Letters to the Editor
-
As lame as the judge's two "defenses" of hetero-only marriage are...
...the author has taken them slightly out of context. Follow the bouncing ball:
1) In order to rule whether the New York Domestic Relations Law's ban of homosexual marriage is a violation of New York State's equal protection and due process clauses of its constitution, the judge has used a rationality test -- i.e., could the legislature have a rational reason to deny homosexuals the right to marry?
2) The judge offers two very lame reasons why the legislature could have meant to deny homosexuals the right to marry, noting that there are many others.
3) The judge says that the plaintiffs failed to show that such reasoning was irrational.
4) Under his rationality test, he rejects the argument that the legislature has violated either the equal protection clause or due process clause.
He states in the ruling that the legislature can give homosexuals the right to marry any time it wishes. So it seems that the next step is for progressive New Yorkers to dust themselves off, get up, and tell their legislators to do the right thing.
-
gonnabechef
What's out of context?
I don't think the rational basis test has yet devolved so far that it simply means "any bizzaro basis upon which the state's discriminatory whims rest." That would be more like the Any Basis Whether Rational Or Irrational Test, right? The whole point of the test is to limit discrimination against groups of people (groups that don't receive heightened protection) to distinctions that make sense, distinctions that don't flow solely from a desire to punish a group or to express the majority's dislike of said group. Judge Smith took the coward's way out and I hope someday he'll be ashamed of himself, if he isn't already. A judge with integrity (see Judith Kaye) wouldn't be afraid to point out the obvious lack of rationality behind the restriction of marriage to heterosexual couples. Instead, the majority twists itself into impossible logical knots in an attempt, this cynic argues, to eschew the label of "activist."
-
Yawn . . .
Will somebody please give homosexuals the right to marry so that I won't have to read another whiny article about it on Salon? Please, somebody give them their rights so I don't have to read about their little Ozzie and Harriet gay wonderland family time. Please, give them what they want so they will stop pointing out how bad a job we heterosexuals have done with the marriage thing. Please, please give them what they want so they can stop playing pretend wife, pretend mother. Please, please, please, legislators, give them what they want so they will shut up.
-
gay marriage
The Court put the ball back in the Legislature's court where it belongs. This is an issue to be resolved through the laws not through interpretations of of the Constitution. There is nothing in the U.S. Constitution about gay marriage..there is nothing prohibiting it or requiring the People to recognize it. If the judge had said the Federal law that defines marriage was unconstitutional it would have added more fuel for the Constitutional amendment folks. Its a harder slower fight but if Gay Marriage is going to be a reality it needs to become law through the Legislature..State by State. I am sorry for the pioneers caught up in this but a couple of marches an huffs of indignation is not going to change the law only the people can do that..which means bringing your issues to the small town meetings, and big city councils one group at a time.
-
What evidence do you have?
"Furthermore, if the courts should encourage marriages that help kids, why aren't the courts supporting the more-likely-to-be-stable relationships of gay couples?"
What statistics show that same sex relationships are more stable than heterosexual relationships?
That said, stability of relationships shouldn't enter into this argument. The argument really is just if 2 consenting adults want to be together they should have that right along with the legal responsibilities of marriage. I don't really understand legal jargon very well, but it seems straitforward that all citizens should have the same responsibilities and rights. I don't get it, but what do I know I'm Canadian.
-
I support gay marriage.
And we are going to have to win this one the way virtually every other battle has been won: in the legislatures.
Right decision for the right reasons in the right branch of our government. Otherwise it will never hold and we'll spend (waste) another 30-50 years fighting it like we're doing with Roe v. Wade.
No easy victory, no back door admittance. OK, that was funny. Sorry.
Anyway, good article, wrong avenue. Keep fighting.
-
Stable relationaships
Up thread here someone asked, "What do you mean the "more stable relationships" of same sex couples?!?!"
I felt the need to answer the questions. THe most stable relationships have been proven to be lesbian couples. It's not all that surprising if you think about it. Females are typically pretty easy to get along with, and tend to have less trouble with monogamy. With two Moms, the job of being a mom is probably less hair-raising and isolating. Probably (and this is a guess) less arguing about housework and more mutual support.
Sorry if my comments are offensive to anyone. Just answering the question.
-
Oooh, Crissie...
...beautiful attitude, bigot.
-
Equal Portection
The courts do have the obligation to provide equal protection under the law to all citizens. We have already acknowledged that the founding fathers did not mean African-Americans or women when they wrote that statement but thank the goddess, we have finally acknowledged that nonetheless it applies to both. It is finally time to broaden the definition of citizen to include gay men and women, in order that we finally live in a truly free state.
-
Context
Sorry for the longness. This is an example of what I was talking about.
What Miles wrote:
First, the judge delivered a surprising attack on the heterosexual agenda: Straight people, he said, are really bad at marriage. Opposite-sex relationships, wrote the judge, are often "casual" or temporary. (Wasn't that what right-wing frothers used to say about queers?) Thus, wayward, irresponsible, sexually promiscuous straight people need the legal benefits of marriage as inducements (read: special prizes nobody else gets) to lure them into "solemn, long-term commitments" to each other, so that they can care responsibly for children.
What Smith wrote:
First, the Legislature could rationally decide that, for the welfare of children, it is more important to promote stability, and to avoid instability, in opposite-sex than in same-sex relationships. Heterosexual intercourse has a natural tendency to lead to the birth of children; homosexual intercourse does not. Despite the advances of science, it remains true that the vast majority of children are born as a result of a sexual relationship between a man and a woman, and the Legislature could find that this will continue to be true. The Legislature could also find that such relationships are all too often casual or temporary. It could find that an important function of marriage is to create more stability and permanence in the relationships that cause children to be born. It thus could choose to offer an inducement -- in the form of marriage and its attendant benefits -- to opposite-sex couples who make a solemn, long-term commitment to each other.
It goes back to the test used to decide the case. The judge is saying that, using the example above, the legislature could rationally deny homosexuals the right to marry, and therefore the Domestic Relations Law is constitutional. (Remember, the plaintiffs, in the judge's eyes, failed to prove that the argument was irrational.) That is the heart of the ruling, and a little less broad than Miles makes it out to be.
The ruling even states this:
We hold, in sum, that the Domestic Relations Law's limitation of marriage to opposite-sex couples is not unconstitutional. We emphasize once again that we are deciding only this constitutional question. It is not for us to say whether same-sex marriage is right or wrong.