Battle line drawn in Oklahoma's 'marriage amendment' vote

Oklahoma's battle over gay rights moves into the national spotlight. An Anti-Oklahoma advertisement campaign started Monday in a national newspaper. The first ad popped up in the Money section of

Monday, May 10th 2004, 4:35 pm

By: News On 6

Oklahoma's battle over gay rights moves into the national spotlight. An Anti-Oklahoma advertisement campaign started Monday in a national newspaper. The first ad popped up in the Money section of USA Today.

A state wide gay and lesbian rights group put the ad in the paper as part of a campaign to raise awareness and money. The group wants to encourage people to help stop the proposed state Constitutional marriage amendment from becoming a reality.

Terry Gatewood with Cimarron Equality Oklahoma: â€œif we do not create environment of tolerance and diversity we can build all the baseball stadium we want and those businesses are not going to come.â€

Voters will decide in November if the state constitution should define Marriage as a union only between a man and a woman. Supports of the marriage amendment consider the advertisement economic blackmail and call it offensive.

Altogether, the group plans to run a million dollars worth of ads in USA Today and other statewide newspapers.