So what? Didn’t the majority in the South oppose desegregation? Did the Supreme Court “ram it down their throats”?
If this were to pass, what would that mean for MA, since they have gay marriage now?
“If the Massachusetts Legislature crafts an appropriate amendment that provides for partnership and civil unions, then I would support it, and it would advance the goal of equal protection.”
–John Kerry, 2/27/04
Thanks for your non-contribution. Now please, return to your compound, Mr. Phelps.
If that’s not the most stupid thing I have ever read…it’s right up there.
That anology doesn’t hold. The people in the south could have tried to amend their state constitutions and I’m certain the SCotUS would have found those amendments violate the US constitution. Not the same with gay marriage. Almost all the states have DOMAs, and not one has been found to be unconstitutional at the federal level. Many states are in the process of amending their constitutions to ban gay marriage. If you have a source that indicates the SCotUS would declare either the DOMAs or the state amendments unconstitutional, let’s see it.
Only by judicial mandate. This would nullify the MA SC ruling and throw the issue into the legislature where it belongs.
Loving v. Virginia, which required Southern states to recognize mixed-race unions that could not legally be entered into in the South would seem to contradict your opinion.
A state couldn’t simply say “We won’t marry Catholics in Kansas, nor recognize the union of two Catholics,” that would be struck down as a violation of the FF&C Clause in a heartbeat. Eventually, I believe the same will be true regarding gay unions.
What polls are you talking about? I’m pretty certain that the latest polls I’ve seen showed a plurality opposed to ratification of the amendment.
The rights of minorities should NEVER be put up to a vote by the majority which was discriminating against them in the first place. Should Southern whites have been allowed to vote on whether Southern blacks should be allowed to vote? Should they have been allowed to vote on whether blacks and whites should be allowed to marry each other? Of course not.
In any case, given the extreme length of time involved in passing a constitutional amendment, what was the SCOM supposed to do, say “This is evil discrimination that violates the law, but here, take three years and try to change the law so that this evil discrimination is now legal”?
I don’t think the Massachusetts Constitution will be changed. The issue has shifted since equality came to town. Now, when the legislature reconvene next year to consider re-affirming their intent to ban, they’ll have a year’s worth of evidence showing that gay marriage harms no one and disrupts nothing. The thin coalition that put together this amendment text could easily fracture. The amendment may never even make it onto the 2006 ballot.
And if it does, I have a hard time believing that decent people would go to the polls and gleefully vote to rip apart, spit upon and destroy thousands upon thousands of families in their own state. I don’t think that the people of Massachusetts have that much evil in them.
But states CAN"T say they won’t recognize a union of two Catholics, so that analogy makes no sense. If you look into this, you will see that most of the legal opinions come down on the side of no FF&C for gay marriage. We’ve been over this a number of times in GD threads, and I’m pretty certain that the legal concensus here is that the FF&CC does not apply in this case.
Going from memory here, but I could be wrong. At any rate, I agree that polls change over time so it’s not a good way to make public policy. But the fact remains that any and all parts of the constution are decided by majority vote.
The court could have required that the state allow civil unions for gays until the necessary legislative process is played out. Put a reasonable time limit on it (2-3 years?), but let the people decide. States routinely regulate marriage and when most state marriage legislation was crafted no one even dreamed that gay marriage would be an option.
I’m not arguing against gay marriage, just the process by which it is achieved.
It makes no sense for a state to be able to say “we won’t recognize marriage between gays” but not be able to say “we won’t recognize marriage between Catholics” or Jews, or a white man and a black woman, or any other combination of demographics you want to fill into that blank.
I still don’t see how it applies regarding mixed-race couples, but not regarding same-sex couples. That’s totally incoherent. But I’m not a lawyer or a legal expert (foreign policy is more my area of study), so I’m quite possibly very wrong.
And the majority voted to have an equal protection clause in that Constitution, and that clause is what made it impossible for the state to bar gays from the altar/clerk’s desk. The Supreme Judicial Court was merely enacting the will of the people as expressed in their Constitution by opening marriage up to all Massachussetsians (what the hell do you call people from Massachusetts anyway?).
