Steve Schmidt, the former senior adviser to John McCain and a former strategist for George W. Bush, will give a speech this afternoon urging conservative Republicans to drop their opposition to same-sex marriage. Hm, so that makes two fairly prominent Republicans (if you consider Meghan McCain a “prominent Republican”) urging the GOP to embrace gay rights within a week. Are we possibly seeing social conservatism as a tenant of the GOP’s platform beginning to fray? Maybe, but one thing is for sure, support for same-sex marriage is starting to spread.

Schmidt will deliver the speech at a luncheon for the Log Cabin Republicans, a conservative gay rights group that is named after the famous log cabin that a group of handy gays and lesbians built for Abraham Lincoln after he came out in support for gay rights, or, uh, something. Anyways, CNN has got its hands on Shcmidt’s speech and he makes a compelling argument for conservatives to embrace same-sex marriage:

It cannot be argued that marriage between people of the same sex is un American or threatens the rights of others. On the contrary, it seems to me that denying two consenting adults of the same sex the right to form a lawful union that is protected and respected by the state denies them two of the most basic natural rights affirmed in the preamble of our Declaration of Independence — liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

In a previous interview with The Blade, Schmidt stated that his views on gay rights were shaped by his lesbian sister: “I think one of the most tragic things in the world [is] when people are closeted and are denied their sexuality and this incredibly important part of their lives and the destructive potential of that action.”

Schmidt’s words about acceptance and the importance in allowing young people to be true to their sexuality is particularly poignant today, which is the 13th annual Day of Silence–a day when kids who support LGBT rights don’t speak for the entire day to bring awareness to homophobic and transphobic bullying in schools.

Do you think that Schmidt’s (and Meghan McCain’s) support, even though he admits that he is in the minority within the GOP, could be a sign that the GOP’s embrace of Moral Majority-type social conservatism may be fading out? Perhaps, with the 2010 election coming up, we may see how far many senators from both sides of the aisle will be willing to embrace same-sex marriages.

One Response to “Is The GOP Willing To Accept Same-Sex Marriages?”

1. JorgeMacD says:

   April 19, 2009 at 4:17 pm

   I don’t think this really counts as an erosion of social conservatism per se, just a reframing of what it means to be socially conservative. The whole super-religious moral base was never going to last forever anyway, it’d be nice to see a change.

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