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Supreme Court Strikes Down Defense of Marriage Act
- 77887 13y agoThis is a really good thing. Not because I want everybody to marry their same gender [1] (each has the right to choose whom adult to love)], but rather because if they can get protection it means that we as a nation are moving in the right direction. It means we are becoming less judgmental and prejudiced for the sake of it. At least I hope so. [1] Personally though I think two woman having sex is kinky and quite erotic. Two guys, not so much but to each their own. I'm male by the way.
- danso 13y agoIt is constantly surprising to me how nearly-deterministic these votes are: each respective quartet of the court votes along what's seen as party lines, with Kennedy being the swing vote. Is it because the court really is that partisan, or because the technicalities and details in each case fall sharply along judicial philosophical lines? With life terms, it's not as if the justices need to vote a certain way to keep office.
- jansanchez 13y agoKennedy isn't always the swing vote. Sometimes Roberts is the swing vote.
- ceejayoz 13y agoRoberts has generally been considered the swing vote in cases where he needs to sort of fall-on-his-sword to preserve the non-partisan appearance of the court. The Obamacare ruling was one such case.
- dragonwriter 13y ago> Roberts has generally been considered the swing vote in cases where he needs to sort of fall-on-his-sword to preserve the non-partisan appearance of the court. I think this is a fairly strained interpretation to try to defend the idea that the court is iron-locked into the "liberal 4" + "conservative 4" + Kennedy divide (casting a different divide as Roberts trying to create an illusion about the court), and it falls down when you have high profile cases like the today's Hollingsworth v. Perry [1] where the majority is made up of Roberts, Scalia, Ginsberg, Breyer, and Kagan. [1] http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-144_8ok0.pdf http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-144_8ok0.pdf
- darkarmani 13y ago> Roberts has generally been considered the swing vote in cases where he needs to sort of fall-on-his-sword to preserve the non-partisan appearance of the court. Why? So he doesn't have a problem getting "re-elected?" I'm not sure why you think he is worried about the appearance of the court in that way.
- ceejayoz 13y agoThe Court's power lies in its perceived integrity and being above the fray of election-driven politics. If it appears partisan, it risks being marginalized. Remember, the Court gave itself the powers it has in Marbury vs. Madison, and has at times had folks like Jackson go "let them enforce it". If public opinion turns against the Court, politicians can as well.
- bhousel 13y agoHere is the text of the ruling. Supreme Court rulings always start out with a very readable syllabus which provides an overview of the ruling, recommended read: http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-307_g2bh.pdf http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-307_g2bh.pdf
- mjn 13y agoThe opinions themselves also tend to be quite readable. I try to at least skim most decisions as they come out, to have an idea of what the Supreme Court is doing and why (at least in its own words) it's doing so. One plus of reading both sides is that, with admitted exceptions, the reasoning of the side I disagree with is rarely as stupid as news reports make it sound. A lot of cases that get to the Supreme Court really do have plausible arguments on each side (the really obvious cases get decided lower down).
- kcorbitt 13y agoIndependent of whether this is a good decision, I thought that the Supreme Court's mandate was to decide whether a law violates the Constitution and little more. Doesn't this sort of judicial activism weaken the separation of powers, or is there a legitimate argument to be made that this law violated a constitutional right of gay couples? If there is, it doesn't seem that the court quotes it. “The federal statute is invalid, for no legitimate purpose overcomes the purpose and effect to disparage and injure those whom the State, by its marriage laws, sought to protect in personhood and dignity. By seeking to displace this protection and treating those persons as living in marriages less respected than others.”
- smirksirlot 13y agoFrom the opinion (http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-307_g2bh.pdf http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-307_g2bh.pdf) DOMA is unconstitutional as a deprivation of the equal liberty of persons that is protected by the Fifth Amendment. Pp. 13–26.
- kcorbitt 13y agoOk, that seems reasonable then.
- daraul 13y agoIt also appears that a large part of their ruling bases on the argument that DOMA is unconstitutional, because some states have gone to the effort of providing legal protections. In other words, DOMA was quite possibly constitutional right up until any state passed laws explicitly granting protections and rights to same-sex marriages. At that point however, it was in direct conflict with state laws and in an area where state laws prevail.
- cshenoy 13y ago"DOMA instructs all federal officials, and indeed all persons with whom same-sex couples interact, including their own children, that their marriage is less worthy than the marriages of others. The federal statute is invalid, for no legitimate purpose overcomes the purpose and effect to disparage and to injure those whom the State, by its marriage laws, sought to protect in personhood and dignity. By seeking to displace this protection and treating those persons as living in marriages less respected than others, the federal statute is in violation of the Fifth Amendment. This opinion and its holding are confined to those lawful marriages." Direct violation of the Fifth Amendment.
- rdl 13y agoCurious how this affects startups (along with overturning Prop 8), given the large population of gay people in tech. Presumably since you still need to get married in a SSM-supporting state, those states continue to win out. But federal benefits for immigration and incidental travel to non-SSM states would apply? The biggest tech centers are now all in SSM-supporting states; TX, VA, CO, IL, and NC seem like the most important holdouts. However, they only struck down the federal part, not the requirement that states recognize each other, so there's still a strong incentive to stay in an SSM-ok state even after marriage in an SSM state.
