Step backwards for equal rights in North Carolina

In an amendment to the North Carolina legal constitution the state has outlawed civil union and same-sex marriages.
The move, a day before president Barack Obama gave public support to gay marriage, saw the amended legislation state:

“Marriage between one man and one woman is the only domestic legal union that shall be valid or recognized in this State.” The change came in after a public vote with Amendment One.

Amendment One now bans any establishment within North Carolina from legally endorsing or recognising same-sex partners and any ceremony that may have taken place to unite them.
The backward move appears to have been boosted by a long anti-same-sex promotion by 1918-born religious preacher Billy Graham (pictured on Fox News) who with a heavy campaign in support of the amendment is believed to have given the far from ‘live and let live’ stance a greater anti-vote lift.
[Written by Ian Westhead]