ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE, May 29 (UPI)

U.S. President George Bush thinks a definition of marriage should be based on “national agreement,” not state-by-state, the White House said Thursday.

Spokeswoman Dana Perino said the administration was concerned about the legal implications of New York Gov. David Paterson’s order that all state agencies recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states. In the May 14 directive, Patterson’s legal counsel instructed state agencies to revise policies and regulations to assure same-sex couples married elsewhere will be afforded “the same recognition as any other legally performed union.”

Perino said she was “sure there’s going to be a lot of people who analyze the legal ramifications” of the directive.

“(The) president believes that we should try to make this decision based on a nationwide agreement for the what the definition of a marriage should be,” Perino told reporters while traveling to an Olathe, Kan. fundraiser, “and that activist judges and different states trying to impose something of that importance on the rest of the nation is to be looked at skeptically.”

She said Bush thinks “the people should be making these decisions,” not judges.

© 2008 United Press International. All Rights Reserved.
This material may not be reproduced, redistributed, or manipulated in any form.