On the eve of oral arguments, former Iowa Supreme Court Justice Mark McCormick told the Iowa Independent that there were two possible standards that the court could choose to apply to the statute: they could apply the “rational basis” test, or they could choose to apply “strict scrutiny.”

The two standards have evolved in federal case law as accepted interpretations of the “Equal Protection Clause” in the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. In cases like Varnum v. Brien where a plaintiff claims that a law violates his or her right to equal protection under the law, courts are generally restricted to using one of the two in their decisions.

Read on for some background on each standard and how they might apply to Iowa’s same-sex marriage case.

“Rational basis”

The rational basis test is generally considered to be the looser of the two available standards, which means that Iowa’s ban on same-sex marriage is more likely to be deemed constitutional if the court chooses to apply it rather than strict scrutiny. The standard essentially requires the court to answer the following question: is the law in question reasonably related to the achievement of a legitimate government interest?

If the Iowa court chooses to apply the rational basis test to Varnum v. Brien, they must decide (1) whether Iowa’s law defining marriage as between only one man and one woman serves to further a particular goal, and (2) whether the goal that the law helps to achieve is within the bounds of what government is supposed to do.

In federal case law, the most relevant application of the rational basis test in the context of gay rights is likely Romer v. Evans, which tested the constitutionality of an amendment to the Colorado state constitution that made it illegal for local governments to enact laws protecting homosexuals from discrimination on the basis of their sexual orientation.

Despite the Rehnquist court’s choice to apply the looser standard to the Colorado amendment, it was still struck down as unconstitutional. Justice Anthony Kennedy’s majority opinion said that the amendment’s “sheer breadth is so discontinuous with the reasons offered for it that the amendment seems inexplicable by anything but animus toward the class that it affects; it lacks a rational relationship to legitimate state interests.”

“Strict scrutiny”

The strict scrutiny standard is considered by some legal scholars to be “strict in theory, fatal in fact,” because when a court chooses to apply it to a law, the law in question is almost always struck down. (On the federal level, this claim is empirically questionable, but the statement still reflects the general perception of the difference between the two standards.)

The standard evolved from a footnote in the 1938 U.S. Supreme Court decision U.S. v. Carolene Products and is said to apply only to laws which affect or single out “suspect classifications,” or groups who have traditionally faced discrimination and lacked the political power to improve their circumstances alone.  Laws must also be seen to involve “fundamental rights” to receive this heightened level of scrutiny.

Strict scrutiny includes the requirements embodied within the rational basis test and adds two more:

First, to pass strict scrutiny, a law must not only be reasonably related to a legitimate government interest, but it must be “narrowly tailored” to it. If the law is too broad and affects people in ways that do not achieve the legitimate government interest, or if the law is too narrow and fails to address essential elements embodied by the legitimate government interest, it is unconstitutional.

Second, the law must use the least restrictive means available to achieve the legitimate government interest. If there exists another solution to the problem at hand that would affect people less, the more restrictive solution is unconstitutional.

The extent to which a law must be explicitly targeted at a suspect class in order for it to receive strict scrutiny remains somewhat ambiguous in federal case law, but a law could receive strict scrutiny even if it does not refer to a suspect class, so long as there is evidence that it was intended to affect a suspect class when it was written.

Applying the two standards in Varnum v. Brien

In last week’s oral arguments, Assistant Polk County Attorney Roger Kuhle argued that the court should apply the more lenient rational basis test to Iowa’s definition of marriage. He argued that the current law was not intended to be discriminatory against homosexuals, because it makes no explicit mention of them and served only to reinforce a law that was already on the books when it was passed in 1998.

While Kuhle conceded that marriage should be considered a fundamental right, he said that it was a right to join only opposite-sex unions, because that is how marriage should be defined.  If the court chose to define the right differently, he argued, it would be presuming a new definition of marriage (as something other than between one man and one woman) before deliberations even began.

Kuhle also argued that ‘homosexual’ is not a suspect classification and should therefore not trigger the requirements of strict scrutiny. Sexual orientation, he said, is different from other classifications like race and gender.

