"The sick in the soul insist that it is humanity that is sick, and they are the surgeons to operate on it," Eric Hoffer wrote in The Passionate State of Mind. "They want to turn the world into a sickroom. And once they get humanity strapped to the operating table, they operate on it with an ax."

The "sick in the soul" are wildly swinging their "ax" at the institution of marriage. Whether it's HIV+ Andrew Sullivan soliciting anonymous bareback sex on the internet, or Congressman Barney Frank turning his home over to a gay prostitute who used it as a brothel, the proponents of gay marriage aren't exactly well equipped to "operate" on humanity.

But they believe they are. You see, Frank and Sullivan aren't sick. We are--for not giving our blessing to their sex lives. Rosie O'Donnell panned the President's moderate language supporting an amendment to the Constitution defending marriage as "the most vile and hateful words ever spoken by a sitting president," while others clinically label traditionalists as "homophobes."

In reflexively branding opponents of their agenda "bigots," homosexual radicals aren't merely talking about fire-and-brimstone preachers and gay-bashing thugs. They are talking about America.

America rejects their aims. The Defense of Marriage Act passed 85 to 14 in the Senate, while the House issued a similarly lopsideded 342 to 67 endorsement of the bill. President Clinton signed DOMA into law. Thirty-eight states have passed legislation defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman. By way of comparison, no state has voted to recognize "marriages" between same sex couples, nor have any ballot initiatives endorsed such measures.

Homosexual activists know that they can't win on this issue in the electoral arena. Thus, they shop for jurists who will legislate from the bench and government officials who will arrogantly discard law in favor of whim.

If the lawless drive to force society to endorse same-sex unions succeeds, marriage will be just one casualty. Representative democracy will be another.