New Jersey Legislature Passes Gay Marriage Bill February 17, 2012, 12:17 pm This week the New Jersey Senate and the Assembly, both controlled by the Democratic party, passed bills legalizing same-sex marriage. Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican, called the legislative action "an exercise in theater," which I suppose it was - but only because he has promised a veto. Mr. Christie argues that voters, rather than the Legislature, should get to decide who deserves equal treatment under the law. It doesn't take a PhD in political science to understand why Mr. Christie has taken this stance. He has national ambitions, and knows he'll have to answer to the "family values" camp that's aggressively trying to restrict the number of people eligible to form traditional families. Mr. Christie's betting on prejudice, but that might backfire. Polls indicate that support for same-sex marriage is on the rise nationally, from only 25 percent in 1996 - when Congress passed the Defense of Marriage Act, a name as inapt as "family values" - to 45 percent or more in 2010. There's good reason to think this trend will continue, since a majority of people under 30 support marriage equality. Ask a teenager about gay marriage and you'll get a blank stare. They don't understand why adults are arguing about this. Once Mr. Christie makes good on his veto threat, the Legislature will have nearly two years to override it. The votes aren't there at the moment, but that could change. In 2010, when New Jersey first considered marriage equality, the measure failed. It's not pie-in-sky to think that if two years took the New Jersey Legislature from minority to majority support, another two years could take it to a two-thirds, veto-proof majority.