Common sense prevailed in Iowa. A.G. Sulzberger of The New York Times reports:
DES MOINES — In a rebuke of the state supreme court with implications for judicial elections across the country, voters here removed three justices who participated in a ruling last year that made the state the first in the Midwest to permit same-sex marriage…
Each of the three judges received about 45 percent support with 91 percent of precincts reporting, according to The Associated Press, making Tuesday the first time members of Iowa’s high court had been rejected by voters. Under the system used here, judges face no opponents and simply need to gain more yes votes than no votes to win another eight-year term…
The three justices — Marsha K. Ternus, the chief justice; Michael J. Streit; and David L. Baker — did not raise money to campaign and only toward the end of the election did they make public appearances to defend themselves…
The judicial races were perhaps the most hotly anticipated item on the ballot this year, a sharp contrast from years past in which the election were so low profile that more than a third of those who cast ballots left the section blank…
“I voted no for every single one of them,” said Ms. [Cathy] Hackett, [38,] a customer sales representative who described herself as a conservative Christian. “I’m not anti-gay. I love everybody. But I believe that if two people are going to marry they should be a man and a woman.”
The outcome will have no effect on the ruling that triggered the campaign, a 7-to-0 decision that found that a law defining marriage as between a man and a woman represented unlawful discrimination under the state constitution.
