Defense of Marriage Act heads to US Supreme Court

[markomalley]

From the AP:

A battle over a federal law that defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman appears headed for the Supreme Court after an appeals court ruled Thursday that denying benefits to married gay couples is unconstitutional.

In a unanimous decision, the three-judge panel of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston said the 1996 law deprives gay couples of the rights and privileges granted to heterosexual couples.

The court didn't rule on the law's more politically combustible provision — that states without same-sex marriage cannot be forced to recognize gay unions performed in states where it's legal. It also wasn't asked to address whether gay couples have a constitutional right to marry.

Hopefully Chief Justice Roberts will not put this on the calendar until next April or May. (I say that because the Obama Administration has said that they will not defend DOMA).

Marriage is not a right. It is a licensed vocation. States are not required to recognize licenses issued by other states. As examples, think of physicians or attorneys (they must be licensed by the state in which they practice their professions...and that licensure does not cross state lines).

Sadly, though, this will have no good end, as the State has usurped the authority of the Church in the very process of licensing marriage (the collateral issues, such as tax exemptions, etc., are fallout from their usurpation).

As Pope Leo XIII said back in 1880 (Arcanum):

25. From the beginning of the world, indeed, it was divinely ordained that things instituted by God and by nature should be proved by us to be the more profitable and salutary the more they remain unchanged in their full integrity. For God, the Maker of all things, well knowing what was good for the institution and preservation of each of His creatures, so ordered them by His will and mind that each might adequately attain the end for which it was made. If the rashness or the wickedness of human agency venture to change or disturb that order of things which has been constituted with fullest foresight, then the designs of infinite wisdom and usefulness begin either to be hurtful or cease to be profitable, partly because through the change undergone they have lost their power of benefiting, and partly because God chooses to inflict punishment on the pride and audacity of man. Now, those who deny that marriage is holy, and who relegate it, stripped of all holiness, among the class of common secular things, uproot thereby the foundations of nature, not only resisting the designs of Providence, but, so far as they can, destroying the order that God has ordained. No one, therefore, should wonder if from such insane and impious attempts there spring up a crop of evils pernicious in the highest degree both to the salvation of souls and to the safety of the commonwealth.

[_Abyssinia]

National Organization of Marriage:

First Circuit Ruling Makes US Supreme Court Ruling on Definition of Marriage Likely

The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) today sharply criticized a federal appeals court ruling finding that the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional, accusing the justices of 'making up' arguments to justify redefining marriage. NOM said the ruling makes it highly likely that the US Supreme Court will step in to determine whether there is a rational basis for defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman.

"Liberal federal judges in Massachusetts and California have resorted to making up legal standards in order to justify redefining marriage," said Brian Brown, NOM's president. "They realize the legal precedent doesn't allow them to redefine marriage, so they are making up new standards to justify imposing their values on the rest of the nation. It is clear that the US Supreme Court is going to have to resolve this issue once and for all."

In the Massachusetts challenge to DOMA, the First District Court of Appeals acknowledged that DOMA would survive constitutional challenge if they applied the traditional "rational basis" test to the claims. They also acknowledged that they lacked the legal authority to declare sexual orientation to be a "suspect class" and thus impose a heightened standard of scrutiny to a review of DOMA. Instead, they relied on cases totally unrelated to marriage and found they could impose "intensified scrutiny" on DOMA and require that the law be justified "with special clarity."

"It's obvious that the federal courts on both coasts are intent on imposing their liberal, elitist views of marriage on the American people," said Brown. "They dismiss the centuries-old understanding of marriage as a critical social institution that exists for the benefit of couples and their children, and which has served society well for thousands of years. Instead, they want their own politically-correct views to be imposed, and they are making up new law to do so. It's time for the US Supreme Court to step in and establish once and for all that preserving marriage as the union of one man and one woman is not only completely constitutional, it is profoundly in the public good."

http://www.nomblog.com/23844

[_Abyssinia]

Interesting blog post from a scientist turned homemaker, Catholic covert, on her evolution against gay 'marriage:'

http://www.acceptingabundance.com/my...t-gay-marriage

[rossum]

Originally Posted by markomalley

States are not required to recognize licenses issued by other states.

That is arguable: US Constitution, Article IV, Section 1: "Full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state."

Currently all states recognise opposite sex marriages performed in other states. You don't have to get married separately in each state, once suffices for all.

rossum

[sedonaman]

Originally Posted by rossum

That is arguable: US Constitution, Article IV, Section 1: "Full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state."

Currently all states recognise opposite sex marriages performed in other states. You don't have to get married separately in each state, once suffices for all.

rossum

This presupposes that SS"M" is equal to OSM. It is not.
_________________
The indispensable condition for our personal spiritual survival is that we say NO to the prevailing values of the liberal order and that we KEEP saying NO.

[DWGarvin]

Do people think that marriage is an institution that was founded in the 1930's by a radical homophbic Christian? I mean, seriously...

