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Dr. Ben Carson Apologizes For Saying Being Gay Is a Choice

Redress said:
Lets use your example of laws barring 9 year olds from marrying. Based on the 14th amendment, there are 3 levels of scrutiny that could apply. The most strict is called Strict Scrutiny, which applies in cases of fundamental rights. For a law restricting a fundamental right, it must pass 3 tests:

1: The law must be a compelling government interest. This is somewhat vague, but it is certainly safe to say that protecting minors is a compelling government interest, so no problem on that front.
2: The law must be narrowly tailored to achieve the interest. In this case, a law prohibiting minors below a certain age would fit, as it applies to that interest.
3: The law must be the least restrictive means for achieving that interest. Again, in this example, making it illegal for those under a certain age to marry is the least restrictive way to achieve that interest.
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Like most people who pass the bar exam, I understand the strict scrutiny standard. If you know of any decisions where the Supreme Court has heard a challenge to a state law against bigamy, polygamy, incestuous marriage, or child marriage, applied strict scrutiny, and yet upheld the law, please cite them. Strict scrutiny review is so demanding that it's next to impossible for any law, no matter what subject it concerns, to survive it.

You won't find any such decisions, because contrary to what you claim, the Court has never said that there is a fundamental right to bigamy, polygamy, incestuous marriage, or child marriage. The Court in Loving v. Virginia, citing a 1942 decision, Skinner v. Oklahoma, said marriage is "one of the basic civil rights of man, fundamental to our very existence and survival," calling it a "fundamental freedom." But Loving concerned a marriage between one man and one woman, and nowhere did the Court even imply that its comments applied to any other form of marriage. Nor has it implied that in any other decision.
 
Cardinal said:
Yes. I did not support the war, but I supported the troops. Opposing the war by not supporting the troops, not taking emotional/moral arguments into consideration, is patently ridiculous, because it's not our soldiers who chose which war they would be deployed to. So my opposition to the war was directed toward the people who created it in the first place: the Bush administration. However, I believe that soldiers should receive much better veteran benefits than they currently do.



I don't understand the relevance of this question to the topic.



I really don't understand the relevance of this one. So does Carson oppose LGBT rights?



Er...yes, but Carson said he supports LGBT rights.



Alright, that's nice, but Carson said he supports both LGBT rights while supporting the rights of an entity to discriminate against them. CandaJohn wasn't able to answer this question so perhaps you can take a whack at it: how do you demonstrate the rights of the state to discriminate against LGBT's while equally supporting LGBT rights?

At the very least Carson is prioritizing one over the other, because if one wins, the other is going to lose.
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It makes sense that you don't understand the relevance of the question. That same inability stops you from understanding how you can support states rights but still have issues with the state.
 
sawdust said:
It makes sense that you don't understand the relevance of the question. That same inability stops you from understanding how you can support states rights but still have issues with the state.
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Wow, you folded in one post.
 
matchlight said:
Like most people who pass the bar exam, I understand the strict scrutiny standard. If you know of any decisions where the Supreme Court has heard a challenge to a state law against bigamy, polygamy, incestuous marriage, or child marriage, applied strict scrutiny, and yet upheld the law, please cite them. Strict scrutiny review is so demanding that it's next to impossible for any law, no matter what subject it concerns, to survive it.

You won't find any such decisions, because contrary to what you claim, the Court has never said that there is a fundamental right to bigamy, polygamy, incestuous marriage, or child marriage. The Court in Loving v. Virginia, citing a 1942 decision, Skinner v. Oklahoma, said marriage is "one of the basic civil rights of man, fundamental to our very existence and survival," calling it a "fundamental freedom." But Loving concerned a marriage between one man and one woman, and nowhere did the Court even imply that its comments applied to any other form of marriage. Nor has it implied that in any other decision.
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The court has said that marriage is a fundamental right. That is all that I have claimed. As any one who has passed the bar exam should know, when a fundamental right is being infringed, Strict Scrutiny applies.
 
sangha said:
You are playing word games. SCOTUS has clearly stated that marriage is a fundamental right. In the circumstances you mention, the state has a legitimate interest that is furthered by such limitations.
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See above. Words matter in issues of constitutional law. Every decision in which the Supreme Court has discussed marriage as a fundamental right concerned marriage between one man and one woman. It has never suggested there is a fundamental right to marriage, period. "Furthering a legitimate interest" is the language of rational basis review. If there were a fundamental right to marriage in general, and not just to marriage between a man and a woman, a state would have to prove it had a whole lot more than just a legitimate interest in excluding the kinds of partners I mentioned from marriage. If that were true, laws excluding bigamists, polygamists, and incestuous or underage partners from marriage would not receive ordinary rational basis review, but rather strict scrutiny. And they don't.


