Can someone explain to me how this wouldn’t be a violation of the ‘Full Faith and Credit’ clause of the U.S. Constitution? Where’s Jodi when you need her?
esprix: I certainly agree that homophobia, and also intolerance of gays is alive & well in the USA. I do not agree that simply opposing same-sex marriages makes one a homophobe. Many of those who are against SSM do indeed appear to be anti-gay, but not all.
One of the things that pisses me off about the gay rights folks, is that you have to 100% agree with every plank in their political agenda, or you’re a homophobe- 'taint so. If you disagree with one plank in the Democratic platform, does that make you a Republican?
Personally, I think both sides have points, and I am neutral on the subject, leaning towards “why not?”. But, I think that I have shown myself to be 100% against bigotry, in any form.
I would reply to nacho- but as she can’t tell the difference between the Book of Mormon and the Bible, there is just no use. The only thing worse than a pissant- is an ignorant bigoted pissant.
Technically, that’s true. However, it’s much easier to say “homophobic” than “their political stance is interfering with my political stance and I don’t believe thay have any right to be acting as such”. It’s called “slang”, Danny-boy… just like how the word “Net” has come to mean “something you need to be on in order to post at the SDMB”. While I dislike the overuse of any word (eventually, if it’s used too much, it begins to lose any meaning or impact), it’s not entirely inaccurate from a pop-culture standpoint.
As for the comments about ol’ Miss Sara (off-base though they appear to be… I think she mentioned the word “Bible” once in this whole thread)… well, I’ll let someone else have some fun with that one 
Lizard, surely you aren’t of the opinion that the only rights we have are those specifically mentioned in the Constitution as being protected, are you? The 9th Amendment clearly states that a right not being specifically mentioned does not mean that it doesn’t exist, and the Court over the years has interpreted that in a more and more broad manner. What it means is, “The rights outlined in the Bill of Rights” were the most important ones we could think of at the time, but y’all have all sorts of other rights, and it would take volumes to list them all."
As to the reason the Court has “failed to strike them down,” it’s because the Court has not yet heard nor ruled on any of these laws.
IMHO, it’s manifestly obvious that DOMA and state-level laws violate the Full Faith and Credit clause. It would be equally unconstitutional for, say, Ohio to cease recognizing valid Nevada drivers licenses.
Beautiful thought beautifully stated, Phil.
Two words (and a letter): Loving v. Virginia.
Marriage is a right guaranteed by the Ninth Amendment. One of a handful that the SCOTUS has identified as being among the unenumerated ones that it protects.
Lizard, your posts are unobjectionable if somewhat inaccurate, but the view of human rights underlying them makes me want to become Libertarian. (As soon as I master the vocabulary… :D)
Well, in all likelihood most of those we call homophobes do not in fact have a crippling, irrational fear of gays; they usually have a crippling, irrational hatred of gays. But hey, let’s not split hairs…well, ok, let’s:
homophobia (from m-w):
(my emphasis)
I contend that anygbody who wants to deny gays SSMs is discriminating against them, in the same way as anyone who wants to deny interacial marriages is discriminating. That makes them a homophobe.
BAM
Norway and Sweden already have same-sex marriage laws in place (and have for a couple of years). That about rounds out Scandinavia, dudnit?
Here’s a basic run-down of the Full Faith & Credit argument. Article IV, Section 1 requires all states to give FF&C to “the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other state.” So, it would seem that a gay marriage in State A must be recognized in State B. But there are a couple of reasons why that is not true. Congress stepped in with the DOMA to preempt the FF&C argument, since it would, arguably, be illegal for a state to allow a gay marriage under the DOMA. Those who support the DOMA say that one state should not be able to essentially legislate to another state because State B might have a “strong state interest” in keeping marriage restricted to heterosexuals. The “strong state interest” theory is that marriage should be kept heterosexual because, among other reasons, only heterosexual marriages lead to procreation and continuing the species is a state interest.