[rossum]

Originally Posted by sedonaman

This presupposes that SS"M" is equal to OSM. It is not.

In purely legal terms it is equal in certain states. We are talking about civil law and civil marriage, so it is legal definitions that apply.

rossum

[sedonaman]

Originally Posted by DWGarvin

Do people think that marriage is an institution that was founded in the 1930's by a radical homophbic Christian? I mean, seriously...

This is not so far-fetched. There are those who believe that nothing is better than anything else. They are generally the same ones who call themselves "progressives". But how can society "progress" from one state to another state that is no better?

[sedonaman]

Originally Posted by rossum

In purely legal terms it is equal in certain states. We are talking about civil law and civil marriage, so it is legal definitions that apply.

rossum

The law can say that a circle is a square, but that doesn't make it one. The law used to say that blacks were not persons, but that didn't make them less of persons.

The reason they are not equal, and cannot be equal, even according to the law, is that OSM legally tracks biology; SS"M" does not.
_________________
What started as a demand for basic civil rights has mutated into a liberal demand to overturn the whole society, along with its traditions and norms, its standards and laws, its history and heroes.

[_Abyssinia]

Originally Posted by DWGarvin

Do people think that marriage is an institution that was founded in the 1930's by a radical homophbic Christian? I mean, seriously...

Marriage is an institution that has existed through recording history as defined between one man and one woman, through cultures and regardless of religion. Marriage was not created by government, so government has no authority to redefine marriage.

[FromTheAshes777]

Originally Posted by sedonaman

The law can say that a circle is a square, but that doesn't make it one. The law used to say that blacks were not persons, but that didn't make them less of persons.

The reason they are not equal, and cannot be equal, even according to the law, is that OSM legally tracks biology; SS"M" does not.
_________________
What started as a demand for basic civil rights has mutated into a liberal demand to overturn the whole society, along with its traditions and norms, its standards and laws, its history and heroes.

good post

A state can make documents claiming that a relationship is a marriage until the cows come home, that doesn't make it so.

What I wanna know is, where did states get the authority to declare anyone married in the first place?

I mean, can Tennessee declare that I'm validly baptized? Or that I validly recieved communion?

In my opinion this is a smack in the face of God. The states are saying, "HEY BIG GUY! WE'RE IN CHARGE OF MARRIAGE! NOT YOU!"

[sedonaman]

Originally Posted by FromTheAshes777

...
What I wanna know is, where did states get the authority to declare anyone married in the first place?

I mean, can Tennessee declare that I'm validly baptized? Or that I validly recieved communion?

...

To answer the first question, you must first answer, "What is owed the child?" Whenever you put men and women together, children result. The state has a vested interest in children who are raised to be good citizens, and the best [not perfect] way to do that is with their biological parents. Identifying who is the mother is a lot easier than determining who is the father. Marriage ties children to their parents and the parents to each other. If it were not for children, there would be no need for marriage.

WRT baptism and communion, one could argue that the state cannot intrude into strictly religious beliefs.
_________________
“Laws, people must learn, particularly laws stated in sweeping terms, are dangerous things.” – Lino A. Graglia, Professor in Constitutional Law, University of Texas School of Law, Austin, Texas.

[FromTheAshes777]

Originally Posted by sedonaman

To answer the first question, you must first answer, "What is owed the child?" Whenever you put men and women together, children result. The state has a vested interest in children who are raised to be good citizens, and the best [not perfect] way to do that is with their biological parents. Identifying who is the mother is a lot easier than determining who is the father. Marriage ties children to their parents and the parents to each other. If it were not for children, there would be no need for marriage.

WRT baptism and communion, one could argue that the state cannot intrude into strictly religious beliefs.
_________________
“Laws, people must learn, particularly laws stated in sweeping terms, are dangerous things.” – Lino A. Graglia, Professor in Constitutional Law, University of Texas School of Law, Austin, Texas.

So when the government begins to claim marriages exist when they really don't (gay marriage, and then the slippery slope of everything else that will be declared as marriage). Should we let them continue to make these legal declarations, or should be turn marriage back over to God and the Church?

[_Abyssinia]

Family groups say anti-DOMA decision threatens marriage

http://www.ewtnnews.com/catholic-news/US.php?id=5550

-

The Evidence Before Our Eyes: Why Marriage Laws Matter

http://www.catholicvote.org/discuss/index.php?p=30631

[rossum]

Originally Posted by _Abyssinia

Marriage is an institution that has existed through recording history as defined between one man and one woman, through cultures and regardless of religion. Marriage was not created by government, so government has no authority to redefine marriage.

So, you are telling us that the Bible is not recorded history? 1 Kings 11:3 " And he [Solomon] had seven hundred wives, ..." You are telling us that there is no such thing as Islam, where a man can have four wives. You are telling us that the Mormons don't exist because they originally allowed polygamy. You are telling us that the state of Massachusetts does not exist because it allows same sex marriage.

You really need to look at history as it is, and not history as you would like it to be.

rossum