Activists on both sides of the anti-gay marriage amendment have offered their opinions on which way voters should vote. Here’s what they had to say

Lloyd Zimmerman, a Hennepin County district judge, offered his perspective on the issue as a judge in a New York Times column that was reprinted in the Star Tribune:

The courts, sometimes ahead of their day, sometimes behind, have been the last refuge of human dignity. The state and federal Constitutions remain the ultimate bastions of individual freedoms.

They provide a sanctuary for liberty, not a cage.

Some say it is “unnatural” for gay or lesbian couples to marry each other. The same was said for marriages between blacks and whites, Jews and Christians, Finns and Swedes. In some families, that is still true.

My own father, born before World War I, took a long time to accept the decision of my twin sister, Nancy, to marry a black man. For years, he would not allow her name to be spoken.

He didn’t get to see his grandson Ty, now a responsible father of his own four children, grow up. He never got to know the kind heart and playful humor of Nancy’s (now former) husband, Scott.

In time, my dad changed his mind, asked forgiveness and was forgiven. Wounds healed; our family was repaired.

Dwight Hobbes, columnist for the Minnesota Spokesman Recorder, a newspaper serving Minnesota’s African American community, urged readers to vote “no” on the marriage amendment.

In pushing for the right to live in wedded bliss (or make just as much a mess out of their lives as married straight folk), people who want to enter same-sex marriages aren’t hurting a soul. They are not running around trying to ram their lifestyle down anyone’s throat, trying to outlaw male-female unions.

Outraged citizens, especially these stumping politicians, who just can’t stand having to mind their own business, should give their blood pressure a break. To anyone who really has a big problem with gay marriage, here’s a simple solution: The next time somebody gay proposes to you, just say “No.” Then go sit down somewhere and shut up.

Rep. Steve Drazkowski, R-Mazeppa, fought for the “marriage protection amendment” despite being divorced. He penned a column for the Red Wing Republican Eagle urging voters to approve the amendment and criticized fellow Republicans who are against it.

If marriage is redefined, it would impact all of Minnesota’s society and change the definition of marriage for everyone – whether they like it or not. If gay marriage activists get their way, marriage in Minnesota will become genderless.

Our traditional understanding of marriage will be stripped from the law and will be replaced with this “new” understanding. The law will allow no room for those people – a strong majority of Minnesotans – who for personal, ethnic, moral, or religious reasons cannot agree with the new definition of marriage. This is currently the case in Canada.

Legal experts on both sides of the issue warn of an “immense volume of litigation” against individuals, small businesses and religious organizations if they refuse to condone the “new” understanding of marriage. Churches and religious organizations can lose their tax exemptions. They can be forced to either abandon their core principles or abandon their social ministry.

Jason Adkins, vice chairman of Minnesota for Marriage, a group pushing the amendment penned a column in the St. Cloud Times.

In fact, advocates on both sides of the marriage issue have confirmed that redefining marriage will have tremendous legal consequences for everyone. Tolerance is not enough. All of society must approve. Or else.

We do not know whether the Court of Appeals will go along with the preposterous claims of those seeking to overturn Minnesota’s marriage laws. But what we do know is that this is exactly the kind of thing that has happened elsewhere and what the proposed Minnesota Marriage Protection Amendment on the 2012 ballot will prevent from happening here.

The Minnesota Marriage Protection Amendment would put our state’s existing and historic definition of marriage as the union of one man and one woman into our constitution, outside the reach of activist judges and politicians. It ensures that the important social goods protected by Minnesota marriage law are not left to willful legislators and activist judges, and that people of faith are not stigmatized as bigots simply for defending the time-tested institution of marriage.