Tag Archives: same-sex marriage

legal news, national news

KKK spews same old hate message

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Hold on a second! I thought I read a time or two that the Ku Klux Klan was seeking to remake its image, that it was going to a sort of “kinder, gentler” hate group.

I must have dreamt it. The KKK is reverting to form.

A Mississippi Klan chapter has issued what it said is a “call to arms” to protest a decision to allow same-sex marriages to occur next door in Alabama.

http://www.salon.com/2015/02/14/kkk_issues_call_to_arms_over_alabama_same_sex_marriage_ruling_partner/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

Where I come from, a “call to arms” means what it says: that you are going to take up arms and fight someone — in this case, presumably the federal government. Also, where I come from, that sounds like sedition, which means to plot against the government, to mount an armed rebellion. And isn’t that an act of treason, punishable by, um, death?

A Ku Klux Klan grand dragon/serpent — a guy named Brent Waller — said this on a website post: “We as White Christians intend to see that no outside agitators bully or intimidate the White Christian majority in the State of Alabama. We salute those like the chief justice (Roy Moore) for standing against the Immoral, Ungodly and activist Federal Judges.”

How will they do that? Are they going to shoot someone?

Holy hate speech, Batman!

This nimrod needs to know that the federal judges who are ruling against statewide bans on same-sex marriage are acting totally within the law. The Constitution gives them authority to interpret the nation’s government framework, which they’re doing by declaring the 14th Amendment to the Constitution protects all Americans’ right to “equal protection” under the law. I will restate right here that all Americans means everyone, no matter their sexual orientation.

History has demonstrated time and again — for more than a century — that the Klan doesn’t believe in the Constitution.

 

 

legal news

Ready or not, Texas, same-sex marriage on its way

Get ready, Texas.

We’re about to be told that same-sex marriage is OK after all in the Lone Star State.

That vote we had to amend the Texas Constitution to say “not just ‘no,’ but ‘hell no!’ to same-sex marriage”? It’s going to be ruled in violation of the other Constitution, the federal document that governs all Americans. You see, it has an amendment that guarantees “equal protection under the laws” for all U.S. citizens. It doesn’t say just for those who want to marry those of the opposite sex; it means all, period.

http://www.texastribune.org/2015/02/12/light-alabama-plaintiffs-tx-ask-relief/

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled against an effort to overturn a lower-court ruling involving this issue in Alabama. That has court-watchers believing that other states whose same-sex marriage laws are in limbo at the moment now will be informed that, yes, they also must allow same-sex couples to get married.

One of the U.S. Supreme Court justices, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, has said publicly that all Americans had better get used to the idea of same-sex marriage becoming legal in this country.

I remain somewhat conflicted on this issue. I dislike using the term “marriage” to define same-sex relationships. Being an old-fashioned kind of fellow, I remain a bit reluctant to climb on board fully. That all said, I do understand what the federal Constitution’s 14th Amendment says about equal protection.

Therefore, I believe it should be legalized purely on the grounds that the Founders understood that all citizens need certain guarantees written into the nation’s governing framework.

Texas remains one of 50 states, all of which are subject to federal law. Thus, we’d better prepare ourselves for the inevitable change in the way we view marriage.

 

 

legal news, national news

Alabama's Roy Moore: judicial activist

Judicial activism is alive and well on one state’s bench, and it’s not a state where one would expect to find such a thing.

It’s in Alabama, where the chief justice of that state’s Supreme Court, has decided that the Highest Court in the Land — the United States Supreme Court — declined to overturn a lower federal court ruling that overturned the state’s ban on people marrying others of the same gender.

The high court, then, in effect endorsed the lower court ruling. The state’s ban on same-sex marriage is overturned, along with bans in 38 other states — including Texas.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2015/02/10/alabama-supreme-court-gay-marriage-editorials-debates/23200975/

As USA Today notes in an editorial, same-sex marriage has become as divisive an issue as the civil rights battles were in the 1950s and ’60s. Most Americans support same-sex marriage now, although in the Deep South, opponents of it remain in the majority.

