George Guay sends the following thoughts, most of which I think are correct…
There's an additional, interesting wrinkle to Bennett's statements about not wanting to enforce the Texas sodomy law. From the mid60s, when the Supreme Court recognized that a right to privacy was implicit in the US Constitution (such that a state could not prohibit the sale of contraceptives to a husband and wife), people like Bennett have railed against subsequent Supreme Court decisions based on this right to privacy. Their so-called "strict constructionist" philosophy basically said that if a right isn't mentioned in the Constitution, then it isn't a right. So what happened to Bennett (and other conservatives) advocacy of a "strict constructionist" approach? How come they don't object to the Texas case on those grounds? Also, the Court's Texas decision was significant in that it didn't focus on the right to privacy as much as it was rooted in the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. So the Court was saying that, as a matter of fairness, the Texas law was unconstitutional. That's a second, separate legal basis for rejecting the law, and potentially, a stronger reason to extend most if not all other protections provided in the Constitution to gays and lesbians.
Whenever I hear someone claim to be a "strict constructionist," I think, "Ah, here's someone who's figured out a way to pass off his personal prejudices as Thomas Jefferson's." This is especially true if they also start muttering about "original intent." They're like those sleazy well-merchandised evangelists claiming that if you don't buy their whole worldview (and donate cash to support it), you're going against God's will. Always beware of anyone in the political arena who's hiding behind a "higher authority," whether it's The Lord or the Founding Fathers. It all makes for one of the things that most dismays me about public discourse, which is that no one stands up for principle over immediate gratification. When was the last time you saw anyone — liberal or conservative — say, "I don't like the result of this but we have to look at the larger principle"?
I don't know that so-called "strict constructionists" usually say that a right isn't a right unless it's spelled out in the Constitution. After all, the ninth amendment does say that "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people" and the tenth says, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." I think such people simply look to the law for social engineering. They don't like the idea of two men having a loving, healthy relationship and they figure there must be a way to use the courts to stop it. Guys like Bennett cannot get off the subject of how they think everyone else should live. (Actually, they don't think; they know. It comes to them from God and the Constitution both and so must be enforced…)
The thing I don't think they "get" — or maybe they do, but they're making too much money to admit their cause is unwinnable in the long range — is that the country inevitably moves in the direction of liberation. You can slow it down, you can punish people for a time, you can clog the court system…but you cannot stop it or force it permanently back in the other direction, any more than you can get women back into bathing suits that cover their knees. For years, people who published or distributed sex books and movies were thrown in prison and had their lives ruined, but none of that stopped the eventual acceptance of pornography. You can buy it in supermarkets and airport gift shops and even download it onto your home computer now. Gays have been persecuted, beaten, ostracized and otherwise punished for following their hearts and libidos, but none of it has ever permanently stopped the drift towards gay rights and acceptance. It's not a battle fully won, of course, but it's farther along than it's ever been…and in interviews like the one I linked to, you can sense Bennett and some of the others bracing themselves to lose it altogether. Right now, I suspect right-wing leaders are viewing the issue of Gay Marriage as something they may be able to manipulate to energize their base and get lots of donations and activism for a time…but I don't think they seriously think they're going to be able to prevent Phil and Norman from someday joining in matrimony, maybe even of the holy variety.
Sorry if I awoke in a preachy mood myself this morning but I really think we give guys like Bill Bennett too much credit for adhering to long-range principle and too little for manipulating the public discourse for quick gains. There are no lofty ethics behind what he does; only a good awareness of what may enable social conservatives to win a few minor skirmishes, plus he also knows what will stir up the concerns of those who will buy his books or pay his lecture fees. Then it's probably back to Vegas to blow it all on the Megabucks Jackpot, which he has a better chance of winning than he has of seriously rolling back gay rights.