Our opinions applying the doctrine known as "substantive due process" hold that the Due Process Clause prohibits States from infringing fundamental liberty interests, unless the infringement is narrowly tailored to serve a compelling state interest. We have held repeatedly . . . that only fundamental rights qualify for this so-called "heightened scrutiny" protection--that is, rights which are "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition." . . . Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390, 399 (1923) (Fourteenth Amendment protects "those privileges long recognized at common law as essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.") All other liberty interests may be abridged or abrogated pursuant to a validly enacted state law if that law is rationally related to a legitimate state interest. Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, 593 (2003) (Scalia, J., dissenting) (emphasis added; some internal citations and quotations omitted).


The only right to marriage that is "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition," as a right must be to be fundamental, and therefore subject any state law that restricts it to heightened scrutiny in a substantive due process challenge, is the right of one man and one woman to marry each other. Bigamous marriage certainly does not meet this standard, nor does incestuous marriage, nor does child marriage--and polygamous marriage has been deeply despised in this country's laws from the beginning.
 
Redress said:
The court has said that marriage is a fundamental right. That is all that I have claimed. As any one who has passed the bar exam should know, when a fundamental right is being infringed, Strict Scrutiny applies.
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Instead of just repeating that assertion over and over, back it up by showing us where the Supreme Court has ever so much as suggested there is a fundamental right to any form of marriage other than that between one man and one woman. You can't, because it never has.

Windsor v. United States was a 2013 case which involved the effect of part of the Defense of Marriage Act on the estate tax owed by a woman upon the death of the woman she'd been married to. Even in Windsor, the Court did not claim that same-sex marriage met its standard for fundamental rights. Under that standard, a right must be both "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition" and "essential to a scheme of ordered liberty." And it had good reason not to. As Scalia notes, it "would of course be quite absurd" to claim either.
 
matchlight said:
See above. Words matter in issues of constitutional law. Every decision in which the Supreme Court has discussed marriage as a fundamental right concerned marriage between one man and one woman. It has never suggested there is a fundamental right to marriage, period. "Furthering a legitimate interest" is the language of rational basis review. If there were a fundamental right to marriage in general, and not just to marriage between a man and a woman, a state would have to prove it had a whole lot more than just a legitimate interest in excluding the kinds of partners I mentioned from marriage. If that were true, laws excluding bigamists, polygamists, and incestuous or underage partners from marriage would not receive ordinary rational basis review, but rather strict scrutiny. And they don't.


Our opinions applying the doctrine known as "substantive due process" hold that the Due Process Clause prohibits States from infringing fundamental liberty interests, unless the infringement is narrowly tailored to serve a compelling state interest. We have held repeatedly . . . that only fundamental rights qualify for this so-called "heightened scrutiny" protection--that is, rights which are "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition." . . . Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390, 399 (1923) (Fourteenth Amendment protects "those privileges long recognized at common law as essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.") All other liberty interests may be abridged or abrogated pursuant to a validly enacted state law if that law is rationally related to a legitimate state interest. Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, 593 (2003) (Scalia, J., dissenting) (emphasis added; some internal citations and quotations omitted).


The only right to marriage that is "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition," as a right must be to be fundamental, and therefore subject any state law that restricts it to heightened scrutiny in a substantive due process challenge, is the right of one man and one woman to marry each other. Bigamous marriage certainly does not meet this standard, nor does incestuous marriage, nor does child marriage--and polygamous marriage has been deeply despised in this country's laws from the beginning.
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As someone who passed the bar, surely you're also aware that intermediate scrutiny applies to gender.
 
matchlight said:
Instead of just repeating that assertion over and over, back it up by showing us where the Supreme Court has ever so much as suggested there is a fundamental right to any form of marriage other than that between one man and one woman. You can't, because it never has.

Windsor v. United States was a 2013 case which involved the effect of part of the Defense of Marriage Act on the estate tax owed by a woman upon the death of the woman she'd been married to. Even in Windsor, the Court did not claim that same-sex marriage met its standard for fundamental rights. Under that standard, a right must be both "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition" and "essential to a scheme of ordered liberty." And it had good reason not to. As Scalia notes, it "would of course be quite absurd" to claim either.
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The Supreme court has stated, repeatedly, that marriage, not certain types of marriage, but simply marriage itself, is a fundamental right. They have not stated only certain types of marriage is a fundamental right.
 
