Posted on 05/16/2007 1:52:19 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The marriages of more than 170 gay couples from New York who wed in Massachusetts before last July are valid because New York had not yet explicitly banned same-sex marriages, a Massachusetts judge ruled.
Couples are barred from marrying in Massachusetts if their marriages would be prohibited in their home states. The New York Court of Appeals ruled against same-sex marriages on July 6, 2006.
The Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders had asked for clarification of the status of New York couples who married in Massachusetts before that ruling. Massachusetts became the first state in the country to allow gay marriage in May 2004.
Suffolk Superior Court Judge Thomas Connolly ruled last week that those early marriages are legally valid.
"Just being able to say without any qualifications - 'we're married' - it feels great," said Amy Zimmerman, a New York City resident who married Tanya Wexler in Somerville on May 19, 2004, the third day same-sex weddings were allowed in Massachusetts.
But Michael Long, who heads New York's Conservative Party, predicted Connolly's ruling will not hold up in New York if gay couples press for marriage rights there.
"It's wishful thinking by some homosexual couples that the interpretation of a particular judge will change their status," Long said. "The law in the state of New York is very clear - marriage is between a man and a woman."
Although the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court said in March 2006 that gay couples from states with no "express prohibition" of same-sex marriage could marry in Massachusetts, it was unclear at that time whether gay marriage was specifically banned in New York and Rhode Island.
Connolly ruled in September that gay couples from Rhode Island have the right to marry in Massachusetts because laws in their state do not expressly prohibit same-sex marriage. Whether Rhode Island honors those marriages is an unsettled issue; its Legislature has rejected same-sex marriage but its attorney general issued a nonbinding opinion this year advising his state to recognize those conducted in Massachusetts.
New York's Democratic Gov. Eliot Spitzer has proposed that gay marriage be legalized, but so far has failed to convince either the Republican-led state Senate or the Democratic-controlled state Assembly to do so.
Governor Eliot “Spit Sir” will be most pleased.
On another note: It was confirmed by these couples that gay sex is a real pain.......
When Massachusetts legalized gay marriage, they made it legal in all 50 States because the Constitution says it is.
Article IV, Section 1 Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.
That is why Bush should have pushed the Constitutional amendment when we had a Republican Congress. The first time someone takes their gay marriage license to Texas and then sues the State in federal Court because Texas refuses to recognize it, they are going to win.
Kind of like NY looking at a law saying that any professional team with NY in the name needs to be based in NY.
The NY Giants and NY Jets are based in NJ and thus not subject to NY state law!
As sick as this makes me to have to say, you are wrong. See post 5.
I am not so sure. I believe some gay couples from Mass have already tried that and been shot down in their states courts.
sorehead.
Try using the same logic when you take your sidearm and CCW permit issued in, say, Wyoming, into a gun free zone in Massachusetts.
Somebody let me know when just one of these gay couples separates and GETS A LEGAL DIVORCE, which entails paying real money to a lawyer and separating their lives LEGALLY, the same legal way that they wanted their lives joined.
I have yet to hear of a gay couple who wants more than the thrill of being able to throw their ‘marriage’ into the faces of the straight folks - they want that part of marriage but never will they insist on their rights to a legal divorce.
Betting that in a few years, if anyone cares to do the reseach, they will find multiple cases of gay bigamy, as the insistence for the ‘right to be legally married’ allows them to do just that - over and over - with nary a divorce in between.
Just a hunch. The one ‘married’ lesbian couple I actually heard about separating after being ‘married’ in Canada, have children jointly, and when asked about their separation, their spokesperson said they were ‘mutually separating’ but no mention of divorce.
And there will never be. They will just find other partners, haul off to Canada or to a state that allows gay marriage, and ignore the fact that a ‘legal’ marriage HAS to be dissolved in a ‘legal’ fashion, or it is just a farce.
Last Semester my PoliSci class was basically devoted to this subject. Under Full Faith and Credit a CCW Permit will hold up.
There is also precedence set against it such as Law Licenses, Medical License, etc. where each state requires you to be licensed in their state in order to practice. So it really depends on the judges at the appellant level. But the only way to insure that states do not have to recognize a gay marriage licenses is a Constitutional Amendment.
You are comparing apples to oranges. But under the US Constitution if the marriage is legal in one state, it is legal in all 49 other states.
That is why we must pass a Constitutional Amendment!!!!
This judge is REAAAALY streching matters.
IF the law is silent as to a such a fabricated item the it should only be narrowly construed.
I would submit these homsoexuals are ONLY married in massachusettes and NY does not recognize their fake marriage.
No court has ever held that the laws of one state govern behavior which occurs within another state over the host state’s objection.
