Only one serious error. We call rational basis by that name for the reason that a governmental justification for a scheme must indeed have a tendency in logic to further the stated goal. The government, however, does not need to prove that it is actually true.
[quote=“Bryan_Ekers, post:298, topic:623653”]
It has a certain logic to it. If I may presume to offer a lay summary of the process, as I understand it:
…snip…
/QUOTE]
Good summary but as the 1st district decided in this case there is another level that can be applied that is not intermediate.
This is the “rational basis with bite” where they do not create a new suspect class. They held cases like the following at a higher level without creating a new class.
U.S. Dept. of Agric. v. Moreno: A case where food stamps were denied to non-related households, it was directed towards hippies.
City of Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Ctr.: A case where a mental health facility was denied a zoning permit due to a dislike of the icky mentally ill people.
Romer v. Evans: Struck down a law in Colorado that restricted the ability to pass laws that protected homosexuals.
All of these groups have had “Historic patterns of disadvantage suffered by the group adversely affected by the statute.”
No, we actually term it more like: " the state court is correct in asserting that marriage is a social relation subject to the State’s police power, Maynard v. Hill, 125 U.S. 190 (1888)"
Did “that body” ever get around to making reproduction a duty or obligation of marriage?
No, only that YOU have NOT discovered the over-arching principle of marriage. You’re saying all swans are white - I only need one black swan to prove you wrong.
And Utah was just the first (and so far, only) state I checked. I’m batting a thousand. For all I know, the other 49 have similar, possibly even stronger language on the issue.
Well, SCOTUS might eventually disagree with that latter point. I think they have a good legal basis for doing so and I figure it’s the just and moral thing to do, anyway.
I don’t even care what you call fundamental any more. Show me where it’s a legal requirement and I’ll take note. Otherwise…
I don’t care in the least where the right to marriage came from. I don’t care if it was carved on a mountainside by ancient aliens, or was written by some guy last week on the back of a McDonald’s place-mat. Marriage exists as a legal status with certain privileges and certain requirements. Some citizens have access to it, some do not. I’d like to know the reason for the distinction and if there is none, I’d like that distinction abolished because I’m rather fond of the concept of equal treatment under the law.
It’s not really any more complicated than that.
Fine, if the outcome is that no state can deny a marriage licence on the basis of the genders of the applicants, no problem. Victory. Done. I suppose it could happen that the Feds demand exclusive jurisdiction over marriage, but that would require significant legislation and be massive overkill, anyway.
At this point in time I have failed to find any reference to that result.
Victorian era obviously makes this difficult too. Even mentioning undergarments was improper and while it was perfectly fine to spend the night in the embrace of your same sex friends the whole birthing process was for most part an off limits topic in polite society.
I will continue to look.
I consider yours more of a semantic quibble than a serious correction.
I knew about “rational basis with bite”, but I understand there is some debate on it and SCOTUS hasn’t formalized it (though they have indeed treated “rational basis” cases variably, giving some more analysis than others, i.e. “with bite”), so I left it out in the interest of clarity, one layman trying to give a summary to another.
Romer especially seems to have gotten a bit nasty. I wouldn’t bet on Scalia and Thomas, who dissented, to come up with any pro-gay judgments anytime soon. Or ever, really.
In Meister v. Moore in 1877, a case where the Supreme court decided that common law marriages were still valid unless legislatively made invalid despite other requirements they said the following.
This is the closest I can find to match the claim that it was a right conveyed due to the right to reproduction.
They are concerned about turning a legitimate child into a illegitimate child but that does mean the right is derived from a communities need to reproduce.
The fact that this court calls it a common right, or an individual right makes me believe it was not a right granted due to some ideal of reproduction but that they held value in the arrangement it’s self.
Of course this is opinion, and this case did not in anyway restrict limitations on who can marry that are passed by the state but we are looking for the mythical “traditional meaning”.
I would say this is another data point away from the baby factory theory.
To be clear this is not my claim.
Somehow I am not surprised that you think a required rationality vs. permissible illogic is a “semantic quibble.”
Your choice, you can go on failing to understand these sorts of cases all you like.
Feel free to spell out the practical difference, if you can.
I already did. You see, rationality makes sense, but illogic does not, though it sometimes looks like it does.
I can’t believe you hold that Rational=Illogic, or close enough that the difference is mere semantic quibbling.
But coming from the guy who also said that one’s ancestry is mutable, it’s still not really a surprise.
After digging around for several hours I am handing the task of proving your stance back to those who think the primary reason for marriage is procreation.
Even the most widely read college text on the subject from the first half of the 1800’s plainly calls it a contract and does not infer any relation the importance of reproduction.
From “The Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy - William Paley” (a Christian apologist)
I see no reason to think this was not a common belief and it fits in with the concept of social contract.
I do not see where these duties of the married include procreation, although care of the children is the duty of the woman at this point in time.
Obviously people valued children and demanded that parents live up to their obligations, but I am failing to find any evidence of marriage being directly tied to and the right derived from the states interest in procreation.
I stand by my earlier assessment - semantic quibble.
Plus it wasn’t me talking about ancestry and mutability, so you’re doubly dismissed.
Well, I appreciate your efforts and the most I can pitifully offer in response is a vaguely-remembered description of premarital cohabitation I read in some book I have since lost, describing a Scandinavian custom of a couple living together for a year or so, only formally wedding after the woman became pregnant, i.e. after the relationship proved fertile. I unfortunately can’t offer additional detail, and probably the only reason I remember this at all was because it struck me as a perfectly reasonable and rational custom, far more so than trying to ensure the bride’s premarital virginity and such nonsense.
I know that is the one that David42 was offering as proof. However, no one wants to visit what biblical marriage was or discuss what marriage is documented int he bible.
Invoking Genesis is pretty weak sauce if you want to make a claim towards one woman one man even if we weren’t a secular country.
This is a good point and mostly overlooked in the thread, which after all is supposed to be about the 1st Circuit decision. (BTW, I have to mention that you have in many posts described this as a district court decision when, in fact, it’s a circuit court one.) Having reread the decision several times and having read the cases cited (iincluding those mentioned here), I’m less pessimistic than I stated in Post #25 that the Supreme Court is only likely to affirm (assuming it grants review) if it abrogates Baker. Rather, I can see a majority of the Court adopting the 1st Circuit’s reasoning as a “small step” which protects SSM but doesn’t require states to recognize it (except, perhaps, as a matter of Full Faith & Credit). David42 would have it that the 1st Circuit’s equal protection - due process discussion is dictum, but that’s not how I read the decision. Nor, I think, will the Supreme Court.
You are correct sir, my only non-hobby legal experience was on a Federal grand jury, in a district court, sorry it was out of habit that I was wrong to use the term, thank you for the correction.
Interesting map (pdf) showing the districts and circuits. I was a little surprised to see Tennessee has three districts, while several states with larger populations get by with one or two.
You can’t figure out the difference, yet you think you are a credible poster at a place like the Straight Dope. What a hoot!
**
RATIONAL:**
adjective
1.
agreeable to reason; reasonable; sensible: a rational plan for economic development.
having or exercising reason, sound judgment, or good sense: a calm and rational negotiator.
being in or characterized by full possession of one’s reason; sane; lucid: The patient appeared perfectly rational.
endowed with the faculty of reason: rational beings.
of, pertaining to, or constituting reasoning powers: the rational faculty.
ILLOGIC:
the state or quality of being illogical; illogicality: His speech was full of illogic.
ILLOGICAL:
not logical; contrary to or disregardful of the rules of logic; unreasoning: an illogical reply.
Congratulations, you know how to use a dictionary. I continue to stand by my assessment in #306.