<p>I’m not sure the fight will ever end because there will always be people who are not all right with it. But the fight will get better when gay marriage is allowed in all 50 States and there are no more questions about who has what rights. There are still too many unanswered questions. </p>
<p>If a couple is married in CA and move to MI, are they still married? Do they retain their rights? Does MI have the right to unmarry them? If they filed a joint return and were covered under their spouse’s health insurance in CA, do they then lose that when they move to MI?</p>
<p>Right now States recognized marriages from other States. Even when the rules for who can be married were slightly different. Couples have been known to go to a State without a three day waiting period when they didn’t want to wait, yet their State still recognized their marriage. So if the Supreme court says the Federal Government cannot discriminate, can a State?</p>
<p>There will be many, many arguments for years to come.</p>
<p>That 's an interesting thought. If a state recognizes a marriage from another state that didn’t have a waiting period, or had different age limits about how young you can get married without parental permission, wouldn’t it have to recognize a same sex marriage from another state. Otherwise, you have the same conclusion Kennedy came to for DOMA - that this was discriminatory towards one group, for no compelling reason except distaste of that group. I think that’s where the next lawsuit comes from.</p>
Yes, it is. Apparently some federal benefits are predicated on the law of the state in which you were married, and others are predicated on the law of the state in which you are domiciled.</p>
<p>I’m not so sure this configuration of the Supreme Court will also force states to recognize same-sex marriages legalized in other states. I think Kennedy might go the other way on that one. Prior case law on how the full faith and credit clause applies to the law of marriage is mixed.</p>
<p>"It brings the question- why do married people get so many perks in law? "</p>
<p>I dunno … but I do know how strongly this influenced the movement to legalize marriage. Governments weren’t going to change thousands of laws to say “spouse or domestic partner.”</p>
<p>There are so many assumptions imbedded in Scalia’s passage quoted here (outside of the whiny tone.) But the egregious one, to me, is that a civil right is something that should be voted on. The People do not get to vote on whether to withhold a right or not. That’s why they’re “rights.” The civil rights movement in the 60s was not predicated on getting laws passed to allow minorities rights. It was aimed at making the country, in all parts of it, recognize that those rights already existed and must be honored.</p>
<p>It seems that those who are on the conservative side of this issue want to preserve the traditional meaning of the word marriage, while those on the liberal side say that the word is relative and can be defined by however people wish to define it.</p>
<p>But if that’s the case, why can’t we give homosexual couples the same rights married couples without calling it a “marriage”? It sounds like a fair compromise and a win-win.</p>
<p>
But then who determines what should be considered a right?</p>
<p>This is rich considering how quickly Scalia and company directed that tabulation of FL’s 2000 Presidential voting be STOPPED. For years I respected Scalia for his inflexible views on Constitutionality. I usually disagreed with his conclusions, but thought his voice useful in framing issues. But in the past few years I think he’s gotten a little loopy. (And yes, I consider railing against one’s co-workers to be a little loopy.)</p>
<p>“But to defend traditional marriage is not to condemn, demean, or humiliate those
who would prefer other arrangements …”</p>
<p>A more honest version might have been:</p>
<p>“But to defend traditional marriage is not to condemn, demean, or humiliate those”
condemned to disadvantaged status due to Puritanical views formalized into law.</p>
<p>Scalia also voted to overturn the Voting Rights Act, even though it was reauthorized by a bipartisan Congress in 2006.</p>
<p>
Because those who are against same-sex marriage don’t want this, either. What we’re going to see now, ironically, is that states that currently have domestic partner laws are going to move to same-sex marriage, because you won’t be able to get those federal benefits unless you are recognized as married by a state.</p>
<p>I just can’t believe how little pressure there is to legalize polygamy on grounds of religious freedom. It is an established part of a major religion, Islam, and also practiced under many other customs and faiths.</p>
<p>“It seems that those who are on the conservative side of this issue want to preserve the traditional meaning of the word marriage …”</p>
<p>This was my view, until I began discussing the issue with friends and colleagues who pointed out how pervasive “marriage/spouse” are in existing laws. (I heard there are 12,000 such references … but I didn’t make the count so I don’t really know. Regardless, it’s a large number … to large to “patch.”)</p>
<p>I think the simple insight here is that homosexual marriage was the only PRACTICAL option to obtain reasonable treatment under law. “Your domestic partner of 30 years is lying in a hospital bed near death? Sorry, we only permit immediate family to visit.”</p>
This seems to be a simple solution so I dont understand why its not implemented.</p>
<p>
I dont get this. Why not? I havent heard a discussion regarding this on TV. Someone up thread suggested relabeling the term married couples to domestic units so it covers different kinds of relationships. Why was this not considered?</p>
<p>
Why cant we have something that says, “From here to forth marriage is amended to domestic unit where domestic unit is defined as follows: blah, blah?”</p>
<p>Disclaimer: Pls. don’t throw tomatoes at me but I am not in favor of the redefinition of the word marriage.</p>
<p>I would have been fine if the states and US government had gotten out of the marriage business all together. They could have said everyone currently married has a civil union, allowed civil unions everywhere and said religions were free to define marriage as they pleased. I think it would have been an easier sell, but it’s not what happened. The current system is clearly unworkable. A NY gay couple crosses into New Jersey and they aren’t married any more? That’s ridiculous. We’ll be seeing lots more law suits…</p>
<p>This is precisely what I would like to see happen. The government’s interest in this seems to me to be limited to legal rights accruing to permanent partners: civil unions. Whether or not that union is recognized by a church is the business only of adherents of that church. Separate church and state.</p>
<p>We are all here because of a “union” between a man and woman. To me… this is what G*d intended a family to be …that is my personal opinion. I am not a hater, I have gay friends and I wish them well. They are nice, pleasant, professional people. I can disagree with their lifestyle choices - and still love them and be their friend.</p>