You are absoluly correct.
Unfortunatly nobody is asking ANY of the candidates if they would push for the Federal Marriage Amendment.
McCain has openly come out FOR homosexual marriage (per vanity fair)
Guiliani has openly come out against the FMA and FOR “civil unions” which are just marriage without a diety.
And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.
Congress has already made such a law regarding the recognition of marriage laws such as this - it is the Defense of Marriage Act, which states:
"No State, territory, or possession of the United States, or Indian tribe, shall be required to give effect to any public act, record, or judicial proceeding of any other State, territory, possession, or tribe respecting a relationship between persons of the same sex that is treated as a marriage under the laws of such other State, territory, possession, or tribe, or a right or claim arising from such relationship."
Since the Constitution specifically give Congress the right to make such a law, I don't think we should start panicking just yet...
Article IV, Section 1 Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.
That means that a marriage license from Massachusetts in Texas is just as valid as marriage license from Texas in Massachusetts.
The US Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land, no State Law can ever trump the Constitution.
However, in the 1930's I believe, there was a case that went to the SC over marriages in Arkansas (I think it is the right state, I may be wrong) for age limits. The case basically said that just because Arkansas allows 14 year olds to marry and that is against the public policy of another state then Full faith and Credit does not apply.
But that case was not a political hot bed like gay marriage is so who knows how the courts would rule.
It will be an interesting argument. The future lawyer in me would like to see the fight, but, being a conservative Christian I would rather just see a Constitutional Amendment.
The judge didn't do that. The Massachusetts law specifies that out-of-state couples can't get a license for a gay marriage in Mass. if their state of residency prohibits gay marriage. NY and RI do not explicitly bar gay marriage, so those marriages are legal for purposes of Massachusetts law only. His ruling has no bearing on other states' laws nor on the constitutional question.
I believe that the default position is traditional marriage until another law trumps it.
No, but if you gamble in Nevada, you can't be arrested for it and have your winnings seized when you cross the state line into Arizona.
Interesting how the judge considers the confirmation of illegality by a court the same thing as making it illegal. He seems to have missed the part about how laws are made. When the NY court ruled against gay marriages, it wasn't changing the law.
Except that Massachussets law prohibitted it if the participants home state prohibbited it.
Perhaps, but you can be arrested if you attempt to continue gambling on the other side of the state line.
You have got to be kidding. This judge has no authority to rule on matters concerning another state.
That's not at all correct as pertains to this case. In this case, the legality of the marriage in Massachussets (per MA law) was dependent upon its legality if it had been held in NY. It was illegal in NY, and thus it was illegal in MA as well. If it was uillegal in both states (as it was), then that can't make it legal.
You said: There is also precedence set against it such as Law Licenses, Medical License, etc.
***
This is a question of status. I have seen some material on this, and it seems that this is one of the matters where states can make their own rules. For example, North Carolina doesn’t recgnize common law marriage. If you come from another state that does recognize it, you still are not married in NC. I am sure there will be a number of other posts on this subject, more articulate (and clean) than mine.
You are comparing apples to oranges again. Full faith and Credit applies to legal documents. Like your driver's license, if you have a driver's license from Texas and you are driving to California and you get pulled over in New Mexico, New Mexico has to honor your License to drive and you cannot be arrested for driving w/o a "New Mexico driver's license".
It also Applies to divorce decrees, marriage licenses, child custody, etc. It's not about the law, it's about the State Issued documents.
We Must pass a Constitutional amendment!!!!!!!!
Wow! so my Indiana concealed carry permit is required to be recognized in all 50 states. Cool!
But please keep in mind, I am not a lawyer...just a pre-law student so my knowledge of the law is from instruction not from my own interpretation and my Professor was a flaming liberal!
I already commented on that in this thread, I believe it will. But.... Your going to have to take it to the SC.
Yes, because then you're under another state's jurisdiction. The Full Faith and Credit clause was not meant to ensure that every state's laws would be the same.
Good luck to you in the law. I have been in practice nearly 19 years. Con law is something I almost never use in my practice, so only posting on these boards keeps me even a little up to speed.
As for the libs, I went to UNC Chapel Hill, which my close classmates and I referred to as a liberal bloodbath (bleeding hearts). We still found one or two conservative professors, but they were hard to find.
The best prospects for now is to pass such an amendment in as many states as possible and challenge the gay lobby head on. At least such challenges will help awaken the sheeple.
It also applies to agreements like contracts; if you buy a car from me in Georgia and then drive it to Alabama, I can't follow you to Alabama and ask for my car back because the sale was invalid under some provision of Alabama law.
