The justness of a nation ought never be determined by the liberties it extends to the vast majority of its citizens, but rather by the rights it is willing to guarantee to its most marginalized minority groups. Judged on these grounds, America is far from the bastion of fairness and equal rights it hypocritically declares itself to be. Two hundred twenty-four years and 42 presidents after our nation first proclaimed its independence from British tyranny and oppression, politicians are still fervently proclaiming that "all men are created equal" and "endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights." And, yet, they are still undercutting the universality of this claim with qualifications, stipulations and concerns over offending the moral majority.

Last week's vice-presidential debate proved no exception.

Asked by moderator Bernard Shaw whether "a male who loves a male and a female who loves a female [should] have all--all--the constitutional rights enjoyed by every American citizen?" neither Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.) nor former Defense Secretary Richard B. Cheney could respond with an unequivocal yes.

The best Lieberman could muster was an "I'm thinking about it." For Cheney, more bluntly, the issue was "no slam dunk." Padding their responses with empty rhetoric, both candidates did a poor job of concealing the message their answers conveyed: Implied in the constitutional promise of equal rights for all citizens is an exception clause with respect to gays.

For Lieberman, who has failed to speak publicly since his nomination without praising America's willingness to embrace diversity and safeguard minority rights, the position is particularly disturbing. Openly indebted to a country whose acceptance of principles of legal equality engendered his success, Lieberman comes across as nothing short of hypocritical when he questions whether homosexuals should be extended the same rights which were, despite the prevalence of anti-Semitism in much of the 20th century, unquestionably extended to him. Tainted by his need to qualify the issue of equal rights, his frequent approbation of the American "promise…that the law will treat individuals as individuals regardless of their status--that is to say their race, their nationality, their gender [or] their sexual orientation"--neither rings genuine nor sincere.

Cheney, for his part, offered a response no more encouraging. Praised by some for conceding that gay rights could be "regulated by the states," he carved a position for the federal government that is at best ambivalent towards equality for homosexuals and, at worst, antagonistic to any egalitarian-minded legislation. Indeed, while Cheney's position, on one hand, empowers states to equalize the legal status of homosexuals and heterosexuals, on the other hand it gives the federal government an excuse to be apathetic with regard to states who fail to take such progressive steps, or, in a worse scenario, chose to adopt legislation that is openly hostile towards gays. Refusing to accept the need for or the legitimacy of "a federal policy in this area," Cheney's compassionate conservatism boils down to cold-hearted complacency.

For some pundits the moral reprehensibility of Lieberman's and Cheney's positions is excused by the fact that both candidates' reservations about equal rights are premised primarily on their hesitancy to officially sanction committed, monogamous homosexual relationships as marriages. Noting that Lieberman is "open to taking some action that will address… unfairness" towards homosexuals and that Cheney "[tries] to be…tolerant of homosexual relationships," such commentators claim that the only thing preventing the candidates from unequivocally supporting equal rights was an inconsequential semantic reluctance to call homosexual unions "marriages."

Semantics, however, were far from the core of the candidates' contentions. When Cheney spoke of preserving "conventional marriages" and Lieberman of "the traditional religious and civil institution of marriage" what the candidates were aiming to preserve was not merely the sanctity of the word marriage, but the deeply entrenched and prejudiced belief that a homosexual union could be neither be conventional nor consistent with the precepts of religion and civil law. At the heart of their arguments was an unwillingness to accept that homosexuals be considered normal, holy and legal equals.