To satisfy the rational basis test, Kuhle focused on what he claimed was the government’s legitimate interest in providing an optimal environment for raising children. Opposite-sex couples, he argued, make for the best conditions for raising children, and Iowa’s law restricting marriage to those couples bears a rational relationship to the legitimate government interest.

Arguing for the plaintiffs, Dennis Johnson asked the court to apply strict scrutiny to Iowa’s marriage law. Sexual orientation should be considered a suspect classification, he argued, and Iowa’s definition of marriage was passed with the clear intent to exclude same-sex couples.

Both sides agreed that marriage should be considered a “fundamental right,” but they disagreed about how that right (or “constellation of rights”) should be defined.  This definitional disagreement could be the deciding factor in which standard the court chooses to apply.

But Johnson also asserted that Iowa’s marriage law would not even satisfy the looser requirements of the rational basis test, should the court choose to apply it. He disputed Kuhle’s claims that same-sex couples are inferior at raising children. Both sides have provided evidence to support their arguments already, so they did not dwell on this point Tuesday.

Johnson also argued that the government’s interest in providing an optimal environment for raising children was not well served by a law preventing same-sex couples with children from achieving the stability and validation embodied in marriage. Even if opposite-sex couples are better at raising children, he argued, same-sex couples have raised children in Iowa and they will continue to do so, with or without the right to marry. If that is true, then the government’s interest in raising children in an optimal environment would be best served by allowing same-sex parents to marry.

If the court chooses to apply strict scrutiny to Iowa’s law defining marriage as a union of one man and one woman, it is likely to uphold the trial court’s decision to effectively legalize same-sex marriage.  As Kuhle pointed out, the court would have already decided on a new definition of the right to marry if they concluded that the more stringent standard was appropriate.

But if the court applies the rational basis test, they could still side with the plaintiffs.  The Massachusetts Supreme Court applied that standard, and they still concluded that same-sex couples should have the right to marry.  Polk County Judge Robert Hanson chose to apply strict scrutiny, but his ruling also concludes that Iowa’s ban on same-sex marriage would violate the rational basis test.  Should the court reverse Hanson’s decision to apply strict scrutiny, they might still side with him when applying the looser standard.

A caveat

There exists a third standard called “intermediate scrutiny” that would fall between strict scrutiny and rational basis review in terms of strictness.  It is similar to strict scrutiny, but rather than requiring that a law be “narrowly tailored” to a legitimate government interest, it must only be “substantially related” to the interest. This standard has been applied to cases of sex discrimination, but in those cases, some analysts have argued, intermediate scrutiny has become almost as strict as strict scrutiny.

Intermediate scrutiny has received less attention than the other two standards in Varnum v. Brien, but it is possible that the Iowa Supreme Court could choose to apply it anyway.

Rev. Richard Cizik told National Public Radio on Dec. 2 that he would “willingly say that I believe in civil unions. I don’t officially support redefining marriage from its traditional definition, I don’t think.”

Cizik has been an outspoken member of the Evangelical community and has, for nearly the past three decades, been one of NAE’s chief lobbyists in Washington. His official title, according to a press release about his resignation distributed by NAE, was vice president of governmental affairs.

Leith Anderson, a Minnesota pastor and current president of the NAE, told the board of directors that “in a December 2, 2008 broadcast interview on National Public Radio, Richard responded to questions and made statements that did not appropriately represent the values and convictions of NAE and our constituents. Although he has subsequently expressed regret, apologized and affirmed our values there is a loss of trust in his credibility as a spokesperson among leaders and constituents.”

Anderson’s discussions with Cizik about the comments was delayed, he said, because of a previously scheduled European conference Cizik attended immediately following the interview on NPR’s Fresh Air.

Anderson explained to Eric Gorski of the Associated Press that a “combination of things” from the interview led to Cizik’s ultimate departure. He highlighted both the fact that Cizik admitted to voting for President-elect Barack Obama and discussed nuclear weapons as a foreign-policy issue instead of religious freedom or human trafficking.