Cardinal said:
Wow, you folded in one post.
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You didn't give me anything worthwhile other than pointing out you didn't understand how someone could support states rights and at the same time have issues about some state decisions. I agree with you, if you don't understand, you don't understand.

Carson said he believed that states have the authority to regulate marriage and he did not support gay marriage. I don't find any inconsistency in that statement because the two opinions aren't conjoined.
 
sawdust said:
You didn't give me anything worthwhile other than pointing out you didn't understand how someone could support states rights and at the same time have issues about some state decisions. I agree with you, if you don't understand, you don't understand.

Carson said he believed that states have the authority to regulate marriage and he did not support gay marriage. I don't find any inconsistency in that statement because the two opinions aren't conjoined.
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I asked you this question which you, like Canadajohn, apparently cannot: "How do you demonstrate the rights of the state to discriminate against LGBT's while equally supporting LGBT rights?"

Or are you simply unaware of what LGBT rights are being discussed? Are you unaware that gay marriage is one of the LGBT-rights topics in contention?
 
Cardinal said:
I asked you this question which you, like Canadajohn, apparently cannot: "How do you demonstrate the rights of the state to discriminate against LGBT's while equally supporting LGBT rights?"

Or are you simply unaware of what LGBT rights are being discussed? Are you unaware that gay marriage is one of the LGBT-rights topics in contention?
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Evidently you are talking about gay marriage and I'm talking about states rights.

If states don't allow gay marriage, as part of their duty to support community standards, is it discrimination? You could construct an argument that it is, but you could also construct an argument that gay marriage is destructive to the moral fabric of a community. Personally, I don't give a **** about gay marriage. It's none of my business what others do that don't affect me however the structure of your question is based on prejudicial language. The Logical Fallacies: Prejudicial Language Therefore to address it would be arguing against a logical fallacy.
 
sawdust said:
Evidently you are talking about gay marriage and I'm talking about states rights.

If states don't allow gay marriage, as part of their duty to support community standards, is it discrimination? You could construct an argument that it is, but you could also construct an argument that gay marriage is destructive to the moral fabric of a community. Personally, I don't give a **** about gay marriage. It's none of my business what others do that don't affect me however the structure of your question is based on prejudicial language. The Logical Fallacies: Prejudicial Language Therefore to address it would be arguing against a logical fallacy.
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Sigh. Here we go again.

From the article: "Carson said he supports rights and Constitutional protections for LGBT people plus the right for states to approve or deny gay marriage."

If Carson supports constitutional protections for LGBT's then that would mean, say, gay marriage. If he supports the state's right to ban gay marriage, then he no longer supports gays being allowed to marry. So either a)he's stating a blatant contradiction or b)he does support both but is prioritizing one over the other. If he is supporting both equally, then please explain how that works.

I have a feeling I'm asking the equivalent of "how does gay marriage harm you?" In other words, I'm asking a question that will never receive an answer.
 
Cardinal said:
Sigh. Here we go again.

From the article: "Carson said he supports rights and Constitutional protections for LGBT people plus the right for states to approve or deny gay marriage."

If Carson supports constitutional protections for LGBT's then that would mean, say, gay marriage. If he supports the state's right to ban gay marriage, then he no longer supports gays being allowed to marry. So either a)he's stating a blatant contradiction or b)he does support both but is prioritizing one over the other. If he is supporting both equally, then please explain how that works.

I have a feeling I'm asking the equivalent of "how does gay marriage harm you?" In other words, I'm asking a question that will never receive an answer.
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I've answered your question, You don't like the answer. It's possible to support states rights and disagree with the state on issues. If you can't process that, I can't help you.

Gay marriage does not harm me. I don't care about it. I don't care if it's legal, and I don't care if it's illegal. I think it's a **** show and none of my business.
 
sawdust said:
I've answered your question, You don't like the answer. It's possible to support states rights and disagree with the state on issues. If you can't process that, I can't help you.

Gay marriage does not harm me. I don't care about it. I don't care if it's legal, and I don't care if it's illegal. I think it's a **** show and none of my business.
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Actually, I'm pretty sure you have no idea what the question is or why an inherent contradiction is involved.

Your apathy regarding gay marriage is entirely irrelevant. If you're involving yourself in a discussion on LGBT rights, then whether you like it or not you're de facto involving yourself in gay marriage. Sorry, but there it is.
 