- tptacek 13y agoWe'll have same-sex marriage in Illinois by next year (we have civil unions now). Texas has a state constitutional amendment forbidding same-sex marriage. Virginia has a constitutional amendment banning both same-sex marriage and civil unions. The Illinois constitution, sanely, is silent on the issue; every year we get closer to passing a same-sex marriage law; it's a foregone conclusion.
- mjn 13y agoRe: Texas, the Texas constitution can be amended by a simple majority in a referendum, so the status of the SSM ban there is roughly the same as it was in California under Prop 8 (i.e. it can be overturned by 50% + 1 vote). In general it's nearly useless as a constitution, in the sense of a stable document setting forth some general principles. It's been amended 474 times! So it's more like a giant grab-bag of legislation. That's usually bad, but in this case good (if you support SSM), since it's not set in stone. The bigger issue isn't the structure of it being in the constitution, but the fact that supporters of SSM can't currently get within striking distance of 50% support in the state.
- peterwwillis 13y agoVirginia will probably be the last state to change. They deny any kind of protection for any kind of sexuality, identity, lifestyle or relationship other than a straight biologically-male man and a straight biologically-female woman getting married. If you want equal rights you end up moving to DC or Maryland. They're getting closer to transpeople getting protected status after a spate of individuals beaten nearly to death in public.
- anxrn 13y agoProp 8 goes down as well. http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-144_8ok0.pdf http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-144_8ok0.pdf
- mjn 13y agoIndirectly: the court held that ProtectMarriage.com, as a private group intervening in the case, didn't have standing to appeal a ruling striking down a state law, even if it's one that had been adopted through an initiative they had proposed. The sequence of events was: a federal court struck down a California law (passed via Proposition 8), and California, rather than appealing the decision, said "ok" and accepted the ruling. That leaves no remaining live controversy between the State and the federal court system, so nothing for an appeals court to hear (says today's decision). The decision was 5-4 but not strictly on ideological lines: 2 conservatives and 3 liberals in the majority, 3 conservatives and 1 liberal dissenting.
- dragonwriter 13y ago> The decision was 5-4 but not strictly on ideological lines: 2 conservatives and 3 liberals in the majority, 3 conservatives and 1 liberal dissenting. The assumption that the ideology of members of the court is unidimensional is not justified. "Not strictly according to the popularly perceived ideological factions of the court" is probably more supportable than "not strictly on ideological lines".
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- jackmaney 13y agoI'm elated. There might be some hope for this country, after all.
- crb 13y agoDoes this mean Glenn Greenwald can move back to the US now?
- hawkharris 13y agoUnfortunately, the Supreme Court did not strike down DOMA. Section 2 of the Act, which lets states refuse to recognize same-sex marriages established by other states, remains intact.
- smackfu 13y agoWere they even able to do that, since it wasn't part of the case in front of them?
- hawkharris 13y agoNo, that's a good point. SCOTUS evaluated only Section 3 of DOMA. They did not "strike down" the entire Act, as most reporters are suggesting.
- tomjen3 13y agoIt seems reasonable that that part would be struck down later, when some suit is brought over it, or the Equal Rights Amendment finally passes.
- btilly 13y agoThis discusses two rulings. DOMA and Proposition 8. I like the DOMA decision. I like the specific result of the Proposition 8 ruling, but do not like the way they got there. The issue with proposition 8 is that California lost, and then chose not to appeal. Lawyers for the group that passed proposition 8 then stepped in and took the case. Their argument basically was that if they were not allowed to do this, then any proposition passed by Californians that the government did not like the government could unpass by posting a lackluster defense and then not appealing it. The 9th circuit did not know whether they should grant standing. They remanded it to the California Supreme Court to decide that. The California Supreme Court said that under California law they did have standing. The 9th heard it. The Supreme Court has now disagreed. But I agree with that argument from the supporters of proposition 8. California gives voters the power to pass proposition that the state does not like. The state has now been handed a legal tool which undermines that in federal court. (I do not understand precedent well enough to know whether state courts will look to the Supreme Court or the California Supreme Court on this.)
- will_brown 13y agoYour proposition 8 concerns are very intriguing on a practical level, I would suggest the following: > California lost, by posting a lackluster defense. This is a case of Constitutional law review, where legal precedent must be presented to the Court (in other words there will be little if any dispute of material facts that will be decided by a fact finder, simply a ruling on law), it is not as if California could or the other side could withhold legal precedent from the Court (even if it is adverse to their position), in fact the lawyers could be sanctioned for knowingly withholding case law that is on point. Further, the Court performs its own research, review, and analysis of the existing case law. In my opinion there are far to many safeguards for these types of abuses or throwing of a case.
- btilly 13y agoThere is a world of difference between "put up an acceptable defense" and "defended to the limit of their ability". Opponents of the proposition pick a district court with a judge whose bias is known. The state puts up a defense, loses, and then does not appeal. There are, now, no safeguards blocking this sequence. Nobody can be sanctioned for it. And nobody aside from the disinterested state has standing to complain. The protection of the court is useless if you cannot get your day in court.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]