Still, the entire nation is governed by a single Constitution and the federal courts are empowered to interpret that document in the manner they deem appropriate.

Federal judges have been striking down the bans generally on the grounds that they violate the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, the one that guarantees “equal protection” for all citizens under the law.

Justice Moore, though, doesn’t see it that way, even though he swore an oath to protect and defend the U.S. Constitution.

Don’t conservatives oppose judicial activism? Don’t they rail continually at judges who put their own bias above the law?

Alabama’s top state judge is on the wrong side of this issue. Period.

 

 

 

legal news, national news, political news

10th vs. 14th amendments in gay marriage hearing

The U.S. Supreme Court is going to decide the fate of same-sex marriage in the United States.

Good luck, justices.

At issue are two questions: Whether states must allow same-sex couples to marry and whether states must recognize same-sex marriages that take place out-of-state. The case will decide the fates of same-sex marriage bans in Tennessee, Michigan, Kentucky and Ohio.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/supreme-court-to-decide-if-states-can-ban-gay-marriage/ar-AA8gjVE

Here is where I believe the case should turn: Which amendment to the U.S. Constitution has more sway in deciding this matter, the 10th or the 14th?

The 10th is the final amendment outlining the Bill of Rights. It says: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserves to the states respectively, or to the people.”

That’s pretty clear, yes? It means the states have power not reserved by the Constitution for the federal government.

OK, then came the 14th Amendment, ratified not long after the Civil War. It’s much lengthier and covers a lot of issues relating to rights of citizenship. But at the end of Section 1, it states that no state “shall deprive any person of life, liberty or property without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

Granted, the nine men and women of the nation’s highest court know a lot more about the law and the Constitution than I do, but my reading of the issue at hand is pretty clear. I believe the 14th Amendment trumps the 10th.

The issue as I see it is whether gay couples have the same right to marry as heterosexual couples. The Constitution, as federal judges have been ruling already, says they do. The Constitution lays out clearly that citizens shall not be deprived of “equal protection.” If that language in the 14th Amendment didn’t exist, I suppose you could argue that states — such as Texas — have the legal standing to ban same-sex marriage.

I do believe, though, that the language contained within the 14th Amendment makes it impossible for states to enact laws that override the Constitution.

There well may be some nuance that I’m missing. If it’s buried deep inside the language of the nation’s founding document, I’m sure the justices will find it.

I just don’t see how they can look past the clear and explicit language contained in the equal protection clause.

 

legal news

Feds aren't seeking to create 'moral standard'

Here’s a shocker: The Texas Legislature and its Republican super-majority in the House of Representatives is likely to consider legislation that blocks any effort to lift the state’s ban on same-sex marriage.

OK, it’s not a shocker. I was kidding.

State Rep. Cecil Bell, R-Magnolia, has filed House Bill 623 that would prevent the federal courts or the Congress from legalizing same-sex marriage.

http://www.texastribune.org/2015/01/08/no-salaries-for-recognizing-gay-marriage-bill-says/

According to the Texas Tribune: “The federal government is trying to act to create moral standards, and that’s just not acceptable,” Bell said.

Let’s hold on for a moment.

I do not believe the feds are seeking to “create moral standards” with court rulings striking down same-sex marriage laws in several states. The impetus behind the rulings — in every instance — has been the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment, which grants full rights of citizenship to every American citizen. Full rights of citizenship means that every American is guaranteed “equal protection” under the law.

That means, quite clearly, that if you love someone who happens to be of the same sex as you, the Constitution gives you the right — as a citizen — to marry that individual, just as any citizen is able to marry someone of the opposite gender.

The Tribune reports: “The bill also requires state courts to dismiss legal actions that challenge a provision of the bill and award legal costs and attorney fees to the defendants. Citing the 11th Amendment, which gives states sovereign immunity, the bill also says the state isn’t subject to a lawsuit for complying with the act — regardless of a contradictory federal ruling.”