Still, it’s not the first time Cizik has come under fire from Christian conservatives. He drew the direct ire of the Colorado-based conservative group Focus on the Family when he pushed Evangelicals to focus on “creation care,” a battle to protect the earth from global warming. In 2007 several prominent leaders in the Christian right called for Cizik’s dismissal on grounds that he was diluting the Evangelical agenda.

Although Cizik has not spoken with the press about his resignation, Anderson said that Cizik had expressed regret, apologized and “affirmed our values.”

“For better or for worse, Rich became a great, polarizing figure,” Charles Colson of Prison Fellowship told Christianity Today. “He was gradually, over a period of time, separating himself from the mainstream of evangelical belief and conviction. So I’m not surprised. I’m sorry for him, but I’m not disappointed for the evangelical movement.”

On Tuesday morning, the court heard oral arguments in the case of Varnum v. Brien. The case, filed initially by six same-sex couples who were denied marriage licenses by Timothy J. Brien, the Polk County Recorder, was given summary judgment in Iowa District Court in August 2007. Although the lower court’s decision was placed on hold pending the appeal to the high state court, one same-sex couple was able to quickly maneuver through the marriage process. The fate and validity of that marriage now hinges on the ruling from this appeal.

The Iowa Christian Alliance, formerly the Christian Coalition of Iowa, opposes same-sex marriage.

“The evidence submitted to the [lower court] judge showed that the Iowa Defense of Marriage Act is constitutional, is legal and was voted on by a vast majority of the Legislature with the support of the population of the state of Iowa,” said Norm Pawlewski, a spokesman and lobbyist for the Iowa Christian Alliance. “The lower court ruling was an erroneous decision and the Supreme Court should overrule it. If they don’t, then they are engaging in judicial activism.”

Pawlewski though, is not optimistic that the conservative groups will receive a favorable ruling.

“I think this is going to come down to judicial activism. That’s my opinion,” he said.

Bryan English, a spokesman for Iowa Family Policy Center, also believes that the court will take on a legislative role if it decides to allow same-sex marriage.

“One of the main questions is whether or not the court would be usurping the rights of the Legislature by siding with or supporting the lower court’s decision,” English said. “The justices even said today that one of the outcomes could be a redefinition of marriage. That’s different then deciding if something is constitutional or unconstitutional. A redefinition of something as foundational as marriage is a significant change in the law and ought to be handled by the Legislature.”

Tamara Scott, state director for Concerned Women of America, takes the thought one step further, saying that the current state of the fight for same-sex marriage in the U.S. has turned historical precedent upside down. She points to the battle for suffrage as evidence that groups previously understood the process of amending the U.S. Constitution was the proper avenue.

“If Iowans and Americans would really look at this, they would see that this is a federal issue,” Scott said. “Look at the U.S. Constitution. I believe it was the 14th Amendment that gave the black man the right to vote. The 19th Amendment gave women the right to vote. The white male already had that right, but nowhere, at any time, did the black men and the women assume they were included as well. They knew and they were forced to go through the long and purposefully difficult process of passing an amendment to the U.S. Constitution so they could obtain the right to vote.”

Pawlewski is adamant that the Defense of Marriage Act, which defined marriage as between one man and one woman, is and should be the law until a different wording or definition is passed by the Legislature.

“There is nothing in the Constitution that says everybody has a right to marry whoever, or whatever or how-many-ever they want,” he said. “There was nothing wrong with the law that was passed. It went through the appropriate procedures, and, if the homosexuals want gay marriage in the state of Iowa, then they ought to go through the Legislature just like everybody else.”

Although these groups did not file individual friend-of-the-court briefs in the case, they did work closely with the Alliance Defense Fund to ensure their arguments were read by the justices.

For now, English and Scott are willing to take a “wait and see” approach to the court’s ruling.

