Free Republic

When U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia handed down a scathing dissent in United States v. Windsor — the case in which the high court deemed the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional — he warned of the domino effect it would have on state bans on gay marriage. His prediction came true on Friday, when U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby ruled that Utah's 2004 ban on gay marriage was unconstitutional. And Shelby even made note of Scalia's dissent at points in his ruling, citing it as part of his reasoning in striking down the Utah law. Scalia warned that...

Judge Robert J. Shelby, whom President Barack Obama appointed to the U.S. District Court in Utah last year, issued an opinion on Friday declaring that a right to same-sex marriage is "deeply rooted in the nation’s history and implicit in the concept of ordered liberty."

Starting Monday, Illinois same-sex couples facing terminal illness can marry — nearly six months ahead of the state’s new marriage equality law taking effect, a federal judge in Chicago ruled. U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman has ordered the Cook County Clerk’s office to immediately issue marriage licenses to all Illinois same-sex couples who can provide a doctor’s declaration stating that one or both of them has a life-threatening illness that would prevent them from marrying after the marriage equality law takes effect June 1. “When you have a terminal illness, every day is significant,” Camilla Taylor, Marriage Project...