Civil Marriage Collaborative CMC

The Civil Marriage Collaborative is a strategic investment for donors who want to support public education efforts tp achieve marriage equality for same sex couples.   

By Paul DiDonato|Contact Paul DiDonato serves as the Director of the Civil Marriage Collaborative. In a long social justice career, Paul has been a trustee for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS; Executive Director of Funders Concerned About AIDS; member of  the International Committee of the Council on Foundations; co-chair of the National Steering Committee of Philanthropic Affinity Groups; and Executive and Legal Director at National Gay Rights Advocates.   Paul is a 1985 graduate of the Harvard Law School and 1982 graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.

ABOUT THE CIVIL MARRIAGE COLLABORATIVE

Founded in2004, the Civil Marriage Collaborative (CMC) is a unique effort to build and strengthen a broad and diverse grassroots constituency and a powerful public education apparatus to advance marriage equality for same-sex couples in the United States.

The CMC supports comprehensive public education work at the state level to change hearts and minds and help create an environment of acceptance that can lead to marriage equality in each state funded. To date, CMC has invested $17 million toward research, polling, message development, grassroots and grasstops mobilization and coalition-building activities in a total of 20 states and the District of Columbia. The Collaborative’s annual revenues have increased from $1.3 million in 2004 to a revenue budget in 2014 of just over $2.3 million. 

WHY MARRIAGE EQUALITY?

Being able to marry is far more than a formality or an upper class luxury. Marriage equality is a human rights issue that speaks to fairness, dignity, humanity and equality. Any barrier based solely on sexual orientation that contributes to lessened self-worth (for individuals and families), marginalized societal worth, discrimination, economic insecurity, and unequal access to housing,health care and a range of other critical societal benefits, goods and services for LGBT people is disgraceful, immoral and unacceptable.  Economically, the impact on individuals and families is huge, particularly for poor and working class individuals, couples and families.

Advancing marriage equality also has many other benefits for the LGBT social justice movement. The advancement of marriage equality is and will continue to directly and indirectly undermine many other forms of legally entrenched and societally sanctioned discrimination against LGBT individuals and couples. It is becoming increasingly difficult for anti-equality forces to rationalize and justify workplace discrimination or discrimination in adoption, for example, when courts, legislatures or the voting public deems LGBT couples entitled to the freedom to marry and all that flows from such a right.

RESPONDING TO A SHIFTING LANDSCAPE

In 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court issued its historic Goodridge v. Department of Public Health ruling, holding that denying same-sex couples the freedom to marry was unconstitutional under the state constitution. Six months later, on May 17, 2004, the first legal same-sex marriages in the United States were performed. With this first major victory on the freedom to marry, a small group of leading LGBT and human rights foundations mobilized in 2004 to provide resources and philanthropic leadership to this movement.

When funders first considered a collaborative vehicle for funding marriage equality efforts,the initiating grantmakers reviewed the state of play on the freedom to marriage issue at every level. What stood out was the need to strengthen the movement's capacity for state-by-state planning, collaboration, public education and advocacy, especially in light of the major "lift" that would be needed over many years to address this problem comprehensively at the national level for all LGBT Americans. The grantmakers committed themselves to a shared strategy and highly coordinated funding mechanism to advance the cause of the freedom to marry. These funders chose Proteus Fund, a public philanthropic services organization with a long history of successful collaborative donor table management, to house and grow the new initiative — the Civil Marriage Collaborative, the first nationwide LGBT funding collaborative.

DELIVERING A WINNING STRATEGY

The collective wisdom and resources gathered at the CMC funder table and its effective approach to developing and delivering a successful strategy is widely recognized. An article in the Denver Post in early 2013 cites the CMC as “one of the best examples of effective co-funding.” By pooling their resources and investing in the issue through a strategic ‘big picture’ lens, CMC members can have a much larger and broader impact than the work each partner institution might do individually.

Given the constantly changing landscape of the marriage equality movement, the CMC works to ensure the highest level of relevant,responsive and effective grantmaking. Our strategy sessions, groundbreaking research and input from the top experts have enabled us to act as an incubator for new ideas and bold experimentation. Having engaged in several rounds of high level evaluation in the last two years, we are using these lessons about the impact of public education funding on marriage equality to shape the most effective funding strategies and tactics possible from one year to the next. Through our work as well as presentations to and private conversations with other grantmakers, the CMC has elevated the level of conversation and learning about this issue within philanthropy in general and the LGBT community specifically, while attracting new funding to the field.