“You never know how a judge is going to rule,” Scott said. “You think you understand the legal ramifications and implications and precedents — but you just never know. I’m hopeful that they will understand that this isn’t a position the courts should be making. This is something that belongs in the legislature and something that should be a process that goes through the state Constitution, not seven individuals.”.

There were no mass protests on the steps of the building, no disruptive outbursts in the courtroom, and no major security incidents.  Even stragglers who entered the building minutes before arguments began were greeted by friendly security guards and a very short line to enter.

For an issue as emotional as same-sex marriage, one which has polarized the electorate here in Iowa and elsewhere for years, there was surprisingly little tension in the air.

In Varnum v. Brien, six same-sex couples from Polk County are arguing that the state’s 1998 ban on gay marriages is unconstitutional. The state is defending the Defense of Marriage Act, which passed by wide margins in the state Legislature a decade ago.

The Iowa Supreme Court building in Des Moines.

“Once you decide the standard, the outcome may be controlled by that standard,” Mark McCormick, a Des Moines attorney who served on the Iowa Supreme Court from 1972 to 1986, said in a telephone interview with the Iowa Independent.

McCormick says the seven justices on the court face a fundamental choice: to decide if a “rational basis” or a “strict scrutiny” test should be applied to the case.

“The Court has decided quite a number of equal protection clause cases,” said McCormick. “A good deal of what the court does in [those] cases depends on what the test or standard is.”

When a case involves a routine economic issue, the court typically applies a rational basis test, he said. That means the judges seek to decide if the Legislature could have had any reasonable basis for making the classification that it did. If the judges conclude that the state had a rational reason for the law, the court won’t interfere with it, but will defer to the Legislature.

“Strict scrutiny” is a more demanding standard, he said.

“Where you are dealing with an issue like race or citizenship or something that is considered a fundamental constitutional right, the burden is on the government to prove a compelling need for the classification,” he explained.

In the district court decision in the case last August, the judge applied this standard and ruled in the favor of the gay couples.

“You can see these [two tests] are just at opposite extremes,” he said. “A good deal of a favorable outcome will depend on what test the court thinks should be applied. If this were a race case, there wouldn’t be any question about [which standard would be used]. If this were an ordinary case involving a right based on gender, the court would likely apply the strict scrutiny standard.”

Although much has been made in the lead-up to Tuesday’s oral arguments about the court hearing this case de novo, or without consideration of any lower court’s decision, McCormick said this is not a significant distinction.

“De novo doesn’t mean anything because whenever the constitution is challenged, the review by the Supreme Court is de novo,” he said. “And where a decision like this is made under the Iowa constitution, it doesn’t matter what federal courts might do, because the Iowa court has full control over its constitution and its interpretation of the Iowa equal protection clause.”

This is not to say, however, that the Iowa Supreme Court justices will ignore other state decisions as they make their ruling, he said.

“I think our court will look at the decisions that have been made in other states,” he went on. “The three most recent states to decide the issue, as I recall, have stricken state laws of a comparable nature. So, our court will be looking at the reasoning in those cases, and will probably find something persuasive about some of that reasoning.”

The three most recent state courts to rule on gay marriage were Massachusetts, California and Connecticut. The justices in all three states ruled that laws banning same-sex marriages were unconstitutional.

McCormick said he believed the quickest ruling he could remember from the Iowa Supreme Court came in roughly three weeks. Such a quick ruling is not expected to happen in this controversial case. McCormick said it would likely be months before the court formally weighs in on the issue.

Regardless of how long it takes for the ruling to be made, McCormick said Iowans can rest assured that the Court’s decision will be based in the law.

“I think the people on the court have been involved with enough issues which have had a lot of public attention to know that [public sentiment] can’t dictate or influence how they decide the case,” he said. “In my experience and observation, the court does apply the rule of law in these cases and the judges do put personal feelings to the side. The justices on the court would not ever be influenced by the personal opinion of another judge that they didn’t think was supported by the law. So, I think they will attempt to get right to the heart or merits of the matter.”

The state’s next turn in the national spotlight begins on Tuesday, Dec. 9, when the state Supreme Court hears arguments on same-sex marriage.

