The State of marriage equality in New Hampshire

h2>The State of marriage equality in New Hampshire/h2>
p>In January of 2011 two pieces of legislation to repeal New
Hampshirersquo;s marriage equality law were introduced to the New Hampshire
House of Representatives. The two pieces of legislation were HB437 and HB443
respectively These bills were assigned to the House Judiciary Committee.
On February 17, 2011 a public hearing on these bills was held in
Concord at the State House. It is required in New Hampshire that all bills
introduced have a public hearing and get a vote in the House of Representatives.
The turnout for this hearing was overwhelmingly in support of marriage equality
and in opposition to HB437 and HB443, the bills that would repeal marriage
equality. On October 25, 2010 the Judiciary committee voted to retain
both these pieces of legislation. All bills retained in committee for action shall be acted on during the second-year of session unless the House of Representatives suspends the rules. In this session that is
2011. New Hampshire legislative sessions are two years. /p>p>On September
14 a sub-committee of the Judiciary committee met to work on the retained bills.
The sub-committee decided to make the following recommendations to the full
judiciary committee. Concerning HB443 the sub-committee recommends that HB443
be voted I.T.L. (inexpedient to legislate). This is a recommendation to kill the
bill. The sub-committee recommended amending HB437. On October 25, 2011 the
full Judiciary Committee voted to accept the sub-committees recommendations and
make these recommendations to the full House of Representatives. The legislation to repeal the law that grants marriage
equality will be voted on by the full NH House of Representatives in the fall of 2011.
There will be no further public hearings on these two bills. These bills may
pass the New Hampshire House and Senate. If they do the Governor will veto the
bills. The bills will not become law unless both the NH House and Senate can
override the veto. To override a veto from the Governor it takes 2/3 of both
Houses. 266 of 400 House members and 16 of 24 Senators must vote to override the
veto. It takes 134 House members to block an override or 9 Senators. /p>
h2>What do we do
now?/h2>
p>Find all the tools you need under take action, at
www.nhftm.org Call or write your legislators, urge friends and
family to call or write their legislators. They want to hear from you. Invite
them to have coffee with you and talk to them about how you feel about this
issue. Get to know them, they are your Representatives. Write
letters to the editor/p>p>Report all information to NHFTM at
info@nhftm.org. /p> br/>