As previously reported, the Association of American Law Schools (AALS) came under intense pressure to move its annual convention, scheduled to start January 6, 2009, away from the San Diego Grand Hyatt because the hotel is owned by a contributor to the pro-Proposition 8 campaign in California. Proposition 8 amended the California Constitution to recognize only the traditional definition of marriage (one man, one woman, no exceptions).
In response to this hotel boycott, I asked if these boycotting law professors also were going boycott Barack Obama’s inauguration, since Obama did not support gay marriage. While I received many comments, none were from law professors (although Instapundit warned: “Don’t hold your breath on that one”).
One month later, Obama has selected Pastor Rick Warren to give the invocation at the inauguration. Warren is the pastor of the Saddleback Church in California, and was an active supporter of Proposition 8. Gay marriage supporters have held protests outside the Saddleback Church to protest Warren’s role in denying gays the right to marry in California.
So now the question remains unanswered. Will the law professors boycotting the San Diego Grand Hyatt also boycott the inauguration? And while we’re at it, will the boycotting law professors also boycott those law professors who are going to be serving in the Obama administration? Reductio ad absurdum, doesn’t this require the boycotting law professors to boycott the schools which employ these law professors, which will result in the boycotting law professors no longer being law professors so that they don’t have to attend the AALS convention at all. Problem solved.
Or will the boycotting law professors fall back on that ancient legal maxim: “Do as I say, not as I do.”
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Comments
Heh. Rich.
First of all, Obama has said that he does not personally endorse gay marriage, but adds that it should be left up to the states. Secondly, there’s a difference between Obama, who did not support Proposition 8 and the owner of the Hyatt, who did. Thirdly, I agree that choosing Rick Warren for the invocation was a slap in the face to the LGBT community. As Joe Solmonese so aptly expressed it in the Washington Post: ‘We understand that the Rev. Joseph E. Lowery, a civil rights icon and a dear friend of LGBT Americans, will close the inauguration ceremony. But would any inaugural committee say to Jewish Americans, “We’re opening with an anti-Semite but closing the program with a rabbi, so don’t
worry?”‘