The legal drama has been three years in the making. In December 2005, the gay rights group Lambda Legal filed a lawsuit on behalf of six same-sex couples who sought the right to marry in Iowa. The suit was later amended to include three children whose parents were plaintiffs. The lawsuit argued that it would be unlawful to ban same-sex couples from marriage based on the equal protection and due process guarantees of the Iowa constitution. The state’s Defense of Marriage Act, passed in 1998 by a 40-9 margin in the Senate and an 89-10 margin in the House, defines marriage as being solely between a man and a woman.

On Aug. 30, 2007, an Iowa District Court in Polk County agreed with the plaintiffs and ruled that it was unconstitutional to deny couples the right to marry.

“Couples, such as [the] Plaintiffs, who are otherwise qualified to marry one another may not be denied licenses to marry or certificates of marriage or in any other way prevented from entering into a civil marriage … by reason of the fact that both persons comprising such a couple are of the same sex,” wrote Iowa District Court Judge Robert Hanson in his ruling.

Although Hanson placed a “hold” on his ruling before even 24 hours had passed, dozens of same-sex couples lined up for licenses. One couple, Sean Fritz and Tim McQuillan, both undergraduates at Iowa State University, were able to maneuver through the system quickly enough to become spouses in Iowa’s first — and only — legal same-sex marriage.

A Polk County attorney appealed the decision to the Iowa Supreme Court, which has scheduled oral arguments next week.

In the weeks prior to the scheduled oral arguments, Lambda Legal and One Iowa, an equality advocacy group, presented public forums to discuss the status of the case and encourage those Iowans who support marriage equality to voice their opinion.

“I think one of the misconceptions is that the lawsuit seeks to change what various religious organizations are doing,” said Camilla Taylor, a senior staff attorney with Lambda Legal who argued the case in District Court. “All we are actually talking about is government-issued marriage licenses. Religious institutions have never been required to perform or condone civil marriage, and this lawsuit doesn’t change that.”

Rev. Rich McCarty, one of the panel members at the Iowa City forum, echoed this sentiment in a tongue-in-cheek fashion by stating that “religious communities are free to discriminate against whomever they want to.”

Those speaking at the forum were hopeful that Iowa, a state that granted the marriage rights of interracial couples more than 100 years before the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case Loving v. Virginia, will once again flex its pioneering muscles. It is a hope voiced by Mary Mascher, a Democratic member of the Iowa House of Representatives from Iowa City.

“I think our constitution clearly, clearly prohibits [a ban on same-sex marriage],” said Mascher, one of several legislators and local elected officials who signed on to a friend-of-the-court brief in support of the lawsuit. “[The Defense of Marriage Act] is discriminatory and I voted against that law when it was put on the books for that very reason. I thought it was unconstitutional and I believe that’s what the Supreme Court is going to rule.”

Mascher knows that the issue has become a political hot potato, especially after the November general election when ballot propositions in other states like California were successful in banning same-sex marriage.

A total of 24 friend-of-the court briefs have been filed. Sixteen of those are from organizations and individuals who believe Iowa’s Defense of Marriage Act, passed in 1998, is unconstitutional. Eight briefs are supportive of the gay marriage ban, most of them from national organizations.

Sixteen Republican state legislators joined in filing a friend-of-the-court brief in support of banning same-sex marriage in Iowa when the case was before Iowa District Court last year. Only five of the 16 have added their names to similar brief in the Supreme Court case. Citing their interest in “maintaining a proper separation of government powers,” Reps. Dwayne Alons, Carmine Boal and Betty DeBoef joined with Sens. Nancy Boettger and James Hahn on a brief authored by the Alliance Defense Fund, a legal alliance created in 1994 by Focus on the Family and more than 29 additional Christian ministries, as a response to the American Civil Liberties Union, to “aggressively defend religious liberty.”

Jim Campbell, litigation counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, provided the crux of the opposition brief by questioning the lower court’s decision to reject testimony prior to ruling.