Marriage has achieved constitutional protection under a number of Supreme Court cases (Loving v. Virginia, Griswold, Skinner, Meyer). However, these cases were always about heterosexual marriage. In Bowers v. Hardwick, the Supreme Court rejected the idea that there is a constitutional right to homosexual sodomy since there was no connection between that sodomy and “family, marriage, or procreation”. The Court also rejected an argument under the Due Process Clause. The Court essentially said that laws against homosexual sodomy are ancient and were in place when the Constitution was written, so they saw no reason to expand the right.
So, in short, there is constitutional protection for marriage, but homosexual marriage has always been excluded from that protection. It doesn’t make much sense, but there it is.
It occurs to me that in allowing same sex marriage (which I feel we must,) it does bring up some interesting questions.
Would a gay couple be entitled to the same deduction as a married couple?
I feel that they would due to the mutual benefits a married couple provides in terms of financial stability, but, also, a part of that deduction as it was explained to me is to help provide the financial wherewithal to have children.
Should a gay couple have to declare their intent to raise children in order to receive the full deduction? By extension that would only seem fair that traditional married couples go through the same process. Probably we should just let everybody have the full deduction, regardless.
Gay marriage could become an estate planning tool for non gays. Business partners with a large equity ownership could conceivably divorce their wives, have a marriage to each other in name only, upon the first death the entire business could transfer to the surviving partner without tax.
In the same fashion, a couple might get legally divorced, and the husband “marry” the brides elderly father on his deathbed to take advantage of the unlimited spousal deduction, then remarry his previous wife when he dies.
Similar things can be done now within traditional marriage, but the addition of gay marriage makes them much more feasible. I don’t know if they’ll have to be addressed or not, but it’s interesting to think about. Also, the Polygamy issue might need to revisited. Can one have a traditional and a same sex marriage at the same time? Presumably it might be worth working something out in this area so that a gay couple can raise their own children.
If Alice marries Fred and Fred marries Bob and Bob marries Jane, what’s the relationship between Alice and Jane?
None of these things seems insurmountable, just interesting to think about. I’m surprised that those opposed haven’t tried to come up with something in this area.
In that same light, it also moves to the forefront the role and legal standing of surrogate mothers.
Hi, my name is Joe, and I’m an alcoholic. I feel that since I was born with the predisposition to become an alcoholic, I can’t really help it if I should be a little drunk when driving sometimes. Why do sober drivers get away with driving, even if they have accidents, while I, as an alcoholic, cannot legally drive when I am in my natural state (drunk)? I think that my rights are being trampled on, so I’m going to vote for legislation to legalize drunk driving. It’s clearly not a “special right” to have the privilege of driving drunk given to me. I mean, sober drivers get to do it. Why can’t I?
And all you anti-drunk-driving #@(##)s, why can’t you just give me my full rights to drive in any state of drunkenness/sobriety that I want? You’re taking away my rights, and I’m not going to stand for it!
Narrator: Joe’s case is not valid because Joe is assuming that driving drunk is his “special right,” as he can’t help but be drunk sometimes when driving. What Joe doesn’t realize is, no one else has the right to drive drunk either, whether they were born with alcoholic tendencies or not. To pass legislation enabling drunk driving to be legal just because Joe feels it should be would be an endorsement of drunk driving and would basically be telling our children that that way of driving was a valid and approved thing to do.
It all boils down to this: if you believe that Same-Sex Marriages are harmful to all who enter into such a union, you’re probably going to vote against them. Just like you’d vote against drunk driving being legalized. If you believe that SSMs are harmless, then you’ll probably vote the other way. Mormon leaders have been instructed by God Himself to oppose SSM. They didn’t make the rules.
If I oppose or don’t believe in the law of gravity, does that mean I’m going to hover in the air if I jump off a bridge? Mormon leaders are trying to save as many people as possible from jumping off that bridge, as I see it, because undoubtedly if we legalize something, we’re giving it our endorsement that it’s safe and normal to do something that will destroy our lives and affect the lives of all around us. If you don’t believe this way, fine, but can you see where I’m coming from? Don’t you agree that IF one believes that something is destructive, then one should oppose legislation that would approve it? I have the right to vote my conscience, same as anyone else does, so don’t tell me that I’m voting to force my morality on everyone else when you’re doing the exact same thing, only on the opposing side of the issue.
