Marylanders for Marriage Equality, the coalition of groups fighting to uphold Maryland's recently passed marriage equality law, announced on May 7 that they had opened new campaign offices and hired additional field staffers, part of several new measures the coalition has undertaken in preparation for a November referendum on the law.

Over the past six weeks, Marylanders for Marriage Equality has opened two new campaign offices in Baltimore and Silver Spring, with plans to open additional offices in the future. The campaign hired 12 field staffers to work across the state. Those staffers will be responsible for recruiting volunteers and planning events where campaign workers can have one-on-one conversations with voters about the importance of marriage equality.

The campaign has reached out to clergy and religious congregations who support marriage equality in order to build a coalition of religious leaders, educate voters and give press to faith leaders who support civil marriage to counter those who speak against marriage equality.

The coalition has also hired Rachael Stern as new media director as it runs targeted online ads asking voters to sign a pledge to defend marriage equality at the ballot box. According to a press release, the campaign has tripled its list of Twitter followers and doubled its number of Facebook "likes" since May 1.

An unofficial count of the signatures gathered for the referendum being kept by the Maryland Secretary of State's office shows that the petition effort likely has succeeded. State Elections Administrator Linda H. Lamone told The Washington Post the statewide count has not yet been certified but that it “will probably go up” by the time that happens.

Josh Levin, campaign manager for Marylanders for Marriage Equality, said of his group's efforts thus far to fight the referendum, "We're at a very good place right now. We still have a lot of work to do and a long way until November, but the momentum is clearly with us. The smart, strategic work of the campaign staff, coalition partners and the governor is paying off."

Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) signed the marriage equality bill into law on March 1, following months of contentious debate and two narrow margins of victory in the State House of Delegates and State Senate, including vocal opposition from black religious leaders, especially in Prince George's County, where several delegates and senators voted against the bill.

According to a May poll by the North Carolina-based Public Policy Polling (PPP) commissioned by Marylanders for Marriage Equality, 57 percent of Marylanders would vote to uphold the law, while 37 percent would vote to overturn it. The poll's margin of error is plus or minus 3.4 percent, marking a significant shift from March, when a similar PPP poll showed support leading by a slimmer margin of 52 percent to 44 percent, with a larger margin of error.

The May poll also found that, following the endorsement of marriage equality by President Barack Obama and the civil rights group NAACP, 55 percent of African-American voters would vote to uphold the law, up from 39 percent in March.

[Photo: The scene at the Maryland House of Delegates joint committee hearing on Feb. 10, 2012. (Photo by John Riley.)]

Like Rocky Balboa, marriage equality is back for another round of fighting.

Supporters and opponents of a bill legalizing same-sex nuptials clashed once more at a joint hearing of the House Judiciary and Health and Government Operations committees on Friday, Feb. 10, as the lower chamber considered the bill.

A similar bill passed the Maryland Senate in 2011 by a vote of 25-21, but was sent back to committee after supporters failed to gain the votes necessary for passage in the House of Delegates.

Friday's hearing featured many familiar faces, as many of the witnesses had previously testified at a similar hearing held by the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee on Jan. 31. The committee members at Friday's hearings also were not strangers to those on both sides of the issue.

Some of the committee members -- Delegates Tiffany Alston (D-Prince George's Co.), Jill Carter (D-Baltimore City) and Del. Sam Arora (D-Montgomery Co.) -- made headlines last year when they wavered on their support for the measure under pressure and intense lobbying by opponents of marriage equality. Carter eventually voted for the bill in committee. Several other members of the two committees have either been vocal advocates of the bill, such as Delegates Joseline Peña-Melnyk (D-Anne Arundel, Prince George's counties) and Keiffer Mitchell, Jr. (D-Baltimore City) or opponents of the bill, such as Del. Don Dwyer (R-Anne Arundel Co.) and Neil Parrott (R-Washington Co.).

The hearing kicked off with testimony from O'Malley and two ministers, Rev. Delman Coates and Rev. Donte Hickman, who spoke in favor of marriage equality.

Coates told members of the two committees that people's personal beliefs and religious views on homosexuality should not be a factor influencing whether gay and lesbian couples get equal recognition under the law.

"Public policy has never been predicated on public consensus or personal preferences," Coates said.

Coates also went further, saying that adultery, divorce, out-of-wedlock children and abortion, also are violations of the tenets of some religions.

"If gays and lesbians are denied for this reason, why are heterosexuals who engage in adultery, divorce, having children outside of marriage and abortion not denied?" he asked.

Just as a recent Washington Post poll shows for the first time that a majority of Marylanders support marriage equality, LGBT activists and their allies are scrambling to deliver the votes needed to pass the measure through the Maryland General Assembly. 

The Post poll found that 50 percent of Marylanders support marriage equality, while 44 percent are opposed. The poll was conducted by telephone from Jan. 23-26 among a random sample of 1,064 Maryland adults. The results have a margin of error plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

But while the poll might provide some small degree of comfort to some same-sex marriage proponents, particularly if the measure is forced to go to referendum as expected, the biggest hurdle supporters currently face is getting the law passed in the House of Delegates.

Last year, the Maryland Senate, long thought to be the more conservative chamber, approved legislation legalizing marriage equality in the Judicial Proceedings Committee and voted 25-21 in favor of the bill when it came before the full body. This year, Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) has put forward the bill as one of his legislative priorities.

Supporters and even opponents of same-sex marriage, including Senate President Thomas V. "Mike" Miller (D-Calvert, Prince George's counties), have said publicly they believe the bill will pass the upper chamber with 25 votes once again. The senator whose vote was not counted last year, Sen. Joanne Benson (D-Prince George's), has said she opposes marriage equality.

Yet despite the bill's expected success in the Senate, both the breakdown of votes from last year and the Post poll indicate there are significant cultural, racial and geographic divides, even among members of the same political party, on allowing same-sex nuptials.

According to a Metro Weekly analysis of last year's Senate vote, only one of four senators representing Western Maryland voted in favor of the bill and none from conservative-leaning Southern Maryland or the Eastern Shore supported it, even though there are more Democrats than Republicans in the latter two areas.

Almost 60 percent of the votes supporting marriage equality came from Democrats in Montgomery County and Baltimore City, who unanimously supported the measure. But only three senators from the entirely Democratic Prince George's County delegation voted in favor, with four others opposed.

The numbers are even more stark in the House of Delegates, where all but four delegates representing all or parts of Western and Southern Maryland or the Eastern Shore have either come out against marriage equality or have indicated publicly that they are leaning against the measure.

In contrast, 23 of 24 Montgomery County delegates and 14 of 18 delegates from Baltimore City are on record as supporting marriage equality or are thought to be leaning toward supporting it.

According to a Metro Weekly analysis of public statements made by delegates on the issue, when those "leaning" toward a position are included, there are 62 thought to be in favor and 66 thought to be opposed, with 13 thought to be on the fence. In order to pass the bill through the House, short of flipping a few "no" votes, marriage equality supporters must get almost all of those remaining delegates.

[Image: The Washington Post's poll question on marriage.]