Cardinal said:
Actually, I'm pretty sure you have no idea what the question is or why an inherent contradiction is involved.

Your apathy regarding gay marriage is entirely irrelevant. If you're involving yourself in a discussion on LGBT rights, then whether you like it or not you're de facto involving yourself in gay marriage. Sorry, but there it is.
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I'm involving myself in a conversation about states rights. You've injected gay marriage into what I was talking about. I know exactly what the question is. I've addressed it more times than I care to repeat. Your determination that there is an inherent contradiction is based on your opinion of Dr. Carson and gay marriage. My opinion about states rights is more dispassionate.
 
matchlight said:
Instead of just repeating that assertion over and over, back it up by showing us where the Supreme Court has ever so much as suggested there is a fundamental right to any form of marriage other than that between one man and one woman. You can't, because it never has.

Windsor v. United States was a 2013 case which involved the effect of part of the Defense of Marriage Act on the estate tax owed by a woman upon the death of the woman she'd been married to. Even in Windsor, the Court did not claim that same-sex marriage met its standard for fundamental rights. Under that standard, a right must be both "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition" and "essential to a scheme of ordered liberty." And it had good reason not to. As Scalia notes, it "would of course be quite absurd" to claim either.
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Are you sure you want to point to Scalia's dissent in Windsor to bolster your point?
The one where he went on for 26 snarling pages about how mad the majority opinion made him?

That opinion, as Scalia *did* note - was written so as to allow federal courts to interpret the ruling that state bans on same sex marriage were unconstitutional.

His scathing dissent laid it out:

“By formally declaring anyone opposed to same-sex marriage an enemy of human decency, the majority arms well every challenger to a state law restricting marriage to its traditional definition.”

Interrupted by argle-bargle" -- he also said:

“It takes real cheek for today’s majority to assure us, as it is going out the door, that a constitutional requirement to give formal recognition to same-sex marriage is not at issue here.”

The Windsor ruling cleared the way, making it "inevitable" said he:

"How easy it is, indeed how inevitable, to reach the same conclusion with regard to state laws denying same-sex couples marital status.”

http://www.abajournal.com/mobile/ar...he_future_once_again_in_gay-marriage_dissent/

Many of the federal judges (I think its more than 50 now) who ruled the bans Unconstitutional even cited Scalia's dissent.

That's why I, along with many others refer to him as :

Antonin Scalia: Unlikely Gay Rights Hero!

​


:)
 
matchlight said:
See above. Words matter in issues of constitutional law. Every decision in which the Supreme Court has discussed marriage as a fundamental right concerned marriage between one man and one woman. It has never suggested there is a fundamental right to marriage, period.
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Actually, they have said that marriage is a fundamental right in a number of cases. Period.

"Furthering a legitimate interest" is the language of rational basis review. If there were a fundamental right to marriage in general, and not just to marriage between a man and a woman, a state would have to prove it had a whole lot more than just a legitimate interest in excluding the kinds of partners I mentioned from marriage. If that were true, laws excluding bigamists, polygamists, and incestuous or underage partners from marriage would not receive ordinary rational basis review, but rather strict scrutiny. And they don't.
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Regardless, the prohibitions you mention are not allowed because marriage is not a fundamantal right which is why you can't quote SCOTUS saying something that supports your claim that marriage is not a fundamental right. Your argument is based on the absurd claim that because the state can limit a right, the right does not exist.

PS- In Reynolds v United States and Davis v. Beason, the court explicitly states the state interest in prohibiting polygamy. Reynolds also states:
it is within the legitimate scope of the power of every civil government to determine whether polygamy or monogamy shall be the law of social life under its dominion.
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Note it makes no mention of the state having a legitimate interest in limiting the right to marriage on the basis of gender.

The only right to marriage that is "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition," as a right must be to be fundamental, and therefore subject any state law that restricts it to heightened scrutiny in a substantive due process challenge, is the right of one man and one woman to marry each other. Bigamous marriage certainly does not meet this standard, nor does incestuous marriage, nor does child marriage--and polygamous marriage has been deeply despised in this country's laws from the beginning.
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You have provided absolutely no proof that "one man, one woman" marriages are the only marriages that are considered a fundamental right.
 
