Box Turtle Bulletin
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobby“Now you must raise your children up in a world where that union of man and box turtle is on the same legal footing as man and wife…”
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobbyJanuary 3rd, 2014
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor should ignore Utah’s request for a temporary ban on gay marriages, attorneys representing gay couples argued in a Friday morning filing.
“Forcing same-sex couples and their families to wait and hope for the best during the pendency of this appeal imposes an intolerable and dehumanizing burden that no family should have to endure,” James Magleby and Peggy Tomsic, attorneys at Magleyby and Greenwood argued in the filing.
It isn’t certain when Sotomayor will respond or if she will instead take the stay request to the full court.
One of the reasons that the State of Utah gave for seeking the stay (and one of their arguments as to why they assert they would win on appeal) is that same-sex marriage is one of them there newfangled gadgets and not “deeply rooted in the nation’s history and tradition.” Which reminds me of this paraphrase of Nathaniel Hawthorne:
Tradition sometimes brings down truth that history has let slip, but is oftener the wild babble of the time, such as was formerly spoken at the fireside and now congeals in websites.
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Ben In Oakland
January 3rd, 2014
There are three major problems with the state’s “appeal”, and none of them ought to appeal to anyone with a lick of sense.
One, they quote the regnerus study, a study that has been roundly criticized for being a piece of crap, and admitted by its own author that he didn’t study what the piece of crap claimed to study.
Second, Is there ANY legal basis for denying marriage to adults based upon their perceived/imaginary inability to be parents? The greatest irony is that we don’t even deny PARENTHOOD to people based upon something as stupid as that. Gay people are ipso facto disqualified, but being poor, black, or drug addicted are irrelevant to both the ability to marry and the ability to parent. Yet a poor young black man, even if his papa ain’t a rolling stone, is far more likely to be in jail than to be in college.
And third, this is from the counter motion to the state’s appeal, probably the best part: “Applicants’ argument that this Court should issue a stay because same-sex couples and their children may suffer “dignitary and financial losses from the invalidation of their marriages,†cuts entirely the other way. Applicants cannot simultaneously concede that being stripped of one’s marital status causes profound, irreparable harm and urge the Court to inflict that very injury on the married Respondents and other married same-sex couples.”
not to mention, inflicting injuries on gay people in the first place with the anti-marriage laws, and then shedding copious crocodile tears for trying to harm than again, all without a lick of harm proved to heterosexual marriage, or any indication that they are defending it, which were the state’s main arguments.
$2 million will pay some republican law firm who are dear friends of the governor very well for this swill.
Timothy Kincaid
January 3rd, 2014
Ben,
To touch on something you said:
You can have fathered six children with six different women and provided for none, and you can marry.
You can have lost any visitation rights from the children you have, and you can marry.
You can be under arrest for the molestation of sixteen children, and you can marry.
You can be in jail for beating your own children to death, and you can marry.
Ah but gay couples? No, Regnarus says that you make bad parents so you cannot marry!
Ben In Oakland
January 3rd, 2014
I know! Isn’t it amazing?
Ben In Oakland
January 3rd, 2014
And they tell us they are only protecting marriage and defending the children. no animus involved.
Nope. Nosiree.
Sir Andrew
January 3rd, 2014
Their argument that gay marriage should be stopped because straight people make better parents than gay is so unrelated to the question that it makes one laugh. Ignoring for the moment the fact that the claim is provably and demonstrably wrong, one wonders how they square this argument with the actuality.
Banning gay marriage does not stop gay couples from having and rearing children. Nor does it deal with single straight parent families. Is their argument that all children in non-male/female parenting situations should be taken and given to male/female couples?
None of this makes sense when I hear it. I wonder why they think it will suddenly make sense to a Supreme Court Justice.
Paul Douglas
January 3rd, 2014
Oh it will make perfect sense to Scalia, Alito and Uncle Clarence, have no fear.
Richard Rush
January 4th, 2014
It will never satisfy them if we merely pass a parental fitness test. We must pass it with flying colors. I guess that’s why God had the foresight to give us the rainbow flag.
jerry
January 4th, 2014
Sir Andrew, I can think of three Supreme Court Justices who would not only grant the stay but reverse the decision of the 10th. I think it’s possible that there could be two more and that worries me.
Mark F.
January 4th, 2014
I think it is rather routine to stay decisions of this sort pending appeal, so I was surprised at the 10th Circuit Court’s refusal. The argument could be made that the Defendant’s have a good chance of success on appeal and therefore it would be unfair to same sex couples to have them get married and then have the marriages annulled.
We almost certainly have 4 SCOTUS Justices who are against a Constitutional right to same sex marriage, Kennedy is on the fence and Kagan said there was no right to same sex marriage in her confirmation hearings.
Ryan
January 5th, 2014
Well, Kagan said that in 2009. Somehow I think she’s done some “evolving” herself by now. Just as before, the only vote truly in question is Kennedy.
cowboy
January 8th, 2014
Breaking News:
Utah State A.G. office:
What this means is everything about same-sex marriages in Utah is back to pre-December 20th.
The Sutherland Institute is pleased but the Utah chapter of the ALCU is none too happy.
Ben In Oakland
January 8th, 2014
Cowboy, since those marriages were legally valid when performed, and the state admitted they were legally valid, and no court has ruled otherwise, it might not be so simple. I smell a whole new slew of lawsuits.
cowboy
January 8th, 2014
I see a silver lining to this. It clearly demonstrates a certain amount of discrimination that can be used in our efforts for anti-discrimination laws in the next legislative session in 2 weeks from now.
And, it will be only a couple of months of “on hold” status until the 10th Circuit gives its go-ahead. (I’m certain they will.)
But then the State will keep all same-sex marriages “on hold” until the SCOTUS weighs in?
cowboy
January 8th, 2014
Plus, according to a conservative talk-show host on Mormon-owned KSL the respondents to the HELP-WANTED ad from the Utah State Attorney General has been rather low.
A dearth of lawyers who would get paid with some of the $2 million set aside for legal help?
That must mean something?
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