a vote on that issue. It lost, 712 to 1 in Georgetown, then independent, and 6,591 to 35 in the remainder of the city.

Concluded Catania, "There is an opportunity, from time to time, to have tyranny at a ballot box that would take away the rights of some because a majority thinks differently."

And then the coup de grâce: Catania asked Jackson how many times he'd voted in city elections in the past decade.

Jackson, who recently moved from the Maryland suburbs, said none: "I am recent resident of the District of Columbia."

Later in the hearing, another historical analogue came up: the pre-Civil War "Bleeding Kansas" struggle over whether that state would be admitted slave or free.

That conflict, Catania pointed out, was exacerbated by meddling interlopers from neighboring Missouri.

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

Here's what's going on: Opponents of the gay-marriage-recognition law passed this spring by the D.C. Council are asking Judge Judith Retchin to step in and stop the law from taking effect. That'd be a bare assertion of power by the judge---and Retchin acknowledged as much: "I question whether the court has the authority to stay the effective date."

That date is July 6, marking the end of the 60-day 30-day period during which the U.S. Congress reviews the marriage-recognition measure. It's a quirk of D.C.'s serfdom that Congress gets this approval window, and it's a quirk that's being exploited by the anti-gay marriage lobby.

Earlier this week, the city's Board of Elections and Ethics turned down an effort by the gay-marriage opponents to subject gay-marriage recognition to a referendum. The rationale for that decision was that such a referendum would violate the minority-protecting D.C. Human Rights Act.

The motion before Retchin would stop the gay-marriage-recognition measure from taking effect so that its opponents, headed by Bishop Harry Jackson, would have a chance to press their case on why a referendum is, in fact, a legal and proper thing to do.

In considering whether she has the power to stop the clock on the effective date of the city's pending law, Retchin made clear that she was making no judgment whatsoever on whether the board of elections erred in nixing the referendum. The effective-date question, said Retchin, is the "operative issue before the court. It will really not be the substance of the decision of the board of elections."

Given the long period that D.C. laws spend in congressional purgatory, Retchin pronounced it "astounding" that the legal question of whether the court can step in during this period and effectively freeze the process in its bureaucratic tracks. But the judge, indeed, appears to be treading new territory here.

On Monday, referendum proponents/gay-marriage opponents will file arguments in the case, to be followed two days later by the elections board and the city's Office of the Attorney General. Lotta paper flying around.

The move comes two days after the Board of Elections and Ethics ruled that such a referendum, to overturn a recently passed District law recognizing out-of-state gay marriages, would violate the D.C. Human Right Act and thus would be ineligible to appear on the ballot.

The petition [PDF], filed by Bishop Harry Jackson and six other backers, says the BOEE decision "is erroneous because the determination directly contradicts the D.C. Court of Appeals' decision in Dean...holding that the current D.C. law limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples does not violate the DC-HRA."

The petition, while it spends a great deal of space on the legislative process that led to the law, in the end relies heavily on the Dean v. District case, decided in 1995 by the D.C. Court of Appeals. Here's the meat of their argument:

The Board's denial of the Referendum directly contradicts Dean. The Court of Appeals in Dean conclusively determined that the refusal to afford same-sex couples the status of "marriage" does not run afoul of the DC-HRA. It is true that the Jury and Marriage Act of 2009, at issue here, purports to addresses only the recognition of same-sex "marriages" from other jurisdictions, rather than, as in Dean, authorizing same-sex "marriages" in D.C. in the first instance. But that is a distinction without a difference. It is illogical to say that, under Dean, limiting the status of "marriage" in D.C. to opposite-sex couples in the first instance is consistent with the DC-HRA, but that denying the very same status to same-sex unions deemed "marriages" in other jurisdictions is not. Either way the issue is the same: whether refusing to afford same-sex couples the status of "marriage" contravenes the DC-HRA. Dean clearly holds it does not.

Note the scare quotes around "same-sex 'marriage.'"

The lawyers for the referendum proponents---Steven H. Aden, Austin R. Nimocks, and Brian W. Raum---are all affiliated with the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian conservative legal advocacy group founded in 1994 by a group of politically active evangelicals (including Focus of the Family's James Dobson). Aden is based in D.C., while Raum (who testified at a BOEE hearing) and Nimocks are from Scottsdale, Ariz. (As an aside: It's clear that these guys are new to the local scene: They issued a summons to "Robert J. Spagnoletti, Corporation Counsel of D.C." Spagnoletti hasn't been in government since 2006, and the corp counsel was renamed the attorney general in 2004.)

