Son of Iowa Lesbians Fights Gay Marriage Ban

Photo Courtesy - Getty Images(DES MOINES, Iowa) -- The latest Internet hero is Zach Wahls, a 19-year-old University of Iowa engineering student and Eagle Scout whose parents are lesbians.

Wahls gave a three-minute speech Tuesday before Iowa legislators urging them not to pass a constitutional amendment that would ban gay marriage and civil unions.

His words went viral across the Internet and had nearly a half million hits on YouTube Thursday.

"In my 19 years, not once have I ever been confronted by an individual who realized independently that I was raised by a gay couple," said Wahls. "And you know why? Because the sexual orientation of my parents has had zero affect on the content of my character."

Introducing himself as a "six-generation Iowan," Wahls said he had achieved the Boy Scouts' highest rank and attained a 99th percentile on his college aptitude test.

"If I was your son, Mr. Chairman, I believe I would make you very proud," he testified.

"I'm not really so different from any of your children, said Wahls. "My family really isn't so different from yours. After all, your family doesn't derive its sense of worth from being told by the state, 'You're married, congratulations!'"

Wahls' parents, Zacharia Wahls and Jacqueline Reger, of Iowa City, were married in Iowa in 2009. In his speech, he described his biological mother, who suffers from multiple sclerosis, as the "bravest woman I know."

Neither Wahls nor his parents returned calls and e-mails from ABCNews.com.

The year his parents wed, the Iowa Supreme Court unanimously legalized gay marriage, making it the third state and the first heartland state to allow same-sex couples to wed.

Gay marriage is now legal in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont and Washington, D.C. New York, California, Rhode Island, New Mexico and Washington, D.C., recognize marriages by same-sex couples legally performed elsewhere.

Just last week Barbara Bush, the daughter of former President George W. Bush, expressed her support for same-sex marriage in a new online PSA video for the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights group.

"My family eats together, goes to church on Sunday and goes on vacations, just like you," Wahls told legislators.

"No, the sense of family comes from the commitment we make to each other," he said. "To work through the hard times, so we can enjoy the good ones. It comes from the love that binds us. That's what makes a family.

"So what you're voting here isn't to change us. It's not to change our families. It's to change how the law views us. How the law treats us," he said.

A University of Iowa field poll from October of last year found that over 62 percent of Iowa voters oppose same-sex marriage, and only 28.1 percent supported gay marriage, reports the Iowa Family Policy Center.

The center's website states that the organization believes "that marriage is a permanent, lifelong commitment between a man and a woman. The group has lobbied for House Joint Resolution 6.

"IFPC affirms sexual relations within the bond of marriage, and opposes distortions of sexuality or special rights to those practicing distorted sexual behavior," said its website.

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