But wait, says a gay-rights group. Again, from the Tribune: “Daniel Williams, a legislative specialist for the gay rights group Equality Texas, said the bill would go against legal precedent.

“’This bill is retreading very well-established precedent here. In 1869, the U.S. Supreme Court decided in Texas v. White that no, Texas does may not ignore federal law whenever it wants,’ Williams said. ‘Beyond it ignoring federal law, it would actually punish state employees who follow the law.’”

The setting of a “moral standard” is not at issue here. Adhering to federal law is what’s at stake.

national news, political news, State news

Gay marriage on its way … to Texas?

Do you ever feel as though you’re swimming against a tide that keeps getting stronger while it sucks the energy out of your efforts to fight it?

That’s how I’m feeling with this gay marriage issue.

I’m still grappling with the notion that it’s all right for people of the same sex to marry each other. I’m a traditionalist and my own values make it hard for me to embrace the idea of same-sex marriage as being the same as the marriage I have enjoyed for the past 43-plus years.

OK, I’ve laid down that marker.

I also understand what the law says, what’s in the U.S. Constitution and how all Americans are guaranteed equal protection under the law. Thus, it appears that states’ bans on gay marriage appear doomed.

That notion I will accept.

Florida has just begun allowing same-sex couples to marry. Federal judges — those damn “unelected judges,” in the eyes of conservatives — keep overturning state bans on same-sex marriage. A federal judge in Texas has ruled that our state’s ban — written into the Texas Constitution — violates the federal Constitution’s equal protection clause stated in the 14th Amendment. It grants full rights of citizenship to anyone born in the United States with zero regard to that people’s sexual orientation.

All of this makes perfect sense to me. If the states are governed by a federal framework — the Constitution — then the states are obligated to obey the rules set down within that framework.

Does any of this mean that all Americans must embrace the idea of same-sex partners getting married? Honestly, no.

All it means to me is that the law is the law and that states cannot impose their own laws that supersede the Constitution of the United States of America.

That includes bans on same-sex marriage.

I can feel that tide of political and cultural change getting stronger all the time.

 

Uncategorized

Simple questions need simple answers

Greg Abbott apparently fielded a question that didn’t require a lot of verbal nimbleness.

However, the Republican nominee for Texas governor tried to get cute with his response and in the process had some folks scratching their heads over what he really meant.

http://dallasmorningviewsblog.dallasnews.com/2014/10/does-anyone-really-believe-that-greg-abbott-opposes-interracial-marriage.html/

The question came from the San Antonio Express-News editorial board, according to Dallas Morning News blogger Jim Mitchell: Would the state attorney general have defended a state ban against interracial marriage?

Abbott has said that as AG, it is his duty to defend state laws, such as the law that bans same-sex marriage. So the Express-News sought to broaden the context just a little by posing a hypothetical question about interracial marriage.

Abbott fluffed the answer, according to Mitchell. Here’s how Mitchell reported it: “Rather than say ‘no I would not defend a ban on interracial marriage,’  he slipped into an accurate, but weak response: ‘And all I can do is deal with the issues that are before me… the job of attorney general is to represent and defend in court the laws of their client, which is  the state Legislature, unless and until, a court strikes it down.’”

The result, said Mitchell, was to create questions about whether Abbott somehow believes such a ban is worth defending, that he’s might actual favor such a prohibition.

Abbott’s arguments against same-sex marriage also pose some problems for the GOP nominee. He said something recently about marriage needing to produce children. Obviously, two people of the same gender cannot do such a thing. Here’s Mitchell’s take: “I’ve taken Abbott to task for his defense of the same-sex ban and the prime reason cited in court filings — the supposed state interest in procreation. Regardless of his personal thoughts, the procreation argument is just amazingly weak.”

Come on, Mr. Attorney General. When you get asked a straightforward question, respond with a straightforward answer.

Keep it simple.

national news, political news, State news

Cruz now favors activist federal government

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Ted Cruz keeps giving me — and others — so much grist for commentary.

