Community members and University students gathered at the Lane County Courthouse on Friday to fill out marriage licenses for same-sex couples in protest of the passage of Measure 36. The recently voter-approved constitutional amendment defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman.
Many of the protesters were members and supporters of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Alliance. The LGBTQA tried to take a political stand on Measure 36, but could not because University rules prohibit incidental-fee-funded student groups from taking stances on political issues.
LGBTQA Co-director Crystal Cathcart, who participated in the protest, emphasized several times that although the group of protesters was largely composed of University students, many who were LGBTQA members, and the march began at the group’s EMU office, she said Queer Sitters, a community activist group, officially sponsored the protest.
The mood in the LGBTQA office appeared light as University students assembled to march to the courthouse. Students joked and laughed as one student went down on one knee and delivered a fake marriage proposal. But while the mood was light, the issue is far from laughable for the protesters.
“I want to get married someday,” senior Ryan Minor, who self-identifies as gay, said. “(Measure 36) was kind of a slap in the face.”
The march took several detours along the way, as participants debated the exact location of the courthouse, which is on 125 E. 8th Ave. The geographical setbacks didn’t put a damper on protest morale, as students sang, yelled and chanted along the way.
“One, two, three, four, don’t let the city shut the door!” protesters yelled.
As the participants arrived at the courthouse, they faced an entirely new predicament.
“Do you want to be the bride or the groom?” students asked each other. The forms are designed exclusively for heterosexual couples, and in the end, the group decided to cross out “bride” and “groom” and put sex-appropriate terms.
In the end, freshmen Amanda Koplin, who self-identifies as straight, and her pseudo-fiancee, University student Alec Zimmerman, faced off with Supervisor of Deeds and Records Marle Hoehne as she tried to turn in her application.
Koplin spun an interesting, but untrue, story about having a baby with Zimmerman and being in love with her.
“We feel that we should be able to have the same rights as other people,” she pleaded to Hoehne. “We don’t understand why you’re helping them set us apart.”
Hoehne said his first duty is to follow he law.
“I can’t (process your application),” he said to Koplin. “Our mandate is to follow state law.”
He added that it is not within his capacity to change state law, and the protesters should start there.
Hoehne, in an interview afterward, said he wasn’t sure what would have happened if he tried to process their application, but added it probably would have been invalidated.
“It would probably be the same as issuing a marriage to an underage couple,” he said.
The protesters then sat in the office as an act of civil disobedience. Some protesters called their parents to say they were “getting married.”
Junior Erin Dougherty called her father to tell him about the protest.
“He was proud of me,” she said, her cheeks wet with tears. “He was like, ‘keep trying.’ It’s just so overwhelming.”
Junior Aaron Renner said the protest was inspired by civil rights movements from the past.
“This is the way that Martin Luther King, (Jr.), Mohandas Ghandi and all of the others have dealt with it,” he said.
Cathcart said she saw the protest not just as a statement, but also as an opportunity to bring people together.
“People are taking the news and election really hard,” she said. “This is one way of building community, showing support to one another.”

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