【www.tingchehu.com--美国留学】
【导读】
美国总统奥巴马9日接受美国广播公司采访时说，他改变了自己先前的反对态度，转而支持同性婚姻。奥巴马在采访中说，他在与自己的下属、一些同性恋军人、夫人米歇尔及两个女儿就这一问题开展讨论后，经过思考，作出这一决定。他说，自己最终认定，必须就此公开表态，支持同性婚姻。奥巴马强调说，支持同性婚姻是他个人的立场，他仍认为是否将同性婚姻合法化应由各州自己决定。当前，美国8个州和首都华盛顿所在的哥伦比亚特区已将同性婚姻合法化。
【译文】
SINCE evolution is a gradual process, Barack Obama should perhaps not have felt embarrassed by the fact that, more than three years into his presidency, his exact views on gay marriage were still officially “evolving”. Until this week, that is. In an interview on May 9th Mr Obama finally came to a decision. “At a certain point,” he told ABC, “I’ve just concluded that for me personally, it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same-sex couples should be able to get married.”
既然进化是一个渐进的过程，在超过三年的任期内，贝拉克∙奥巴马或许应该不会对这样的事实感到尴尬——对于同性恋婚姻，他的确切观点依旧是官方的“逐步发展中”。换言之，直到本周仍是如此。在5月9日的一次采访中，奥巴马总统终于做出了决定。他对美国广播公司如是说“在某种程度上我仅仅代表我个人做出结论，能够继续前行且能确信我认为同性情侣们应该结婚，这于我而言至关重要。”
Strangely enough, Mr Obama reached his decision within days of Joe Biden, the vice-president, saying that for his own part he was “absolutely comfortable” with same-sex marriages. One day after Mr Biden, Arne Duncan, Mr Obama’s education secretary, said that he too thought same-sex marriages should be legal. The sequence of events creates the impression that by accident or design the president was in the end shamed into speaking his mind.
奇怪的是，在副总统乔∙拜登发表声明称其个人对同性婚姻是“绝对自在”之后的几天内，奥巴马总统就做出了该决定。在拜登之后，美国教育部长阿恩·邓肯也表明他认为同性婚姻应该合法化。无论是无心插柳还是蓄谋而为，这些事件发生的顺序给人造成的印象是，总统羞愧难当只好直言不讳。
Whatever his motive, Mr Obama’s conversion is a step forward for gay rights. The president had already stopped enforcing, but not yet repealed, the federal Defence of Marriage Act, which defines marriage as a union between one man and one woman. He had repealed the “don’t ask, don’t tell” law which barred homosexuals from serving openly in the armed services. But he had hesitated on gay marriage “in part because I thought that civil unions would be sufficient,” Mr Obama told ABC. He had been “sensitive to the fact that for a lot of people, the word marriage was something that invokes very powerful traditions [and] religious beliefs.”
不管动机如何，奥巴马态度的转变又向同性恋者权益迈进了一大步。总统虽然已经停止了强硬态度但仍旧没有废止联邦婚姻捍卫法案——该法案将婚姻定义为一位男性和一位女性结成的小集体。但他一直对同性婚姻持犹豫态度“部分缘于我认为公民的婚姻应该是够格的。”，奥巴马对美国广播公司如是说。他过去一直对这个事实感到非常敏感，那就是对于大部分人来说，婚姻这个词牵扯到了强有力的传统和宗教信仰。
At the state level, meanwhile, the cause of both gay marriage and civil unions had a bad week. North Carolina (where the Democrats will hold their convention this summer) voted overwhelmingly in favour of a constitutional amendment to make marriage between one man and one woman the only legal union the state will recognise. And in Colorado a measure to legalise civil unions in a state that made gay marriage illegal in 2006 was prevented from coming to a vote in the state legislature.
同时，在国家层次上，同性婚姻和民事结合的引发都经历了艰难的一周。北卡罗来纳州（民主党将于今年夏天在此举行例会）的投票结果显示，人们以不可压倒性的选票支持宪法修正案将男女结合的婚姻认定为被国家承认的合法婚姻。在科罗拉多，一项意图将民事结合保持在像2006年那样承认同性婚姻合法的状态的措施被禁止在州立法机构投票。
Advocates had expected that Colorado would become the first state that has banned gay marriage to pass a bill allowing civil unions, which grant certain legal rights to same-sex couples. But in a dramatic turn on May 8th a state Senate-approved bill to that effect died without a full vote in the Colorado House of Representatives, which holds a slim 33-22 Republican majority. This was after Frank McNulty, the Republican Speaker, delayed bringing the bill to the floor in time to beat a midnight deadline.
拥护者们期盼着科罗拉多将会成为禁止同性恋婚姻的州中的第一个通过承认民事结合法案的州，这将会为同性情侣们授权某些法律权益。但在5月8日一个戏剧性的大转折中，一项经国家参议院核准的法案基本上被否决了，甚至是在科罗拉多众议院未能全票通过的情况下，这使得共和党多数派从33人减少到了22。这是因为共和党发言人——弗兰克·麦克纳尔蒂推迟将该法案公布于众，以至于未能及时赶上午夜的截止时间。
Republicans in Colorado may come to regret the 11th-hour stratagem. In America as a whole, says Gallup, 50% of people support same-sex marriage. And according to local polls, civil unions strike a majority of Coloradans as an acceptable compromise. Maybe the views of its legislature just need time to “evolve”.
科罗拉多的共和党人可能会后悔最后关头所施的计谋。盖洛普称，总的来说，在美国50%的人们支持同性恋婚姻。根据当地的民意调查问卷，民事结合将一大部分科罗拉多人拉到了可接受折中的队列里。也许立法机构的意见只是需要时间来“进化”。
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