With the new VT Civil Union, the couple will get the same tax breaks that a married couple gets, but only on a state level, starting Jan. 1st 2001.
In VT it clearly states on the Civil Union application that you need to be free to join in union and you can’t be bound by marriage or another civil union, because you’re only allowed one at a time. I belive it also says that you need to have been divorced 6 months before you are free to marry or join in civil union. If you have been previously married or in a previous civil union, you may be asked by the town clerk to provide coppies of your divorce certificate before your application can be processed.
K.
Suppose Bob and Fred are in a gay marriage, so are Jane and Alice. Everybody wants to have children. Rather than adopt, Jane becomes a surrogate for Bob, and Alice a surrogate for Fred. They pool their resources and collectively raise the children in an environment of stability.
Should that be treated as two marriages with one child each, or one big marriage with two children? If the latter, do they receive two marriage exemptions, or one divided twice? In the event of a death how are things treated for estate purposes? Are the kids siblings, or unrelated?
If we treat this as one marriage it would seem unfair not to allow two straight couples the same benefit, or two swinging couples.
Does Gay marriage lead to triune, four way or even large marriages? It probably does. How do we tax these?
I’d think ultimately we’d have to have two classes of marriage. The first would be the traditional two person marriage with or without children.
Second would be something like a marriage corporation. It would benefit surrogates, and gay couples, and others. In this case, it would seem that we would have to repeal the prohibitions against polygamy. One man could marry more than one woman within this structure. The taxation would have to be different then the traditional marriage.
There might even be a one time conversion feature. A gay or childless couple could convert there traditional marriage into a marriage corporation for the purpose of bringing in a surrogate and his/her partner for the purpose of raising kids.
Brave New World.
Sober drivers have the right to drive drunk? Since when?
Anyone, alcoholic or otherwise, has the right to drive sober. Nobody, alcoholic or otherwise, has the right to drive drunk.
This may be the single most poorly-constructed analogy I have ever seen.
I wrote:
I mean, of course:
It’s clearly not a “special right” to have the privilege of driving drunk given to me. I mean, sober drivers get to drive whenever they want to. Why can’t I?
Gravity:
I understand, I’m just thinking about where this takes us down the road.
I’ll stick with my traditional, but gay marriage with Children, and the legal standing of surrogates seem to go hand in hand, and clearly some kind of resolution in this direction should be made.
But they can’t drive whenever they want to. If they are drunk, they are not allowed to drive, by law, any more than Joe is.
Snark, you are so full of crap, you squeak. The LDS has certainly done a number on you and your psyche to make you the sad, self-hating creature you are.
First, homosexuality and drunk-driving are not analogous. I get so fucking tired of gay haters equating homosexuality with something harmful, like crime. Homosexuality is better equated with being left-handed–they are both innate orientations, they are unchangeable, and they are not harmful, but some people find them distasteful.
Yopu say homosexuality is harmful? How, you jackass? For months, you have been sniveling about your struggle to obey the dictates of your church and your own sexual urges. Haas it ever occurred to you that Joseph Smith was a fraud? That the LDS Quorum are just a bunch of old men who have never heard God’s voice? Just because the LDS says being gay is bad doesn’t make it so!!!
If being gay is harmful, show me evidence. Show hard facts. Don’t just repeat the religious garbage that has been programmed into you. The LDS Church and its hatred is what’s killing you, Snark, not being gay.
Yep. In one of the open sessions, someone expressed dismay with the whole thing by saying: “Where does it end? Next we’ll be having marriage for the bisexuals!”
I mostly find that funny because with the civil union addition, we do have marriage for bisexuals. It doesn’t change the law to allowing more than 2 people to marry, or to have more than 1 partner at a time.
I don’t think that it would be a bad thing, though. It’s not anyone’s business if I have a husband and a girlfriend, why should it matter if I have a husband and a wife? Why would it be any more offensive? Or any more anyone else’s business?
K.
Gravity:
I agree, but there should be benefits and protection to those parties that wish to formalize such a relationship, don’t you agree?