"the evidence shows that the movement of marriage away from a gendered ins ution and toward an ins ution free from state-mandated gender roles reflects an evolution in the understanding of gender rather than a change in marriage. The exclusion [of gays from marriage] exists as an artifact of a time when the genders were seen as having distinct roles in society and in marriage. That time has passed."
so your sweet wet hand also does it for you.
Did not need to know, but duly noted for future reference.
This is the first judge to take into consideration the Cons ution of the United States. This is not the first judge to make a very similar ruling to this based on state cons utions.
People in California cannot vote to overturn the Cons ution.
It is very, very, very simple.
SnC's not a big believer in the cons ution, so you should go about your argument differently, Manny.
U still jealous?
How about a hyphen dumb-ass.
Dumb is not a real word, therefore it does not requires the use of a hyphen any more than the word dumbass does, dumb .
Is being a dumb a choice for you?
really because the quote I just posted was about evolving a definition and not about the cons ution.
He said everybody is en led to get married.
requiring people to buy something or commit a crime isn't uncons utional but requiring a state to allow everyone in all situations to be able to marry is.
All because he disregarded all precedent and legal definitions of marriage. all because there are no real differences in genders. Good to see the libs talk about the founding fathers in a good light though, instead of calling them racist slave owners and not worthy of studying.
how does this, in any way, preclude a physiological process?
He didn't discard it so much as modify it, in the same way that judges didn't "discard" the legal definition of marriage by allowing interracial couples to marry.
U aroused?
Use a hyphen to join words to show that their meaning is linked in some way, dumb-ass.
He didn't disregard them. He just stated that the case wasn't strong enough to support the prosecution's side. "Appeal to tradition" is a logical fallacy, after all. Just because something was done a certain way in the past doesn't mean it's the correct way to do so now.
No got, i'm not. Put the down. I'm not interested in buttholing!!!!!!
I've been thinking about this question, and I think it's somewhat of a red herring. Does it matter if they "chose" to be gay or not? Is a biological factor necessary? I think the majority of people who answer honestly understand that gender preference is a part of who a person is, and that determination is not made consciously (as one would decide, for instance, what shirt to wear). Given that, it seems to be severely limiting the "pursuit of happiness" of gay people to not allow them to marry, as most people would see marriage as a strong way to pursue happiness.
Thats great that you posted something out of context but starting on page 117 of the ruling Judge Walker goes into meticulous detail on how the Equal Protection clause applies to this case.really because the quote I just posted was about evolving a definition and not about the cons ution.
He said everybody is en led to get married.
requiring people to buy something or commit a crime isn't uncons utional but requiring a state to allow everyone in all situations to be able to marry is.
All because he disregarded all precedent and legal definitions of marriage. all because there are no real differences in genders. Good to see the libs talk about the founding fathers in a good light though, instead of calling them racist slave owners and not worthy of studying.
I know that you're upset that what you want the cons ution to do isn't what it does but there are clearcut and well explained reasons to why that is the case in this situation.
By all means, explain to us why that is incorrect and why this will be overturned on appeal but please stick to this case.
"i was not at all surprised by the decision, given the way things unfolded in court," says the rev. Albert mohler, president of the southern baptist theological seminary in louisville, ky. "but after having read it, i am flabbergasted. Some say, 'where is the judicial activism you are so concerned about?' well, here it is right here. It's stunning." mohler tells time that walker's decision to define marriage in a way that includes gay couples "upends [millennia] of human experience and teaching." beyond changing marriage, he says, walker's decision goes further in that it both advances the "normalization of sexuality in america" and attempts to marginalize the role moral and religious beliefs can play in public life and in shaping the law of the land. "once you take morality out of it, you invite a rational challenge to all manner of other laws that seek to govern our conduct in this society."
You know what else upends millenia of human experience and teaching? Women suffrage. Is the Reverend looking to outlaw that?
Slavery involves millenia of human experience as well. Bring that back?
