SCOTUS, Learned Body or Kindergarteners?
Excerpt: In a telling moment at Tuesday’s Supreme Court arguments over same-sex marriage, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. suggested that he may have found a way to cast a vote in favor of the gay and lesbian couples in the case.
“I’m not sure it’s necessary to get into sexual orientation to resolve this case,” he said. “I mean, if Sue loves Joe and Tom loves Joe, Sue can marry him and Tom can’t. And the difference is based upon their different sex. Why isn't that a straightforward question of sexual discrimination?”...
Professor Koppelman and other scholars filed a brief, urging the court to strike down the four same-sex marriage bans before it, on sex-discrimination grounds.
“If Ann is permitted to marry Bob, but Charles may not marry Bob,” it said, “then Charles is being discriminated against on the basis of sex.”...
A basic premise of Chief Justice Roberts’s question was that the issue before the court is not “gay marriage.” Same-sex marriage bans, after all, do not prohibit gay people from getting married. A gay man, for instance, is free to marry a lesbian in all 50 states. What same-sex marriage bans do is bar people of the same sex, gay or straight, from getting married.
“I’m not sure it’s necessary to get into sexual orientation to resolve this case,” he said. “I mean, if Sue loves Joe and Tom loves Joe, Sue can marry him and Tom can’t. And the difference is based upon their different sex. Why isn't that a straightforward question of sexual discrimination?”...
Professor Koppelman and other scholars filed a brief, urging the court to strike down the four same-sex marriage bans before it, on sex-discrimination grounds.
“If Ann is permitted to marry Bob, but Charles may not marry Bob,” it said, “then Charles is being discriminated against on the basis of sex.”...
A basic premise of Chief Justice Roberts’s question was that the issue before the court is not “gay marriage.” Same-sex marriage bans, after all, do not prohibit gay people from getting married. A gay man, for instance, is free to marry a lesbian in all 50 states. What same-sex marriage bans do is bar people of the same sex, gay or straight, from getting married.
More Here: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/3
SAY WHAT? Is it just I who feels as though these (SCOTUS) arguments appear, childlike? (Almost to the point that little kindergarteners are arguing the laws that we must all obey throughout our short lives) No, it can't possibly be just me, after all, isn't this the body of supposedly learned human beings who gave us the unseemly “Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and the rise of super PACs” laws, therefore, some of their “reasoning’s have appeard a bit, bat-shit-crazy, before?
If they could rule on a law that in actuality can gut democracy allowing the rich to choose, who can and who cannot lead this nation… (in the wealthy schemer’s favor) then assuredly they can command who we can and who we cannot (as in one human being) be allowed to legally marry (with all the legal benefits that marriage affords). Not only Bat-Shit-Crazy but also cruel.
Federal Rights and Protections Granted to Married Couples
There are 1,138 benefits, rights and protections provided on the basis of marital status in Federal law. In June 2013, the Supreme Court’s decision inU.S. v. Windsor struck down part of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which excluded same-sex married couples from recognition for all federal benefits and programs [1]. Because of this ruling, same-sex married couples across the country have been recognized for federal purposes for the first time. However, the persistent patchwork of state marriage laws continues to stand in the way of many couples fully accessing the federal benefits they have earned including Social Security and Veterans Benefits.
posted by thinkingblue at 10:49 AM
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