The state's top lawyer has taken to the phones to promote a constitutional amendment against gay marriage. "This is Attorney General Greg Abbott. A shadowy group is making deceptive phone calls to trick you on how to vote on Proposition Two. Let me be clear. A vote for Proposition Two is a vote for traditional marriage. Early voting ends this Friday. Please protect marriage by voting early for Proposition Two so we can keep marriage between a man and a woman." The shadowy group he's referring to is No Nonsense in November, which was set up weeks ago to oppose the constitutional amendment. They didn't identify themselves in their ads. Neither did Abbott's sponsor, but his aides say he did the recording for the Republican Party of Texas, which paid for the phone calls. A spokeswoman for the GOP wouldn't say how many calls were made, or to whom. Other Republicans have taped messages, apparently, and some voters will be hearing those comments on their answering machines between now and Election Day next week. Abbott's message started hitting answering machines -- at least those in reporters' offices, where we got ours -- a day after the No Nonsense group did a round with people reading judicial comments from Abbott himself and from Justice Nathan Hecht, Abbott's former colleague on the Texas Supreme Court. the two Republicans initially scheduled a press conference to protest the use of their words, but decided against it. Abbott did the ad, while Hecht issued a statement saying his words were taken out of context. The anti-2 folks say the wording of it is sloppy and would accidentally outlaw marriage of any sort, if read literally. Abbott contests that, as do the authors of the amendment, who say opponents are trying to confuse voters. But the opponents pulled out an Abbott opinion -- he used to be on the high court -- where he said judges should rely on the words before them over the intent of the Legislature. Hecht's quote was taken from an interview in which he was defending Harriet Miers. He told the Austin American-Statesman that the personal views of judges are outweighed by the laws they interpret: "When you're construing the Constitution or statute, you're stuck with what's there." Abbott, as you can see, is taking a position on the amendment. Hecht, who might eventually hear a case stemming from the thing, has no public position on it.