“The government should promote and encourage strong families,” Campbell said. “The expert testimony excluded by the court was crucial to establishing why Iowa’s Defense of Marriage Act does that and why the act is completely constitutional. The people of Iowa, through their elected legislators, took their stand on marriage as a union of one woman and one man when they passed this Act in 1998.”

Mascher thinks supporters of the gay marriage ban from outside the state “would tread upon our constitution.”

“Part of me says that is their right of freedom of speech and that everybody can come here and say what they want and speak their piece. But at the same time, this is Iowa. I think we as Iowans have definite feelings and opinions about that too. I don’t want to be a part of anything that would take rights away in our constitution. That would be the first time in the history of Iowa that we’ve ever put an amendment to that constitution that took rights away. If you think about the enormity of that, it really gives you pause in terms of thinking that this would be something that we would even consider, and that there are people who would try to destroy our constitution in that way.”

A perhaps strange bedfellow in all of this is Gov. Chet Culver. Prior to the November general election — indeed, prior to the beginning of the 2008 legislative session — Culver claimed he was in favor of calling a special legislative session to deal with a Supreme Court verdict that would allow same-sex marriage in Iowa.

Mascher, while not completely convinced that Culver has ruled out this strategy, cautions that it could be politically unwise.

“What I think the governor has to understand and appreciate is that he is one branch of government and our legislature is another branch of government,” Mascher said. “In order for anything to happen and occur, it can’t just happen with his signature. He doesn’t have any kind of veto power over a constitutional amendment. He can call us back. We don’t have to come. We don’t have to do anything. So, I think he would do that at his own peril because it would be embarrassing to call us back and then not have anything be done. I don’t think that politically he is willing to take that kind of a risk.”

Oral arguments are expected to begin at 10 a.m. on Dec. 9 in the Iowa Judicial Branch Building in Des Moines. The opposing parties will have 30 minutes in which to make their arguments.

More information regarding oral arguments, the trial court ruling and other proceedings can be found on the Iowa Judicial Branch Web site. There is no mandated time frame for the court to make its ruling following the oral arguments. Most close to the case anticipate it will take several months.

King told CNSNews.com that Iowans care deeply about preserving traditional marriage and the issue is likely to mobilize voters:

“Here we are with the Democratic National Party conducting an assault directly on marriage that throws out everything we have known in 6,000 years of history,” King told CNSNews.com.

“I don’t think they [the people of Iowa] really believe it yet. They don’t take it seriously. They don’t understand the depth of mobilization. They won’t believe it will happen,” he added.

But King added that if Iowa’s own DOMA law, which is currently facing a challenge in the Iowa Supreme Court, is repealed, opposition to ending DOMA on the national level may gain momentum.

“When the people of Iowa see pictures of same-sex couples kissing on the steps of their churches, they will mobilize,” said King. “That’s when the Democratic Party’s advocacy becomes a problem.”

The issue has heated up again in the wake of last year’s Polk County court ruling that Iowa’s law banning same-sex marriages is unconstitutional. That ruling was stayed on appeal, but not before one male couple managed to get a valid license and hold a wedding ceremony. Gay marriage opponents now want to enshrine their views in the state Constitution, joining 25 other states.The question won’t be on this fall’s ballot, as it would have to pass two consecutive sessions. But if it comes to a roll call, those votes are likely to be prominently featured in GOP campaign ads. Democrats must trade that fear against the money and volunteer time LGBT activists offer to campaigns.

"Shame on me for investing my time, money, and efforts supporting candidates that believe I’m not fully equal to them," said Democratic activist Janelle Rettig of Iowa City, citing Johnson County legislators who won’t commit to the principle of full equality. Rettig and her partner have a valid marriage license from Canada. "I guess being good neighbors, citizens and taxpayers isn’t enough."

Long before gay marriage was a front-page issue, Iowa Democrats were in the forefront in support. They placed marriage equality in the state party’s 1994 platform. But the day after that platform was approved, gubernatorial nominee Bonnie Campbell formally renounced it, specifying the gay marriage issue.