This quote says it all...Oh no! Rationality in law! Heaven forbid!"once you take morality out of it, you invite a rational challenge to all manner of other laws that seek to govern our conduct in this society"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_tradition
An appeal to tradition essentially makes two assumptions:
- The old way of thinking was proven correct when introduced. In actuality this may be false — the tradition might be entirely based on incorrect grounds.
- The past justifications for the tradition are still valid at present. In cases where cir stances have changed, this assumption may be false.
Heres a good article about how the SC might go.
By JAMES TARANTO
For the first time, a federal judge has held that the Cons ution mandates the legal redefinition of marriage. The California Supreme Court had reached a similar conclusion in 2008, and voters responded by amending the state cons ution via a ballot measure known as Proposition 8. If yesterday's ruling is eventually upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, it would mandate same-sex marriage nationwide. The Los Angeles Times describes the ruling in Perry v. Schwarzenegger:"California 'has no interest in differentiating between same-sex and opposite-sex unions,' U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker said in his 136-page ruling. . . .Previous court decisions have established that the ability to marry is a fundamental right that cannot be denied to people without a compelling rationale, Walker said. Proposition 8 violated that right and discriminated on the basis of both sex and sexual orientation in violation of the equal protection clause, he ruled."Walker stayed his ruling at least until Friday, when he will hold another hearing," the Times reports. Presumably it will be appealed to the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. That circuit is notoriously liberal, so one would expect the ruling would be likelier than not to be upheld, whereupon it would go to the Supreme Court.
If the Ninth Circuit upholds Walker's decision, the Supreme Court would almost certainly agree to hear an appeal, which would present the practical equivalent of a circuit split. Although this is, so far as we know, a novel question for U.S. appellate courts, such a ruling by the Ninth Circuit would establish same-sex marriage as a federal cons utional right within that court's jurisdiction (nine Western states plus a couple of insular territories), at a time when it is illegal in all but a handful of other states.
So how would the Supreme Court rule? In the sense that it is a speculative question, nobody really knows. The New York Times has an amusingly uninformative piece, the gist of which is that hardly anyone is willing to venture a prediction:Professor [Doug] NeJaime suggested the case might turn on the court's traditional swing vote, Anthony M. Kennedy, who has shaped decisions that struck down laws that discriminated against gay men and lesbians. The rational basis test used by Judge Walker is in line with the standard used by Justice Kennedy in cases like Lawrence v. Texas, which struck down a state sodomy law. By structuring an opinion that allows the Court to use the lower level of scrutiny, Judge Walker "is speaking to Justice Kennedy," he said.Professor Jesse H. Choper, a professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley, said that it was too soon to tell which way Justice Kennedy might come down on the issue of same-sex marriage. "I have no way of predicting how he'd come down on this, and I don't think he does, either, at this point."So it all comes down to that wild and crazy Justice Kennedy, and by gosh, you just never know what he's going to do!
We disagree, and we are prepared to offer up a prediction: When the Supreme Court takes up Perry v. Schwarzenegger--perhaps under the name Brown v. Perry or Whitman v. Perry--the justices will rule 5-4, in a decision written by Justice Kennedy, that there is a cons utional right to same-sex marriage.
This accepts the conventional assumption that the court's "liberal" and "conservative" wings will split predictably, 4-4. Yet while Kennedy cannot be pigeonholed in terms of "ideology," on this specific topic, he has been consistent in taking a very broad view of the rights of sexuals. He not only voted with the majority but wrote the majority opinions in two crucial cases: Romer v. Evans (1996) and Lawrence v. Texas (2003).
