Same-Sex Marriage

Wedding Ceremony of Charles and Robert

Staten Island Celebrates, Quietly and With Cupcakes

On Friday afternoon, State Senator Diane Savino was still plotting exactly how best to help same-sex marriage couples celebrate their big day on Staten Island.

“Assemblyman [Matthew] Titone and I are going to be there handing out cupcakes and champagne — or perhaps mimosas, or bellinis,” Savino said.

By the time The Observer arrived at Staten Island’s Borough Hall at 2 p.m. on Sunday afternoon, Titone and Savino had come and gone, and the procession of couples seeking marriage ceremonies and licenses had largely tapered off.

The majority of the 38 couples who had registered to marry there had long since come through, leaving plenty of room for stragglers to meander into Borough Hall, sometimes in clothing more fit for a backyard cookout than a wedding ceremony. “That’s the beauty of the entire thing,” commented a passerby on Stuyvesant Street. “They can just hop off their bicycles and come and get married, no red tape, nothing.” Read More

Senate Dems Stand Behind John Sampson On Marriage Vote Delay

Senate Democrats stood behind Majority Leader John Sampson’s unwillingness to pledge to bring gay marriage up for a vote in 2011 in a series of interviews today.

Many State Senate Dems gathered on the steps of City Hall for a press conference on hydro-fracking and they agreed with Sampson that it may Read More

Sampson and Schneiderman Defend Monserrate Committee

In an upstairs conference room at 250 Broadway this afternoon, Senate Majority Leader John Sampson somberly, but forcefully, defended his plan to commission a nine-person committee–with a Democratic majority–to consider the case of convicted Senator Hiram Monserrate.

“Violence against women is simply unacceptable and will not be tolerated,” said Sampson. “It has no place in Read More