Legislators who say no when asked "Should marriage be only between a man and a woman?"
Senators: Joe Bolkcom, D-Iowa City; Michael Connolly, D-Dubuque; Matt McCoy, D-Des Moines
Representatives: Bruce Hunter, D-Des Moines; Mary Mascher, D-Iowa City; Dick Taylor, D-Cedar Rapids

Another seven senators and 12 representatives — again, all urban Democrats — either said they were “undecided” as to whether marriage is only between a man and a woman or did not answer.

As it stands now, the vote on HJR 8 or SJR 2001 breaks exactly 50-50 on the House side, with four Democrats crossing party lines to support the amendment and one Republican opposed.

House Democrats, Yes
Geri Huser, D-Des Moines
Dolores Mertz, D-Ottosen
Brian Quirk, D-New Hampton
Kurt Swaim, D-Bloomfield

House Republican, No
Chuck Gipp, R-Decorah

That dead heat would kill action for the year, but one switch to yes would put the Senate in play. On that side of the Rotunda, the issue is more up in the air, with 12 Democrats and one Republican either undecided or not responding. Amendment opponents would need most of these votes to block Senate action, as the senators who have committed are split 21 in favor to 16 opposed.

While the war in Iraq might loom large in the minds of Democratic caucus-goers, Iowa Republicans are much more focused on immigration and cultural issues, according to a new survey of state GOP chairs. The local Republican officials, like the leading GOP presidential candidates with the exception of Ron Paul, mostly agree that a stable Iraq is key to U.S. national security and the war on terror. But the Iraq war itself is not playing out as a stand-alone voting issue.

“The war is certainly an issue, but I don’t think it carries the same impact the media says it does,” said John Markham, chair of the Dubuque County Republican Party in eastern Iowa.

The war is “probably not [hitting home] as much as it was two years ago,” said Rev. Harold Miller, who served as chair of the Grundy County Republican Party until recently.

In a series of phone interviews conducted by Huffington Post’s OffTheBus project, 37 of Iowa’s Republican county chairs were asked to name the issues most important to GOP caucus-goers this year.  Almost universally, immigration and social issues were mentioned.  Asked about the Iraq War, many county chairs downplayed its significance.

“The war has overshadowed the real things that need to be spoken about,” said Alice DeRycke, chair of the Iowa County Republicans in central Iowa.

“I think [the war] is probably the third or fourth item down the list of importance,” said Dave Stolb, GOP chair of rural Guthrie County in western Iowa.  “The immigration issue” is the most important in Iowa.  “Immigration is number one, with ’social agenda’ … definitely high up there.”

These insights may help to explain why, despite one Republican polling firm’s data showing that more than 50% of Republican caucus-goers support withdrawal from Iraq within six months, the most successful Republican candidates in Iowa oppose any current plans for withdrawal.  (No sources we reached seemed to fit into the supposed majority of GOP caucus-goers who support withdrawal, and several did not believe that the poll was accurate.  But at the very least, the poll raises questions about how the war plays politically across the state.)

Vonnie Kinkaid, chair in Union County, attempted to add a bit of perspective to the discussion when asked about the poll data.  “Listen, no one here is pro-war.  There are much worse wars.  We lose more people to the war on alcohol, more to substance abuse than to the mission in Iraq,” she said. “There are worse problems at home, things we got to straighten out here.”

In terms of what those problems are, most county chairs were in general agreement: immigration and social issues trump the war and most other issues in the minds of GOP caucus-goers.  Several county chairs also helped to shed light on why this may be.

Irene Blom, chair of the Marion County Republicans in central Iowa, said that the biggest issues for Republicans in her area are abortion, gay marriage, and “the downfall of morals and religion.”  Blom, like a significant number of Iowa’s social conservatives, is of Dutch descent, and her family’s history has played a role in shaping her political views.

“My parents were born in the Netherlands,” she explained. “20 to 25 years ago, my [Dutch] relative came to visit and predicted that America should be careful, as it is going the same way as Holland.  You know what has happened there.”

