11th Circuit Gears Up For Gay Marriage Case? SCOTUS?

[Skylar]

They offered the Loving decision as an example. That's what 'e.g.' means. It was a case that demonstrated that state marriage laws are subject to judicial review....and if they violate rights, the laws are invalid.

Odd then that they'd end up saying in Windsor that gay marriage was made legal by a statewide consensus weighing the pros and cons and by that route that gay marriage was only legal in "some States"..

Only if we apply your interpretation is it 'odd'. Just as the lifting of the stays are 'strange' if we use your interpretation. But if we recognize that your interpretation is invalid and imaginary, their citation of loving is neither strange nor odd. But pretty predictable. As are the lifting of the stays.

 

[Silhouette]

Is this "invalid and imaginary"?

page 14 of Opinion: United States v. Windsor
After a statewide deliberative process that enabled its citizens to discuss and weigh arguments for and against same-sex marriage, New York acted to enlarge the definition of marriage...Against this background of lawful same-sex marriage in some States, the design, purpose, and effect of DOMA should be considered as the beginning point in deciding whether it is valid under the Constitution

 

[Skylar]

Is this "invalid and imaginary"?

page 14 of Opinion: United States v. Windsor
After a statewide deliberative process that enabled its citizens to discuss and weigh arguments for and against same-sex marriage, New York acted to enlarge the definition of marriage...Against this background of lawful same-sex marriage in some States, the design, purpose, and effect of DOMA should be considered as the beginning point in deciding whether it is valid under the Constitution

Subject to certain constitutional guarantees as the Windsor court states repeated. You imagine a version of Windsor where state law isn't subject to these constitutional guarantees. And that imaginary version of the ruling is invalid. As it doesn't exist.

Your refusal to acknowledge the constitutional guarantees that state marriage laws are subject to is especially surprising given that every single federal court ruling to overturn gay marriage bans did so on the basis that state marriage laws violated such constitutional guarantees.

Every. Single. Ruling.

And yet you ignore them all, ignore any mention in Windsor where any such constitutional guarantees are cited. You omit it from virtually every citation of Windsor. And pretend that no such passages nor guarantees exist.

The USSC won't pretend with you. Nor will I.

 

[Syriusly]

Is this "invalid and imaginary"?
e]

No- its just your usual dishonesty.

 

[Silhouette]

page 14 of Opinion: United States v. Windsor
After a statewide deliberative process that enabled its citizens to discuss and weigh arguments for and against same-sex marriage, New York acted to enlarge the definition of marriage...Against this background of lawful same-sex marriage in some States, the design, purpose, and effect of DOMA should be considered as the beginning point in deciding whether it is valid under the Constitution

Subject to certain constitutional guarantees as the Windsor court states repeated. You imagine a version of Windsor where state law isn't subject to these constitutional guarantees. And that imaginary version of the ruling is invalid. As it doesn't exist....

Did you miss the words "some" and "Against this background of lawful same-sex marriage" and "after a statewide deliberative process that enabled its citizens to discuss and weigh arguments for and against same-sex marriage"?

 

[Montrovant]

Silhouette, you seem to be working under the premise that if the USSC hears a case, it rules on all aspect of that case. It is my understand that they generally make very narrow rulings.

 

[Silhouette]

Silhouette, you seem to be working under the premise that if the USSC hears a case, it rules on all aspect of that case. It is my understand that they generally make very narrow rulings.

Which is why it's really weird in Windsor they reiterated over and over and over that states "unquestioned authority" to define marriage was central to that case; and the weird part is why you're having trouble grasping that that narrow Ruling said that states have that right "pro and con". And this is the singular hub of why Edie Windsor won her money...

If there is a 2015 Hearing on homosexuals/polysexuals/monosexuals marriage, do you think for a minute that the Opinion on that Hearing will not include citations to Windsor 2013?

 

[Skylar]

page 14 of Opinion: United States v. Windsor
After a statewide deliberative process that enabled its citizens to discuss and weigh arguments for and against same-sex marriage, New York acted to enlarge the definition of marriage...Against this background of lawful same-sex marriage in some States, the design, purpose, and effect of DOMA should be considered as the beginning point in deciding whether it is valid under the Constitution

Subject to certain constitutional guarantees as the Windsor court states repeated. You imagine a version of Windsor where state law isn't subject to these constitutional guarantees. And that imaginary version of the ruling is invalid. As it doesn't exist....

Did you miss the words "some" and "Against this background of lawful same-sex marriage" and "after a statewide deliberative process that enabled its citizens to discuss and weigh arguments for and against same-sex marriage"?

The Windsor court never found that the States laws aren't subject to judicial review. You've completely imagined it. And in fact, the Windsor court found the exact opposite: that State laws are subject to constitutional guarentees, even citing a federal case in which the USSC overturned state marriage laws because they violated individual rights.

Subject to certain constitutional guarantees, see, e.g., Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1, “regulation of domestic relations” is “an area that has long been regarded as a virtually exclusive province of the States,” Sosna v. Iowa, 419 U. S. 393.

Windsor V. the US

An explicit contradiction of your assumptions. So you bizarrely ignore it. But what's the point of ignoring the contradiction? Its not like the courts will.

The Windsor case found that State marriage laws trump federal marriage laws. No lower court ruling overturning gay marriage bans is based on the idea that federal marriage law trumps state marriage law.

Not one. Making the suprememcy of State marriage law over federal marriage law irrelevant to any such ruling.

Every lower court ruling overturning gay marriage bans do so on the basis that such bans violate constitutional guarantees. Making the very constitutional guarantees you ignore the singular relevant issue the court will have to address if it takes any of these lower court rulings overturning gay marriage.

