Fund-Raising
Letter Adds to Santorum Controversy
The
Advocate, May 1, 2003
U.S. senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.), who has been
criticized for recent remarks about gays and lesbians, sent a letter to donors
shortly after the September 11 terrorist attacks soliciting donations for a
nonprofit group lobbying against same-sex marriage. “I know it may sound
like a huge exaggeration, particularly in light of the attack on America, but
this may truly be the most important letter I ever write you,” Santorum
wrote.
The letter endorsed Alexandria, Va.-based Alliance for
Marriage and its campaign for a constitutional amendment banning same-sex
marriages. The mailing sought money so the nonprofit could flood Congress with
petitions to “protect marriage between a man and a woman against the attacks
of the homosexual activists.”
Mark Mead, spokesman for the gay political group Log
Cabin Republicans, told The Philadelphia Inquirer that the letter raises
doubts about Santorum’s priorities. “There are far more important issues
for families in Pennsylvania than this—education, a fair tax code, safer
streets, prescription-drug medicines for those who don’t have coverage,”
Mead said. “He has an unhealthy obsession with this, overlooking more
important issues.”
The revelation about the letter is the latest development
in an ongoing storm of controversy surrounding Santorum’s public comments on
homosexuality. In an April 7 Associated Press interview, he brought up the
pending Supreme Court case regarding Texas’s sodomy law and said, “If the
Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual sex within your home,
then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have
the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to
anything.” In an April 22 statement, Santorum said his comments should not
be misconstrued as a statement on individual lifestyles and that he is a
“firm believer that all are equal under the Constitution.”
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