The freshman Texas Republican U.S. senator now has this doozy of an idea. Let’s amend the U.S. Constitution to prevent states from overturning bans on same-sex marriage.

http://www.texastribune.org/2014/10/06/cruz-amend-us-constitution-preserve-marriage-bans/

This comes from a tea party darling, someone who’s railed time and again during his still-brief time in the Senate over federal government overreach into states’ business.

Not so, however, when it comes to one more issue that now needs to become part of the federal Constitution.

Oh, Ted. Keep delivering these hits. Please.

Cruz got angry at the U.S. Supreme Court over its refusal to hear some state cases involving the overturning of bans on gay marriage. He called it a matter of gross judicial activism. Indeed, as a learned friend of mine noted, the high court exercised “judicial restraint” in refusing to hear these cases.

That won’t deter the runaway freight train aka Ted Cruz.

He’s going to try to get Congress to approve a constitutional amendment that places federal authority over state authority.

I swear I understood Cruz was a champion of states’ rights. What happened?

Oh, I almost forgot. Cruz wants to run for president in 2016 and he’s got to appease that right-wing GOP “base.”

legal news, national news

Where's the threat to 'traditional marriage'?

So …

The Supreme Court has refused to review challenges to same-sex marriage laws in several states. “Marriage equality” proponents have proclaimed that as a victory, that it shows the highest court in the nation is comfortable with states allowing same-sex unions.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/supreme-court-declines-to-review-same-sex-marriage-cases/ar-BB7QehZ

I’ve commented already today on the shifting tide in favor of same-sex marriage.

No doubt we’re going to hear commentary from those who perceive some “threat” to traditional marriage by the expansion of the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples.

Allow me this brief look at the so-called threat.

There isn’t any.

I’ve stated already that my wife and I — and I feel comfortable speaking for her on this matter — are quite comfortable with our own union. We sealed it 43 years ago and we’re going quite strong. At no point ever in all those years have we felt threatened by those who choose to bond with others of the same sex. The gay couples we have known have their own lives and we have ours. End of story.

No, the threat to traditional marriage covers a lot more ground than this single issue. It rests with society at large, with laws that make it arguably too easy for couples to end marriages.

My own values are deeply held and are personal in the extreme. They won’t be shaken loose by those of different orientations.

I could bet real American money that I am not alone in believing that same-sex unions pose zero threat by themselves to “traditional marriage.”

legal news, political news, State news

Same-sex marriage tide has turned

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The currents have turned in favor of same-sex marriage.

Who knows? It well might be accepted as part of the “new normal” in this country, if the courts continue to have their way.

http://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/texas/article/State-by-state-look-at-gay-marriage-bans-5804228.php

One by one, state bans on same-sex marriage are falling victim to that little ol’ provision in the U.S. Constitution that protects people’s “equal protection of the laws.”

It’s in the 14th Amendment. It’s one small clause in one small sentence. It resonates loudly in appellate courtrooms all across the country.

Even the U.S. Supreme Court — that bastion of “strict construction” arguments of the U.S. Constitution — has ruled that the federal government must recognized state-sanctioned same-sex marriage. Texas has joined the parade of states that are awaiting final disposition of this argument.

I remain on the fence on this issue. The term “marriage,” to me at least, carries a traditional connotation in that it involves the union of a man and a woman.

Having noted that, I am not going to condemn anyone who wants to marry someone of the same sex. It’s not my call to determine who people should love. I’ll let the government sort it out. I’ll continue to live my traditional life in marriage to a woman I married 43 years ago. And I will let others live as they choose.

Furthermore, none of these court rulings puts my marriage in any danger. It will survive quite nicely and I am sure it will continue to grow and flourish without any threat from whatever the courts continue to rule.

Tradition and belief systems aside, though, the Constitution does appear to stand in favor of all Americans regardless of their orientation. If it says that all Americans must not be deprived “equal protection” under the law, that it means all Americans. There’s not a word in that clause that mentions their sexual orientation.

“All” means all, yes?