Romer struck down an amendment to the Colorado Cons ution that nullified state or local ordinances barring discrimination on the basis of " sexual, lesbian or bisexual orientation, conduct, practices or relationships." This provision, adopted by ballot initiative, violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment, Justice Kennedy wrote for the court:We must conclude that Amendment 2 classifies sexuals not to further a proper legislative end but to make them unequal to everyone else. This Colorado cannot do. A State cannot so deem a class of persons a stranger to its laws.In Lawrence, the court overturned a 1986 ruling and held that state laws criminalizing consensual sexual sodomy violated the cons utional right of privacy:In our tradition the State is not omnipresent in the home. And there are other spheres of our lives and existence, outside the home, where the State should not be a dominant presence. Freedom extends beyond spatial bounds. Liberty presumes an autonomy of self that includes freedom of thought, belief, expression, and certain intimate conduct. The instant case involves liberty of the person both in its spatial and more transcendent dimensions.In his Perry ruling, Judge Walker cited both Romer and Lawrence, arguing that their logic leads inexorably to a finding that same-sex marriage is a cons utional right. One jurist who agrees is Justice Antonin Scalia, who sharply dissented in Lawrence (citations omitted):Today's opinion dismantles the structure of cons utional law that has permitted a distinction to be made between heterosexual and sexual unions, insofar as formal recognition in marriage is concerned. If moral disapprobation of sexual conduct is "no legitimate state interest" for purposes of proscribing that conduct, and if, as the Court coos (casting aside all pretense of neutrality), "[w]hen sexuality finds overt expression in intimate conduct with another person, the conduct can be but one element in a personal bond that is more enduring," what justification could there possibly be for denying the benefits of marriage to sexual couples exercising "[t]he liberty protected by the Cons ution"? Surely not the encouragement of procreation, since the sterile and the elderly are allowed to marry. This case "does not involve" the issue of sexual marriage only if one entertains the belief that principle and logic have nothing to do with the decisions of this Court.Those who see Justice Kennedy's position in Perry as difficult to predict in effect entertain "the belief that principle and logic have nothing to do" with his decisions on the court. Is this belief justified?
In arguing that it is, one might point to Boy Scouts of America v. Dale , a 2000 case in which Kennedy joined Chief Justice William Rehnquist's 5-4 opinion striking down New Jersey's effort, pursuant to state antidiscrimination laws, to force the Boy Scouts to admit gays. But this was not in reality a decision against gay rights; it was a decision in favor of the scouts' rights to free expression and association. Kennedy's vote in this case showed him to be more principled than the court's liberals in his adherence to the First Amendment.
In Perry, however, the defendants are unlikely to be able to counter the plaintiffs' claims by arguing that forcing states to recognize same-sex marriage violates anyone's individual rights. Their appeals are to tradition, morality and the collective right of the people to self-government--worthy arguments, we would say, but ones Justice Kennedy has already rejected in Romer and Lawrence.
As to why we think Kennedy will write the decision, that's easy: The writing of opinions is assigned by the most senior justice in the majority, and Kennedy is now the court's most senior member outside the conservative bloc.
Some proponents of same-sex marriage have argued that bringing this litigation now was a foolish move. "The Supreme Court, they reasoned in early 2009, was not ready to declare a right to SSM," as Dale Capenter puts it at Volokh.com. "Premature litigation, they feared, would do more harm than good. . . . Well, nothing has changed." Purely as a bit of strategic analysis, this argument seems wrong to us.
Arguably "nothing has changed" since 2009 in terms of either side's prospects for success before the Supreme Court. But with four justices now in their 70s, including Kennedy, the makeup of the court is likely to change considerably over the next decade.
The direction of that change depends on who is president and on the partisan split in the Senate, which means that it is anyone's guess. Plausible scenarios for just three years from now range from President Obama and a modest Democratic majority to a conservative Republican president and a large GOP majority.
The former outcome would produce a court more amenable to same-sex marriage, but as a hedge against the latter--which, by the way, now seems likelier than it did in 2009--it was smart for the plaintiffs to move ahead when they did, so that they are almost assured of reaching the Supreme Court while Justice Kennedy is still there.
Just, um, wow. Good job reverend for further hurting the case of your side.
this is a great point. Then why not unions which allow the same benefits as marriage?
"Having both a male and a female parent does not increase the likelihood that a child will be well-adjusted."
I really disagree with this part of Judge Walker's ruling.
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