Religion itself also appears to motivate caucus-goers, particularly when it comes to how their children are educated.  Cheryl Adams, Van Buren County GOP chair, identified “Prayer — the freedom of prayer in the public schools” and “the right to display the Ten Commandments in public places” as the most important issues in the minds of GOP caucus-goers in her area.

Mark Lundberg, county chair in Republican-rich Sioux County, noted that although his county’s public schools are excellent, parents send 25% of school-age children to private, Christian schools.  “The electorate here is strongly pro-family and anti-gay marriage,” he said.  “There is a strong Christian conservative influence here.”

But even more than moral issues, immigration was named by county chairs most often as the top issue on GOP caucus-goers’ minds.

“I think Iowans, and for that matter, people as a whole across the nation, are concerned about the illegal immigration problem that we face,” said Loras Schulte, Benton County Republican chair.

Connie Hoelscher, chair in Hamilton County, agreed: “We need to get the non-US citizens out of our country.”

In some cases, immigration was tied directly to local unemployment.  “They have taken jobs away from our people,” Hoelscher claimed.  In other cases, the reasons for prioritizing immigration were less clear.

Iowa’s recent hispanic immigrants, mostly from Mexico, tend to live in small pockets across the state near meatpacking plants, where they often work.  In those areas in particular, anti-immigrant sentiments can be high.

Decades ago, meatpacking plants paid some of the highest wages in rural Iowa, and their employees were unionized.  Rick Halvorsen, chair of the Warren County Republicans, gave his account of what has happened in the plants and their surrounding communities over the past two decades:

I’m not a union man, but the plants broke the unions and saddled the community with supporting the workers.  [The packing plants] wouldn’t pay a living wage [to workers doing] those really pretty awful difficult jobs.  So they went south of the border and now it’s 50% from Mexico and just 12-15 years ago these were all-white towns.  They have to hire Spanish-speaking teachers for the schools.  [The packing companies] broke the unions 20 years ago.  Those workers moved away.  We’re 50% Hispanic now.  Packing companies like Swift have been making huge profits, and they don’t pay the workers enough to live… The Mexicans have large families, the wives and kids coming up, but the plants won’t pay.  Low wages and large families means the taxpayers are supplementing the companies’ profits.  We pay for the health insurance and benefits for their workers.  We’ve had enough of that.

(Straight from the horse’s mouth, that’s about as clear a summary of immigration politics in Iowa as I’ve seen.)

But despite widespread consistency among county chairs about what issues matter to GOP voters, the presidential race in Iowa remains fragmented and volatile.  “A lot of people are on the fence, a lot of people [are] undecided,” said Trudy Caviness, chair in Wapello County, before she quickly rephrased.  “People are undecided on who to vote for, but not on the issues,” she concluded.

(Commentary) Upon hearing news of Polk County Judge Robert Hanson’s ruling smiting Iowa’s prohibition on same-sex marriage, I grabbed my well-thumbed copy of James Dobson’s “Marriage Under Fire,” hopped in my Sin City getaway car, and fled Des Moines before God had a chance to destroy the capital city with fire and brimstone. I had to reach moral high ground before it was too late. While crossing the county line, I was tempted to look back and steal one final glimpse of the capital city aflame.

But when I looked in the rear-view mirror, I felt disappointed. A firestorm had not consumed my place of birth; I had not turned into a pillar of salt. My wavering doubts in the sanctity of marriage slowly gave way to doubts about the moral prophets of doom, who have predicted that gay marriage not only will destroy the sanctity of marriage and the moral fiber of our society but also will serve as a precursor to the apocalypse.In his “Marriage Under Fire” manifesto, Dobson argues that same-sex marriage will bring about the end of the world: “The culture war will be over, and the world may soon become `as it was in the days of Noah.’” Dobson, chairman of the board of “Focus on the Family,” reiterated that theme in October 2004 when he asserted that allowing same-sex couples to wed would not only “destroy marriage. It will destroy the earth.”

One week later