Posted on 01/17/2015 3:22:48 PM PST by NYer
Washington, D.C., January 17, 2015 (Zenit.org) | 192 hits
The U. S. Supreme Court granted a request Friday to review the November 2014 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit upholding the constitutionality of marriage laws in Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee.
The decision regarding same-sex marriage is expected in June or July.
Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Subcommittee for the Promotion and Defense of Marriage, responded to the Court’s action, saying, “A decision by the Supreme Court on whether a state may define marriage as the union of one man and one woman may be the most significant Court decision since the Court’s tragic 1973 Roe v. Wade decision making abortion a constitutional right.”
The anniversary of that decision is next week, Jan. 22, and will be marked by the annual March for Life in D.C., as well as the West Coast Walk for Life.
Pope Francis just today spoke against a redefinition of marriage. At a meeting with families in Manila, he said: "While all too many people live in dire poverty, others are caught up in materialism and lifestyles which are destructive of family life and the most basic demands of Christian morality. This is the ideological colonization. The family is also threatened by growing efforts on the part of some to redefine the very institution of marriage, by relativism, by the culture of the ephemeral, by a lack of openness to life."
Archbishop Cordileone also noted, “It’s hard to imagine how the essential meaning of marriage as between the two sexes, understood in our nation for over 200 years, and consistent with every society throughout all of human history, could be declared illegal. To those arguing for a constitutional redefinition of marriage, one must ask: when did the Constitution suddenly mandate a novel and unfounded definition of marriage? To ask such a question is not a judgment on anyone. It is a matter of justice and truth. The central issue at stake is: what is marriage? The answer is: a bond which unites a man and a woman to each other and to any children who come from their union. Only a man and a woman can unite their bodies in a way that creates a new human being. Marriage is thus a unique and beautiful reality which a society respects to its benefit or ignores to its peril.”
Archbishop Cordileone added, “Let us pray that the Supreme Court will be guided by right reason and render a true and just decision upholding the constitutionality of states to respect the institution of marriage as the union of one man and one woman.”
The Supreme Court is expected to hear oral arguments in the coming months.
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14 States Ban Same-Sex Marriage
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13 | by Constitutional Amendment and State Law Alabama (2006, 1998), Arkansas (2004, 1997), Georgia (2004, 1996), Kentucky (2004, 1998), Louisiana (2004, 1999), Michigan (2004, 1996), Mississippi (2004, 1997), Missouri (2004, 1996), North Dakota (2004, 1997), Ohio (2004, 2004), South Dakota (2006, 1996), Tennessee (2006, 1996), Texas (2005, 1997) |
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“Not at all. They’ll simply write in “except for those already married under the previous erroneous rules” and granfather ‘em all in.”
Doesn’t seem to me that that would work... What if the state decided it wasn’t going to change it’s law?
Exactly right. And therefore they will be merely clarifying a tax-and-benefits legal definition.
What really needs to happen is that this administratively acknowledged contractual agreement needs to be called something other than "marriage" for everybody. And the word "marriage" has to go back to where it came from: a joining acknowledged by a spiritual tradition between two people and God, based on love - and completely outside of government jurisdiction.
There! I think that’s a more precise question.
With all due respect to Archbishop Cordileone, he needs to get up to speed on 10th Amendment powers versus 14th Amendment protect rights. From a related thread, please consider the following.
As a consequence of widespread ignorance of 10th Amendment-protected state powers versus constitutionally non-enumerated rights, the pro-gay marriage movement is wrongly getting away with shoving constitutionally unprotected gay marriage down everybody’s throats with a PC interpretation of the 14th Amendment’s (14A) Equal Protections Clause (EPC).
More specifically, activist judges are wrongly subjectively reading the so-called “right” to gay marriage into the EPC. But by doing so they are wrongly ignoring that the Supreme Court has historically clarified that 14A added no new protections to the Constitution. With respect to constitutional rights, it was intended only to strengthen only those rights expressly amended to the Constitution by the states.
“3. The right of suffrage was not necessarily one of the privileges or immunities of citizenship before the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, and that amendment does not add to these privileges and immunities. It simply furnishes additional guaranty for the protection of such as the citizen already had [emphasis added].” —Minor v. Happersett, 1874.
In fact, the Supreme Court was likely basing its clarification of the scope of 14A on the official clarification of 14A by John Bingham, the main of Section 1 of 14A where the EPC is found.
“Mr. Speaker, this House may safely follow the example of the makers of the Constitution and the builders of the Republic, by passing laws for enforcing all the privileges and immunities of the United States as guaranteed by the amended Constitution and expressly enumerated in the Constitution [emphasis added].” — Congressional Globe, House of Representatives, 42nd Congress, 1st Session. (See lower half of third column.)
So in order for the courts to apply the so-called “right” to gay marriage to the states via 14A, the states would have already had to amend the Constitution to expressly protect gay marriage as a right, imo, which they have never done. So activist justices and judges don’t have any constitutionally enumerated gay rights protections that they can apply to the states.
Again, special interest groups are getting away with using judicial activism to shove their agendas down people’s throats because nobody knows the Constitution and its history anymore.
It buzz-word used to be "tolerance," implying "reluctantly put up with something you don't like."
Then it became "acceptance," implying "get over it."
We long ago passed that stage to finally end up with "celebration!"
As I said before, I'm not necessarily against the concept of gays marrying... it doesn't have any impact on me personally. But I am DEFINITELY against the issue being forced on States where the people have emphatically expressed their wills.
I doubt that, what recent rulings from this court can you point to that the liberal justices decided in accordance with the Shaira.
I agree, but I think it will be 6 to 3 as apposed to 5 to 4.
IMO Roberts will vote to uphold gay marriage.
Wouldn’t they have to remarry to be legal?
I believe this to be an excellent question. I know this: If two men in the State of Missouri can get the same marriage license as a man and a woman, then mine and my wife's Missouri license actually means nothing at all. It has no moral significance whatsoever.
I certainly have not felt my U.S. Dollars weakened by counterfeiters printing.
“I believe this to be an excellent question. I know this: If two men in the State of Missouri can get the same marriage license as a man and a woman, then mine and my wife’s Missouri license actually means nothing at all. It has no moral significance whatsoever.”
Understand, I’m not looking at this as a way to dissolve marriages, but a way to get the feds to back off. If this idea were adopted by states, we’d see an end to this nonsense I believe.
So, suppose the states who’s marriage laws were overturned by the courts took the position; Fine, our marriage laws are (were) unconstitutional. All state marriages must therefore be re-done under the new law, otherwise they are invalid. Imagine the uproar?
Most of the damage is done by counterfeits that bear some resemblance to the real thing. Homosexual “marriage” is the equivalent of Monopoly money.
Come on now. In what tangible ways have the validity or sanctity of the vows you exchanged with your wife been either weakened or strengthened because two men or two women that you probably don't even know got a license and got "married?"
I'm neither "pro" nor "anti" gay marriage. It is just irrelevant to my day-to-day life. I don't care if the voters or elected representatives of a state sanction it. I don't care if those same voters/representatives ban it.
The much bigger issue is the imposition of laws by an unelected judiciary which should not even have standing to decide the matter on behalf of a State's citizens.
People who divorce do not affect my personal relationship, either, but they certainly damage the institution of marriage. Marriage is an institution created for the protection of of the offspring of procreation; a child does best being raised by a mother and a father; it is in society’s interest to preserve the family.
Redefining marriage to include a man masturbating inside another man’s shit hole is insane, and forcing people to accept it as normal and healthy is evil.
will roberts pull a fast one like he did with obamacare? you just can’t trust any republicans anymore, like justice kennedy...
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