The case has been assigned to Judge Judith Retchin, with an initial conference scheduled for September. But the petitioners have asked for expedited review, since the law is scheduled to exit congressional review and go into effect on July 6---putting it out of the reach of referendum. They have also asked for "other declaratory relief and permanent and temporary injunctive relief as may be necessary to ensure that the Referendum is accepted by the Board and that the referendum process moves forward." It is unclear whether a judge has the power to "stop the clock" on congressional review while the issue is being decided.

Retchin, on the bench since 1992, is a former assistant U.S. attorney who been known in her judicial career for her tough sentencing in criminal matters---most infamously for ordering the incarceration of paraplegic Jonathan Magbie for marijuana possession. Magbie later died after being sent to D.C. Jail; Retchin took tough criticism from the Washington Post's Colbert I. King and others for not checking if the jail was medically equipped to handle Magbie.

Jackson was featured in a five-minute segment midway through the O'Reilly Factor, as proof, according to host Bill O'Reilly, of "the staggering hypocrisy of the left and media that enables the far left to do these things."

Some backstory: On June 5, Lou Chibbaro Jr. reported in the Washington Blade that Jackson had only recently registered to vote in the District and that he listed his residence as a one-bedroom apartment in the Whitman, a Mount Vernon Square condo building. That, of course, is germane because he is (a) a proponent of a referendum on a District law and (b) required to be a registered District voter to do so. Earlier this week, Chibbaro added to his report, reporting that virtually no one at the condo building had seen Jackson and that Jackson is maintaining his residences in Maryland.

On Wednesday, at a hearing before the Board of Elections and Ethics, Jackson took time to decry the disclosures, calling them a threat to him and his family and an attempt to intimidate him and other same-sex marriage opponents.

On O'Reilly, he continued his protestations.

"Well, Bill," he started, "they hacked into my records, found out when I registered to vote in the District of Columbia. They printed in two newspapers my home address and the addresses of houses I own in the Maryland region, outside D.C. And there have been e-mails that have gone forth saying they want to destroy my church. Kind of amazing, isn't it?"

"It isn't," O'Reilly replied. "I'm not amazed by it." He then brought up his own recent troubles, where he's come under fire for his years of vitriol toward Kansas abortion doctor George Tiller, leading some to suggest culpability in his brutal murder. Hypocrisy, he said: "You don't hear a word about people like you, and they're printing your name in the paper!"

Jackson continued: "You know, Bill, people are looking for privacy, and they say their rights need to be protected. And on the other side, unlike the civil rights movement...[which] operated with a Christian spirit, this minority is going to rise up and impose their will on the majority. And they don't care that I've got young adult daughters and a wife. They don't care what happens to my family. They just want it their way, and they'll intimidate you or me into submission if they can."

"How are you handling all this, as a man of God?" O'Reilly asked. "Are you forgiving them? Are you angry with them?"

Replied Jackson: "Well, I am praying for them and forgiving them. Bill, this is very much a spiritual battle in my view, and I look at Martin Luther King Jr. as the ultimate model in terms of his public resistance to oppression, and I think that this is going to deepen our faith roots if you will. But very sincerely, I cannot answer back, obviously, with the same kind craziness that they're operating with. But I'm glad that you've had me on tonight so that we can expose the fact that folks are saying one thing then doing something totally hypocritical on the other side."

Cue Bill O'Reilly, tough guy: "I know you can't do anything, but I can. And if anybody bothers you or your family, and if you believe that anybody's putting you in danger or doing anything against you church, I want you to call me immediately. And we will deal with those people, because we are going to defend people like you."

Then O'Reilly gave Jackson "the last word": "Thing that I'm so concerned about is that this kind of thing has a chilling effect on people standing up for their rights. Once people see what's happened to me, they say, 'Shoot, I'm not going to get involved. I'm not going to say my piece.'"

"That's why they do it to me! That's why they do it to you!" O'Reilly interjected. "And it's not the American way. It's un-American."

