Court rules gay marriage bans in 2 states unconstitutional

CHICAGO — A U.S. appeals court in Chicago ruled Thursday that gay marriage bans in Wisconsin and Indiana violate the U.S. Constitution — thereby bumping the number of states where gay marriage will be legal from 19 to 21.The unanimous decision by the three-judge panel of the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals is yet another in a series of courtroom wins for gay-marriage advocates.
Since last year, the vast majority of federal rulings have declared same-sex marriages bans unconstitutional.

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TheDemSocialist said:

Read more @: Court rules gay marriage bans in 2 states unconstitutional | New York Post

Another win for equality! Another step in the right direction! Equality for the win! Its only a matter of time until its legal in all 50 states! :mrgreen: :applaud:[/FONT][/COLOR]

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Subsequent decisions such as Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620, 634–36 (1996); Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, 577–79 (2003), and United States v. Windsor are distinguishable from the present two cases but make clear that Baker is no longer authoritative. At least we think they’re distinguishable. But Justice Scalia, in a dissenting opinion in Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 586, joined by Chief Justice Rehnquist and Justice Thomas, thought not. He wrote that “principle and logic” would require the Court, given its decision in Lawrence, to hold that there is a constitutional right to same-sex marriage.

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The state tells us that “non-procreating opposite-sex couples who marry model the optimal, socially expected behavior for other opposite-sex couples whose sexual intercourse may well produce children.” That’s a strange argument; fertile couples don’t learn about child-rearing from infertile couples. And why wouldn’t same-sex marriage send the same message that the state thinks marriage of infertile heterosexuals sends -- that marriage is a desirable state?

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At oral argument the state‘s lawyer was asked whether “Indiana’s law is about successfully raising children,” and since “you agree same-sex couples can successfully raise children, why shouldn’t the ban be lifted as to them?” The lawyer answered that “the assumption is that with opposite-sex couples there is very little thought given during the sexual act, sometimes, to whether babies may be a consequence.” In other words, Indiana’s government thinks that straight couples tend to be sexually irresponsible, producing unwanted children by the carload, and so must be pressured (in the form of governmental encouragement of marriage through a combination of sticks and carrots) to marry, but that gay couples, unable as they are to produce children wanted or unwanted, are model parents -- model citizens really -- so have no need for marriage. Heterosexuals get drunk and pregnant, producing unwanted children; their reward is to be allowed to marry. Homosexual couples do not produce unwanted children; their reward is to be denied the right to marry. Go figure.

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If marriage is better for children who are being brought up by their biological parents, it must be better for children who are being brought up by their adoptive parents. The state should want homosexual couples who adopt children -- as, to repeat, they are permitted to do -- to be married, if it is serious in arguing that the only governmental interest in marriage derives from the problem of accidental births. (We doubt that it is serious.)

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Wisconsin’s remaining argument is that the ban on same-sex marriage is the outcome of a democratic process -- the enactment of a constitutional ban by popular vote. But homosexuals are only a small part of the state’s population -- 2.8 percent, we said, grouping transgendered and bisexual persons with homosexuals. Minorities trampled on by the democratic process have recourse to the courts; the recourse is called constitutional law.

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At oral argument the state‘s lawyer was asked whether “Indiana’s law is about successfully raising children,” and since “you agree same-sex couples can successfully raise children, why shouldn’t the ban be lifted as to them?” The lawyer answered that “the assumption is that with opposite-sex couples there is very little thought given during the sexual act, sometimes, to whether babies may be a consequence.” In other words, Indiana’s government thinks that straight couples tend to be sexually irresponsible, producing unwanted children by the carload, and so must be pressured (in the form of governmental encouragement of marriage through a combination of sticks and carrots) to marry, but that gay couples, unable as they are to produce children wanted or unwanted, are model parents -- model citizens really -- so have no need for marriage. Heterosexuals get drunk and pregnant, producing unwanted children; their reward is to be allowed to marry. Homosexual couples do not produce unwanted children; their reward is to be denied the right to marry. Go figure.

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