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sawdust said:
I support the right of states to govern themselves in every area that isn't in conflict with constitutionally mandated Federal responsibilities. I believe that the states have the right to outlaw the marriage of children or animals because there is no Federal mandate to regulate marriage. The lack of a Federal mandate gives them authority to regulate all marriage.
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Equal protection is a constitutional mandate...court after court has ruled SSM falls under this requirement
 
sawdust said:
Did you oppose the war in Iraq and support the troops? Would you rather not wear a seat belt but wear one because the state says you must? Do you oppose the KKK but understand the government protects their free speech. Is the Westborough Church allowed to protest their lunacy because their free speech rights are protected? Life is full of situations where we personally oppose activities which are protected by the state. When we do this, we respect the supremacy of governments power to organize society while we disagree with what that power enforces.

I don't support Obama's illegal alien policy but I have to accept it because I have now power to stop it. My belief is incompatible with the actions of the state. Doesn't make me a hypocrite. Likewise, it's possible to support states rights but disagree with states on issues.
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The only reason the state bans came into being is busybodies who could not accept equal protection and relationships that do not effect them in the least. Opposing the state bans is even less interference than this, because the bans DO effect us and it's merely following equal protection

Your other analogies fail because to interfere in the KKK rallies would be akin to what the gay marriage bans did - violate constitutional rights and going out of one's way to get involved in crap that is easily ignored
 
sawdust said:
I'm involving myself in a conversation about states rights. You've injected gay marriage into what I was talking about. I know exactly what the question is. I've addressed it more times than I care to repeat. Your determination that there is an inherent contradiction is based on your opinion of Dr. Carson and gay marriage. My opinion about states rights is more dispassionate.
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States do not have rights - see civil war. They can only ratify amendments. And really, this is the 50th anniversary of the brutality in Selma and you want to defend "states' rights"?
 
matchlight said:
Instead of just repeating that assertion over and over, back it up by showing us where the Supreme Court has ever so much as suggested there is a fundamental right to any form of marriage other than that between one man and one woman. You can't, because it never has.

Windsor v. United States was a 2013 case which involved the effect of part of the Defense of Marriage Act on the estate tax owed by a woman upon the death of the woman she'd been married to. Even in Windsor, the Court did not claim that same-sex marriage met its standard for fundamental rights. Under that standard, a right must be both "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition" and "essential to a scheme of ordered liberty." And it had good reason not to. As Scalia notes, it "would of course be quite absurd" to claim either.
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Windsor is irrelevant because it does not address the issue (ie if people of the same sex have a right to marry) at all. The issue in that case is whether the Fed govt has the power to discriminate between marriages that a state does allow. Windor's failure to describe SSM as a fundamental right is due to the fact that such a description was completely unnecessary and irrelevant to the issue before the court

Citing the fact that Windsor doesn't state that SSM is a fundamental right to argue that it is not is as silly as stating that Marbury v Madison does not state that SSM is a fundamental right
 
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AlbqOwl said:
I doubt any American has ever elected a President who agreed with that American on every issue. I really don't CARE what a candidate's personal position is on abortion or the death penalty or guns or gay marriage or evolution/creationism or any other controversial topic that gets tossed around on message boards.

What I want to know is if the candidate believes it is the federal government's prerogative to order such things. If he does, even if I agree with his position, I will consider him unsuitable for office. If he does not, then we're good to go.
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He gets to pick SCOTUS nominees so yeah, it's a safe bet that would be a litmus test for any repub elected in 08-2012, since they were all deathly opposed to gay rights whenever the topic came up (and often when it didn't). Fortunately that did not come to pass
 
matchlight said:
Instead of just repeating that assertion over and over, back it up by showing us where the Supreme Court has ever so much as suggested there is a fundamental right to any form of marriage other than that between one man and one woman. You can't, because it never has.
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Perhaps you can cite the case in which they did say it was only between a man and a woman. Of course you can not because it never did, but i 14 cases dating back as far as 1888 it did say it was a personal choice.
 
sawdust said:
I'm involving myself in a conversation about states rights. You've injected gay marriage into what I was talking about. I know exactly what the question is. I've addressed it more times than I care to repeat. Your determination that there is an inherent contradiction is based on your opinion of Dr. Carson and gay marriage. My opinion about states rights is more dispassionate.
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Ah, I see. Here, let me help with that by copying and pasting the thread title: "Dr. Ben Carson Apologizes For Saying Being Gay Is a Choice." All this time you've just been in the wrong thread.
 
chromium said:
States do not have rights - see civil war. They can only ratify amendments. And really, this is the 50th anniversary of the brutality in Selma and you want to defend "states' rights"?
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States have rights, see tenth amendment. That's why you don't have a federal drivers license.
 
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