State House rally combines romance and politics

PROVIDENCE - Frank Ferri got down on one knee.

Looking into Tony Caparco's eyes, he said, "Will you marry me?"

The two men have been together 25 years, and have lived in the same house in Warwick for 20. Still, neither of them had ever proposed.

For Ferri, who co-chairs the advocacy group Marriage Equality Rhode Island, the familiar Valentine's Day gesture made a point - he popped the question in a crowded State House rotunda amid a rally for same-sex marriage - but it was also sincere. Caparco didn't know it was coming, he said afterward as he showed off the diamond band, which Ferri had bought on a cruise the couple took two years ago.

The men, both Providence natives, own property in Massachusetts, and could get married there, but choose not to, Caparco said: "We want to get married here, where we grew up, where we have family, where we have businesses."

Ferri, 52, owns the Town Hall Lanes bowling alley in Johnston. Caparco, 58, manages a granite countertop store in Warwick.

Ferri's proposal served as a grand finale to the two-hour rally, which featured music: "All you need is love. . ." - "Goin' to the chapel and we're gonna get maaaaaarried" - posters aplenty, and a banner unfurled from the third-floor balcony, stretching all the way to the marble floor of the rotunda, and then some.

The list contained a sampling of the rights and protections conferred by marriage under state and federal law - a list more than 1,400 items long, by the event organizers' count.

Those rights and protections are not available to same-sex couples - but the demonstrators yesterday said they hope that will soon change.

State Sen. Rhoda E. Perry, D-Providence, the bill's prime sponsor in the Senate, said she hopes this will be the year for a change of heart in the legislative leadership. (House Speaker William J. Murphy and Senate President Joseph A. Montalbano both oppose same-sex marriage.)

If they're worried about the political implications of supporting such a measure, Perry said, they might look to neighboring Massachusetts. "Not one politician in Massachusetts who voted for same-sex marriage has lost his or her seat," Perry said. "Not one!"

State Rep. Eileen S. Naughton, D-Warwick, announced proudly that one fellow Warwick Democrat - Rep. Peter T. Ginaitt - had joined the list of cosponsors this year.

Besides Perry and Naughton, other politicians in attendance included state representatives Edith H. Ajello and Paul E. Moura, both Providence Democrats, and Al Gemma, D-Warwick; state Senators Elizabeth H. Roberts, D-Cranston, and Charles J. Levesque, D-Portsmouth; and several Democratic congressional candidates, including Brown University professor Jennifer Lawless, who's running against U.S. Rep. James R. Langevin, and all three Democratic candidates for Lincoln D. Chafee's U.S. Senate seat: Secretary of State Matt Brown, former Attorney General Sheldon Whitehouse and West Greenwich businessman Carl L. Sheeler.

The protest's theme - "Get Engaged" - combined romance and politics. A handout urged attendees to "get engaged" by contributing time or money to Marriage Equality Rhode Island and by contacting their state legislators to encourage them to support the bill.

State legislators have introduced similar legislation every year but one since 1997. But, said the rally's master of ceremonies, Newport filmmaker and theatrical director Don Mays, "This is going to be the last time we have to have this rally, because the legislature is going to make the move. They are going to become. . ."

He didn't have to finish his sentence; the crowd did it for him. "Engaged!"

This article, written by Elizabeth Gudrais, appeared on February 15, 2006, in the Providence Journal.