Iowa caucus

Romney Campaign Slams 'Undignified And Inappropriate' Marriage Pledge From Iowa Group

Eric Kleefeld | July 13, 2011, 10:12AM

GOP Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney

Mitt Romney is further distancing himself from the GOP's religious right base in Iowa, by refusing to sign a social conservative group's controversial "Marriage Vow" pledge -- with his campaign going the extra mile by excoriating the pledge itself.

[TPM SLIDESHOW: Meet The 2012 GOPers: Mitt Romney]

The "Marriage Vow" involved a candidate pledging personal fidelity to his or her spouse, that he or she would change divorce laws to make "quickie divorces" more difficult, and would oppose gay marriage, pornography, and "Sharia Islam," among other things. Two Republican candidates, Michele Bachmann and Rick Santorum, signed the pledge, and then immediately encountered controversy due to the resolution's original preamble language on slavery -- which has since been edited out -- stating, quite contrary to the facts, that African-American families were more secure under slavery than they are today, under an African-American president.

As the Associated Press reports, Romney campaign spokeswoman Andrea Saul bluntly declared that the pledge "contained references and provisions that were undignified and inappropriate for a presidential campaign."

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2012 elections

Gingrich Seeking To Tweak 'Marriage Vow' -- From Iowa Conservative Group

Eric Kleefeld | July 11, 2011, 6:31PM

Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich has decided not to sign -- at least, not sign as of yet -- an Iowa conservative group's controversial 'Marriage Vow' pledge for Republican presidential candidates to personally and publicly uphold heterosexual monogamy and sexual morality.

"We're happy to work with you to sharpen it so people understand where we're going with it," Gingrich told Family Leader head Bob Vander Plaats, according to Gingrich spokesman R.C. Hammond, in a National Journal report. "It's not there yet."

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2012

Inflammatory Social Conservative Pledge Trips Up GOP Contenders

Benjy Sarlin | July 11, 2011, 3:30PM

Michele Bachmann and Rick Santorum are taking heat for signing onto a group's pledge suggesting African-American families were better off in some ways under slavery.

The two most prominent social conservatives in the 2012 field signed onto "The Marriage Vow - A Declaration of Dependence upon Marriage and Family," by The Family Leader, a Christian group. According to the pledge, "Slavery had a disastrous impact on African-American families, yet sadly a child born into slavery in 1860 was more likely to be raised by his mother and father in a two-parent household than was an African-American baby born after the election of the USA's first African-American President."

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