More on How Gay "Marriage" Happened in New York state

Here is another article, [at 4/25/13 this article isn't available but the quotes below are accurate;  here is a link to a similar account] also from New Yorker's Family Research Foundation, that gives more explanation about how the same-sex "marriage" vote in New York was basically bought and sold and passed under questionable (illegal?) conditions.  Republicans were instrumental in passing this bill.  The author mentions the groundwork that was laid by Republican donors in collusion (shall we say) with Andrew Cuomo. 

The battle really began back some months ago when Steve Cohen and other top staff members from Governor Andrew Cuomo’s administration met with wealthy Republican financial contributors in New York City. The governor’s staff proposed that they should work with the governor to see that homosexual “marriage” legislation was passed into law. It didn’t take long for those liberal-leaning Republican Wall Street financiers to get on board with the governor. Billionaire Paul Singer (whose son is living in a gay-lifestyle), and hedge fund managers Cliff Asness and Daniel Loeb were influential in passing same-sex “marriage” legislation. They wrote six-figure checks, totaling over one million dollars, to fund the public relations campaign for gay “marriage”. This level of support did not go unnoticed by Republicans who normally sought campaign funding from these same sources. 

He mentions the "letter of necessity" that Cuomo used to circumvent consideration of the bill in the Assembly. 

To get a vote this quickly, the governor had to send a letter of necessity to the Assembly, declaring that this legislation was critical to the state, and necessary, such that there was no time for it to go through the normal legislative process. 

 Once the bill was in the Senate, the governor went to work again. 

The Senate leadership and the governor’s staff made an agreement not to permit the same-sex “marriage” legislation to be laid aside or discussed. This blocked any debate and expedited the process. The governor wanted to have the vote pass in a manner that would allow for maximum coverage in that evening’s 11:00 PM newscasts. His staff was in full force on the Senate floor, working with various leaders, expediting the process to make the 11:00 o’clock deadline. It is highly unethical for the executive branch of government to be involved in the operation of the legislative branch.

Senators were locked into the chamber and lobbyists were locked out.

Senators were locked in the chamber so they could not disappear for the vote and be marked absent – or in Albany lingo ‘take a walk’. This is the first time I have seen senators locked in the chamber, forcing them to vote. Again, this seemed to be part of a broader effort to lock down the needed votes, and not let any peel away from taking a difficult vote.

The author makes clear that Republicans could have stopped this bill.

The Republican Party controls the state senate, giving them the authority to determine what to do with the legislation. They did not have to bring the legislation to the floor. The Senate Republican Conference could have stopped same-sex “marriage” in New York State, but they failed to do so. Twenty-nine Republicans voted against the bill on the floor, but it is not clear that they did all they could to keep it from coming to the floor in conference. It only takes seventeen senators in conference to hold a bill.