Our invite-only application process allows for the highest level of evaluation and due diligence screening of applicants and grantees through site visits or presentations to the CMC, regular calls and reporting. Because we have worked on this issue for nearly ten years, we are keenly familiar with the strength sand weaknesses of many, if not most, of the players.

Currently we are supporting public education initiatives and organizations in states where marriage equality has the best chance of being a nearer-term possibility or where the existing freedom to marry is in need of further public education efforts to ensure it is entrenched in the hearts and minds of the populace. In addition to our annual cycle of grants, the CMC’s Rapid Response mechanism awards grants outside of our normal cycle in response to unanticipated emergent situations and unique opportunities to advance marriage equality.

THE WORK AHEAD

The June 2013 Supreme Court decisions were inarguably epic on many levels: 

•  The marriage movement won marriage equality in California without a new ballot fight;
•  The ruling eliminating a key section of the federal Defense Of Marriage Act (DOMA) and that ruling was made not on a technicality but on an amazingly good constitutional analysis;
•  The PR spin was a massive win for equality forces and a massive defeat for anti-equality forces. 

That being said, the June 2013 court decision did not go so far as to extend the right to marry as the law of the land. This means that nothing changed for the population of the significant majority of states where gay and lesbian people still cannot marry. Civil rights history in this country indicates that the Supreme Court especially, as well as Congress and the President, usually only act on such major civil rights issues when popular opinion, the culture and politics have established a sense of a clear popular will or mandate. Many civil rights issues had to work their way to victories in 20 to 25 or more states, for example, before a federal standard was established by the federal courts or the other branches. At nearly 20 jurisdictions, the marriage equality movement remains below that traditional threshold for the Supreme Court to believe that a policy change is so dominant that it should or must become a federal standard.

It is also misguided to believe that full marriage equality is now inevitable within the near term future, an issue that will “take care of itself.” While the recent marriage ballot victories reflect a surprisingly rapid shift in public opinion, the fact remains that marriage equality opponents will fight to the bitter end. Strong forces continue to fight against the freedom to marry not only in every state that has yet to adopt marriage equality, but even in states that have. New tactics in these fights include manufactured arguments that the freedom to marry impinges on freedom of religion and freedom of free speech, for example.  

Thus,the state-by-state effort to advance marriage equality must continue and indeed pick up speed. We must not lose this momentum. We need to keep up the pressure and build on the extraordinary achievements of the past 10 years and solidify the growing perception that the majority of Americans are ready to expand the definition of marriage.

GET INVOLVED NOW

Despite the CMC’s “invitation only” process which automatically reduces what would otherwise bean avalanche of funding requests, in any given year we see a significant gap between CMC applicant need versus CMC grants capacity. Currently the CMC would require an annual grants budget of approximately $3 million (versus the 2013grant level of $1.7 million) simply to fully fund the vital public education requests presented to us.

Donors to the CMC contribute a minimum of $50,000 annually. Once a CMC member, a donor representative participates fully in CMC business, including annual strategy development conversations,review of dockets and various learning opportunities. The CMC offers a rich and collegial learning environment that encourages active participation and information sharing.

Donors who are interested in participating in CMC but who cannot meet the contribution minimum are encouraged to consider supporting the Civil Marriage Collaborative Donor Circle at the Horizons Foundation with a minimum contribution of $5,000. The donor circle meets three times annually and offers donors opportunities to learn about the marriage movement across the country and, in an intimate setting, to have discussions with outstanding guest speakers from the top levels of the movement. For more information about Horizons' CMC Donor Circle please contact Roger Doughty, Executive Director, atrdoughty@horizonsfoundation.org or 415.398.2333 x102 or Paul DiDonato 212-213-5108.

PROTEUS FUND - HOME OF THE CMC

Proteus Fund is a public foundation with deep experience in social change philanthropy and special expertise instate-based strategic grant making, supporting research, collaboration,education, and organizing efforts. We work with individual donors and foundations to achieve their goals through strategy development, research and fund management. Our work advances issues at the leading edge of democratic and social change.

CONTACT:

Proteus Fund
Tel: 413 256-0349
www.proteusfund.org 

 

CIVIL MARRIAGE COLLABORATIVE FUNDING PARTNERS: Past and Present (* = current funders)

The Atlantic Philanthropies
David Bohnett Foundation
Calamus Foundation
Calamus Foundation – Delaware*                                
Columbia Foundation
Ford Foundation*
Gill Foundation*
Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund*
Horizons Foundation*
Kevin J. Mossier Foundation
Johnson Family Foundation*
Open Society Foundations
Overbrook Foundation*
An anonymous donor* 

 

 

 

 

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