It would have been unconscionable for the court to say “look, this is evil discrimination, but we’ll ignore it, or band aid over it, while you go make it legal evil discrimination.”
According to the court, the people already decided, when they wrote the equal protection language into the document. Should every court case of Constitutional import be stayed for 3 years to allow the people to alter the Constitution? That would be an absurd way to administer justice.
I understand, and appreciate your support for equality, even though I disagree with your posture re: Massachusetts.
I think the SJC of Massachusetts did precisely what courts are there to do: it ensured that the laws of Massachusetts conformed to the Constitution of Massachusetts.
What? There has been gay marriage in MA for over a month?! How can that be? Where is the total breakdown of family values? The dogs and cats, living together in cross-species miscegnation? The plagues of frogs, boils and salamanders from Jehovah’s vengeful hand? Where are the gay police, rounding up children on the way to their first communion, and spiriting them away to queer education camps?
I suspect that what will actually happen is that some way will be found to postpone the vote, in order to forestall committment until the direction the wind is blowing can be ascertained, as well as which side of the political bread has the political butter. That way, the Right gets what it wants: a grandstanding display of solidarity with the base. As well, another chance to decry how the liberals have, once again, thwarted God’s Will. And the Left can, somewhat weakly, claim the success of not losing against almost insurmountable odds. And the vast, uncertain middle gets more time to study the question, and determine what thier unassailalbe committment to principle demands.
Frankly, I’m disappointed that I started a thread on this very topic, and this one already has six times the responses mine did. What, do I not have enough GD cred? 
Perhaps, at some point in the future, you may be invited to join the SDMB Elite. Our standards are entirely arbitrary, our approval fickle and mercurial. At any rate, you will be permitted to display the Crimson Asterisk of Cecil when you start a thread (which is, of course, invisible to the uninitiated) and then you will be guaranteed a response more in line with your expectations.
I can post this to your thread in calm assurance that the other Elite will not be posting here, and thereby discover my indiscretion. I’m counting on you not speak of it outside these confines. Consequences, you know. Dreadful consequences.
So, just to make sure, I have to be a liberal, right?
Liberal? 
I’m from MA, and I don’t know what we call ourselves.
I understand the thinking there, but I also understand that had gay marriage been contemplated when the laws were written, it would be outlawed. I see it as legalistic to the extreme to say: “Well, you didn’t specificy that marriage was only between a man and a woman, so we’re going to assume that you meant it to be between any two adults”.
We’ll see what happens in MA, and maybe the amendment won’t pass there, but it certainly will pass in some states. I supsect this will be a long drawn out process that will end up in the SCotUS eventually. There’s just no way to get around that.
As many of us have said in other threads, it would be best if the gov’t just got out of the marriage business altogether. Let people marry or not marry as they will, and the state can be there to validate any legal contract a couple* wants to draw up.
*or whatever groupings might occur
Either that, or obnoxious. Your call, really. Take your pick.
It should be noticed that some of groundlings achieve a similar effect by starting threads with provacative and/or metaphysical titles: “Is God A Homo?” for instance, or “Is George Bush on meth?”. That sort of thing.
You need a snappier title. FMA?? Who the hell knows what that is? “Gay armagedon on hand!” would be sure to net you 5 pages at least.
Yes, you need to write your headlines like you’re a reporter for the New York Post. Sensationalism sells, man. Also, a blatant bias in the thread title (“anti-gay” as opposed to FMA) reels in both those who agree with you, and those who hate you and want to argue.
However, had I seen your thread, I would not have posted mine. I don’t like to step on people’s toes like that. It’s very rare that I start threads, anyway.
Yeeeesh, then my thread title “BLS methodology: Unemployment Statistics” is going to suck donkey then? Wlel, maybe not, “unemployment statistics” might snap some heads, though the thread itself is on statistics instead of policy.
BTW, in my experience, when you have a “normal” and “elite” group, the “elite” group will completely withdraw from the “normies” and form their own society. Case in point - Fark.
Zag, people are joking. There’s not really such a bifurcation here at the SDMB. There are posters everyone knows and respects, like Polycarp and Liberal when he’s sane, but that’s about it. And in any case, were there an elite society, not-too-well-liked me certainly wouldn’t be a part of it.