LL will make but one comment. OK, two. (1) You're fitting your wife and young adult daughters in a one-bedroom condo? (2) Obtaining the address and date of registration for a District voter by no means requires any "hacking." Any person is free to visit the offices of the Board of Elections and Ethics (441 4th St. NW, 2nd floor, south wing), walk into the waiting area, log in to a public computer terminal, and look up that information for any voter in town. In fact, call 202-727-2525, ask real nice, and they might even look it up for you. And land records? Those are public, too.

Open government: Very, very American.

Freedom Plaza briefly found itself this morning at the center of the culture wars, when about 150 folks gathered to protest the D.C. Council's recent vote to recognize same-sex marriages in other states.

Bishop Harry Jackson, a D.C.-resident minister who leads a Bowie, Md.-based flock, assembled the group with the help of the Family Research Council, whose president Tony Perkins appeared today with a group of ministers on the stone expanse across from the John A. Wilson Building.

Protesters carried a variety of neatly made signs bearing such epigrams as, "If We Change Marriage, What Will Be Next?"; "Say No 2 Same-Sex Marriage in D.C."; "Kids Deserve a Mom and a Dad"; and "Think About the Children."

Jackson read a message from evangelical firebrand James Dobson, who urged followers in his statement to "create a Defense of Marriage Act for the District of Columbia."

Cindy Jacobs, "a respected prophet" and frequent 700 Club guest from the Dallas area, took the microphone to tie the day's rally to a debate on hate crimes currently taking place on Capitol Hill. The protest is a civil-right issue, she said, claiming that the federal legislation threatened the ability to oppose gay marriage. She went on to namecheck Martin Luther King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail. "We're not going to give Satan any rest," she cried. "We're not going to give city councils any rest. We're not going to give legislatures any rest."

LL spoke to ten individuals after the 90-minute rally ended. None were current residents of the District of Columbia.

One, a youth minister from Bowie, Md., was taking time off of work to join the rally. "It think it's important that whenever people are taking a stand, we need to support people taking a stand," he said. While he personally doesn't like in the District, he said "friends and relatives will be affected by it."

Another, the Rev. John Hardy of Stafford, Va., came with his wife and a congregant from his flock at Covenant Family Worship Center after getting a call from Jackson. He says he plans to tell the rest of his flock about his event and pray for local politicos. "We believe that prayer does things," he says.

A couple from Chevy Chase, Md., Jim and Joan Schnabel, came after getting an e-mail alert from the FRC. Jim pointed out that he was a native Washingtonian. "Probably the only one here," he cracked. Joan pointed out that D.C. isn't quite the same as other places: "It is the center of the nation. It influences the world."

Another minister, Rev. Derek McCoy, also claimed native Washingtonian-ness, though he now lives in suburban Maryland. "I think it's important to know this is the nation's capital," he said, noting that he's been "privy to" poll results showing 60 percent of D.C. Afriacan-Americans against same-sex marriage.

LL heard the nation's-capital bit a lot. "We don't see this as a protest," said Mike Jacobs, husband of the aforementioned Cindy. "We're not here to protest something. We're here to support something." He went on to take issue with LL's focus on residency. "I'm a natural born citizen of the United States of America, and this is my capital. Your capital," he said. He said he had "standing" to rally here that, he says, he wouldn't have in, say, Vermont, where the legislature recently passed a same-sex marriage bill.

At the conclusion of the rally, Jackson had attendees raise their hands to the Wilson Building and pray for the councilmembers. "Washington, D.C., we call you into alignment with the word of God," he cried. Earlier, he had vowed to return next week and keep returning while the gay marriage measure was under consideration.

Afterward, LL ran into At-Large Councilmember Kwame R. Brown. He declined to address the substance of the protest, but did say this: "I appreciate all the prayers."

UPDATE, 2:15 P.M.: According to two accounts, Marion Barry addressed the crowd at the rally before LL showed, telling them he would have voted against the gay-marriage recognition amendment had he been in attendance earlier this month. He led them in a chant of "No to same-sex marriage." LL was present last summer when Barry told the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club that he supported gay marriage in the District.

Gay activist Rick Rosendall, who was in attendance, says Barry appealed to morality in explaining his stand. "I find it somewhat strange that someone who has had four failed marriages and has lived somewhat swinishly is using morality to keep me from getting married."