Montana committee narrowly defeats removal of marriage ban language

Timothy Kincaid

February 5th, 2015

In November 2014, federal courts ruled that Montana’s ten year old constitutional ban on same-sex marriage violates the US Constitution. Marriage equality has been in place since.

Montana’s constitutional ban (along with statutory bans) on same-sex marriage remains on the books. Depending on how the Supreme Court rules in June, it is possible (though unlikely) that the marriage ban could be reinstated.

However, some Montana legislators decided to preempt the Supreme Court, and remove the ban from the civil code. This likely has no legal impact on the state constitution, but could serve as a symbolic gesture of support for equality.

House Bill 282 was authored by Bryce Bennett (D – Missoula) and today the Judiciary Committee voted on whether to bring it to the full floor. By a tied vote of ten to ten, the Judiciary Committee tabled the bill. It will not go to the full house at this time.

I do not yet have the vote breakdown. However, there were six Democrats on the Judiciary Committee and fourteen Republicans, which indicates that there was significant bipartisan support.

Richard Rush

February 6th, 2015

We may be expecting too much too soon. As of April, 2014, twelve of the fourteen states that still had anti-sodomy laws at the time of the Lawrence v. Texas decision in 2003, still have them on the books. To Montana’s credit, they were one of the two states to remove them since Lawrence (although they would deserve more credit if they had removed them prior to Lawrence).

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/21/anti-sodomy-laws_n_5187895.html

Eric Payne

February 6th, 2015

Further commenting on Richard Rush’s observation, not only do several states still have sodomy laws on the books, there are some states in which arrests are still being made: I personally spoke with a Virginia police officer two years ago, following a lead I received in e-mail correspondence (a friend of a gay man I know was arrested in Virginia Beach), I was told: “(We) make arrests enforcing the laws on the books. If that law’s been overturned, the judge lets them loose.”

And on July 28, 2013, it was reported by USA Today:

An East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff’s Office task force arrested at least 12 men since 2011 under a sodomy law invalidated a decade ago the U.S. Supreme Court, a newspaper reported Sunday…

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/07/28/louisiana-sodomy-arrests/2595071/

Priya Lynn

February 6th, 2015

Eric, I would think those men would have an open and shut case suing the sheriff’s office for harrasment or false arrest.

Eric Payne

February 7th, 2015

Priya… you’d think so, but no.

When one of the men, later, filed suit against that Sheriff and the state, it was dismissed. That judge ruled there were no grounds for the suit because the man wasn’t actually prosecuted for sodomy, which would have been a violation of his constitutional rights. The fact he wasn’t prosecuted actually, in this judge’s mind, enforced that the criminal justice system works. The man was arrested for suspicion of a crime, but the prosecution ended because there had been no crime. That’s what police are supposed to do.

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