That's a part of the opinion called obiter dicta, or more commonly just dicta. They provide insight into the justice's thinking and legal philosophy, but don't have the force of precedent (and in this case, it was a dissent, so it wouldn't have provided binding precedent anyway).
Scalia's opinion that Lawrence opens the door to gay marriage is simply his opinion -- it deserves respect as the opinion of a smart legal scholar and the best writer on the Court, but it carries no force of law.
Under the clause underlined above, the Defense of Marriage Act would qualify to protect states from being forced to recognize marriages that violate their laws.
It's not unprecedented outside other areas, either: I know that here in New York, if you earn any driving privileges in another state prior to age 16, New York State won't recognize them in any way, shape or form.
Granted, but it was the other opinions I'm more worried about. In one of the majority opinions ( I don't remember which, (sorry, I'm at home and it's too late for research))one of the majority judges wrote that they acknowledged that the minority, Scalia, said that it opened the door for other things between consenting adults such as incest, but they agreed that it would not include things like that. But says who??? Them??? If they decided that the state had no business in the bedrooms of consenting adults then where do they get the authority to pick and choose which sexual acts are OK and which are not???
Again, I defer to those who actually practice law with the complete knowledge that the problem with "jail house lawyers" is that if they know so damn much about the law then why are they in jail.
I work as an investigator for a large law firm, I start these arguments all the time between the associates, I'm surprised I haven't got fired yet, but they do encourage me.
Read/pingout tomorrow. Unless you get to it first.
I was going to do a buncha pinging today but did hours of gardening in the hot sun and that was it for today.
But ultimately I believe it is going to come down to a SC ruling and we already know how this court will rule (we hope). The only real way to protect marriage is to pass a Constitutional Amendment and Bush and the last Congress blew it.
There must be a reason why no one has challenged it yet (ACLU), it may just be because they know they will lose against this court and don't want to risk having a future court turn it away because it has already been ruled on. Or, they may be afraid that Full Faith and Credit will open up a big can of worms from us gun owners over our CCW permits.
Says the court that is actually called upon to rule on that question at some future point. The dicta are opinions, more impressive but of no greater legal weight than yours or mine.
Again, I defer to those who actually practice law with the complete knowledge that the problem with "jail house lawyers" is that if they know so damn much about the law then why are they in jail.
My favorite parable is that of the goats and the fence. For years, my father kept goats -- he had quarter horses, and the goats were good at eating down the underbrush and clearing more land for grazing. We sank the posts deep and strong, double-braced the wire, and the gate was impenetrable, and yet the goats kept managing to get over, under and through.
Were the goats smarter than us? Not hardly. But while we were thinking about the fence, they were thinking about the fence. When Dad was thinking about his job, his family, his bills, the leak in the roof, they were thinking about the fence. When I was thinking about my Trig exam, my college applications, and whether I should ask Melissa to the prom, they were thinking about the fence. When were asleep and dreaming, they were sleeping and dreaming about the fence.
A practicing member of the bar has dozens of cases at a time, hundreds over a career. A jailhouse lawyer has only one. Most convicts are stupid, but not all -- and trust me, you will never know a pro se petitioner's case better than he does. Other than avoiding getting shanked in the yard, it is his only concern.
I work as an investigator for a large law firm, I start these arguments all the time between the associates, I'm surprised I haven't got fired yet, but they do encourage me.
As well they should. If you want to be a lawyer, you need to be able to see every question from all sides -- you're better prepared to fight an opposing argument if you see it coming. If you're strictly pay-for-play, then you can take any client, agree or not. If you take one side, you're ready to fight the other side's argument, because you've seen it from the inside.
FF&C doesn’t apply when another state’s law explicitly states the opposite or is against the public policy of that state. If FF&C always meant that every state had to recognize and abide by the laws of another state, there would be no difference in any state laws. Another FReeper already mentioned gun laws, which are a good example.
This is just a way to get around their own law. It’s only legal if it’s legal in the other state. It never was legal in NY. The NY ruling made that clear. Just because people challenged it did not make the law ambiguous. If Son of Sam challenges the murder laws in NY do they become ambiguous? Can everyone then run out and murder whomever they please because the laws are ambiguous?
And what level of ‘now it’s legal’ is necessary? If the state has no constitutional amendment against it, it’s legal? If the governor of the state has not issued a proclamation against it, it’s legal? It the people have not voted against it, it’s legal? If the legislature has not passed anything against it, it’s legal? If all these situations are not in effect in a state to prohibit homosexual marriage, it’s legal?
Romney really did not realize what can of worms he was opening when he decided not to fight the Massachusetts Supreme Court.
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