Since constitutional guarantees are the ONLY question that need to be resolved, why then do you continue to ignore them?

 

[Syriusly]

page 14 of Opinion: United States v. Windsor
After a statewide deliberative process that enabled its citizens to discuss and weigh arguments for and against same-sex marriage, New York acted to enlarge the definition of marriage...Against this background of lawful same-sex marriage in some States, the design, purpose, and effect of DOMA should be considered as the beginning point in deciding whether it is valid under the Constitution

Subject to certain constitutional guarantees as the Windsor court states repeated. You imagine a version of Windsor where state law isn't subject to these constitutional guarantees. And that imaginary version of the ruling is invalid. As it doesn't exist....

Did you miss the words "some" and "Against this background of lawful same-sex marriage" and "after a statewide deliberative process that enabled its citizens to discuss and weigh arguments for and against same-sex marriage"?

Miss them? How could any of them- since you keep repeating them as if that was part of the actual decision- rather than a discussion of the case

Here is the actual decision:

The class to which DOMA directs its restrictions and restraints are those persons who are joined in same-sex marriages made lawful by the State. DOMA singles out a class of persons deemed by a State entitled to recognition and protection to enhance their own liberty. It imposes a disability on the class by refusing to acknowledge a status the State finds to be dignified and proper. DOMA instructs all federal officials, and indeed all persons with whom same-sex couples interact, including their own children, that their marriage is less worthy than the marriages of others. The federal statute is invalid, for no legitimate purpose overcomes the purpose and effect to disparage and to injure those whom the State, by its marriage laws, sought to protect in personhood and dignity. By seeking to displace this protection and treating those persons as living in marriages less respected than others, the federal statute is in violation of the Fifth Amendment. This opinion and its holding are confined to those lawful marriages.

The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit is affirmed.

It is so ordered.

Nothing in the decision about whether gay marriage is legal or not.

 

[Syriusly]

Silhouette, you seem to be working under the premise that if the USSC hears a case, it rules on all aspect of that case. It is my understand that they generally make very narrow rulings.

Which is why it's really weird in Windsor they reiterated over and over and over that states "unquestioned authority"

What is really weird- and dishonest is how you keep saying that-without the qualifier.

Windsor refers to 'unquestioned authority' twice.

Windsor says 4 that the States are subject to constitutional guarantees

Subject to certain constitutional guarantees, see, e.g., Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1, “regulation of domestic relations” is “an area that has long been regarded as a virtually exclusive province of the States,” Sosna v. Iowa, 419 U. S. 393.

rejects the long-established precept that the incidents, benefits, and obligations of marriage are uniform for all married couples within each State, though they may vary, subject to constitutional guarantees, from one State to the next.

The States’ interest in defining and regulating the marital relation, subject to constitutional guarantees, stems from the understanding that marriage is more than a routine classification for purposes of certain statutory benefits. Private, consensual sexual intimacy between two adult persons of the same sex may not be punished by the State, and it can form “but one element in a personal bond that is more enduring.” Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U. S. 558, 567 (2003) . By its recognition of the validity of same-sex marriages performed in other jurisdictions and then by authorizing same-sex unions and same-sex marriages, New York sought to give further protection and dignity to that bond.

But there is no such departure when one State adopts or keeps a definition of marriage that differs from that of its neighbor, for it is entirely expected that state definitions would “vary, subject to constitutional guarantees, from one State to the next.”Ibid. Thus, while “[t]he State’s power in defining the marital relation is of central relevance” to the majority’s decision to strike down DOMA here, ibid., that power will come into play on the other side of the board in future cases about the constitutionality of state marriage definitions.

And there it is right there Silhouette- the court says right there that there will be future cases in front of the Supreme Court regarding the constitutionality of state marriage definitions.

You are lying when you keep claiming that Windsor gives States the rights to regulate marriage any way that they want- The Court specifically said States do not- and that they would be reviewing future cases involving the constitutionality of state marriage definitions.

 

[Skylar]

Silhouette, you seem to be working under the premise that if the USSC hears a case, it rules on all aspect of that case. It is my understand that they generally make very narrow rulings.

Which is why it's really weird in Windsor they reiterated over and over and over that states "unquestioned authority" to define marriage was central to that case; and the weird part is why you're having trouble grasping that that narrow Ruling said that states have that right "pro and con".

Its only 'really weird' if we work under the assumption that the court was answering the question of whether or not the States can have gay marriage bans. As you have fallaciously claimed.

But that wasn't the questioned asked Windsor, nor the question Windsor answered. This was:

Does Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act, 1 U.S.C. § 7, which defines the term “marriage” for all purposes under federal law as “only a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife,” deprive same sex couples who are lawfully married under the laws of their states (such as New York) of the equal protection of the laws, as guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States ?

Edith Windsor, Petition For Writ Of Certiorari
http://www.nyclu.org/files/releases/Windsor_Cert_Petition_7.16.12.pdf

And the answer was, yes. Section 3 of DOMA does deprive same sex couples who were lawfully married under state laws of equal rights protection, because state marriage laws trump federal marriage laws.

The Windsor courts never ruled that State marriage laws trump constitutional guarentees nor that they were immune from judicial review. Which is your bizarre assumption. Instead they ruled that state marriage laws are subject to constitutional guarantees:

Subject to certain constitutional guarantees, see, e.g., Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1, “regulation of domestic relations” is “an area that has long been regarded as a virtually exclusive province of the States,” Sosna v. Iowa, 419 U. S. 393.

Windsor V. US

They even cited as an example the Loving decision, where the courts did EXACTLY what you insist the courts can't do: overrule state marriage laws.

See how that works? State marriage law trumps federal marriage law. Constitutional guarantees trump State marriage law.