http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071208/ap_on_re_us/gay_divorce
Let the debate begin!
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071208/ap_on_re_us/gay_divorce
Let the debate begin!
I support same-sex marriage but the case seems perfectly straightforward to me. You have to be married to get divorced in Rhode Island just like in every other state. They aren’t married under Rhode Island law so there can be no divorce. If they want a divorce, they can move to Massachusetts and get one here. That is just the way things play out. Massachusetts can’t unilaterally decide that gay marriage is allowed everywhere in the nation as long as the couple can arrange a quick trip to Boston. Most people forget that marriage is more of a legal construct to deal with issues such as property law, survivorship, medical decisions, and inheritance more than anything else. If Rhode Island law can’t support that in the first place then there was no marriage and therefore can’t be divorce.
Clearly, the institution of divorce is under attack by the homosexual lobby. We need a constitutional amendment to stop this before it destroys broken families.
What other states recognize Massachusetts gay marriages and/or the civil unions, domestic partnerships, etc. authorized by several states? Does anyone have a reasonably good text link to such a list?
Certainly Rhode Island cannot be reasonably criticized for refusing to dissolve a legal relationship that it does not recognize to exist in the first place. (Whether they’re right or wrong in not recognizing such relationships is a different question – this is an If/then proposition. If Michigan does not recognize common-law marriages, for example, an Alabama couple in such a relationship who have moved to Michigan cannot rely on Michigan law to deal with their rights under it. Same principle applies, in a more controversial setting.)
I’m from Rhode Island… and depending where you live in RI, you can get to massachusetts within a minute… and up to 30 minutes if you’re in Westerly. If they were married in Massachusetts, they should go for their divorce there. It’s not a far drive, really.
RI doesn’t have same-sex marriages yet, so how could they possibly grant same-sex divorces? there are no laws supporting it…
According to the article, they wouldn’t need to just go to Massachucettes, one of them would have to actually be a resident there to get a divorce.
So, if you support same-sex marriage, then why do you support Rhode Island in this case?
Heterosexual couples can get a divorce where they live. They don’t have to travel back to the state they got married in. This is one of the huge issues regarding gay marriage, because all states grant full faith and credit to the marriages performed in another state.
I was married in Pennsylvania and now live in Florida. I can get a divorce in Florida, but not in PA. I would think that if you support gay marriage, then you would have to support the right of the couple to live where they choose and have the same rights.
Now that I think about it again, couldn’t the judge have simply said, “Since we don’t recognize your marriage anyways, you can call yourself divorced if you want” but then if they married someone else in Mass at a later date, then they could be arrested for polygamy I guess.
This quasi-legal status of gay marriage is confusing from a legal aspect…
Oh, of course. It’s obvious that enlightened progressives have the right to decide what the rules are going to be for everyone everywhere, so there’s no moral obligation to, like, vote on it or anything stupid like that. Once you’ve made a demand in the name of equality, there’s no need to let that silly democracy thing get in the way, is there? Tyranny of the majority, and all that.
Part of the function of the government is to protect the minority from the majority; a major reason why we are not a pure democracy. If the majority vote in favor of bigotry, too bad for them. Or would you support the right of a state to refuse to recognize interracial marriages, and ignore the marriages of out-of-stater mixed couples ? Could they refuse to recognize Catholic marriages as valid ? How about a state that refused to let people of Irish ancestry marry, and refused to recognize the marriage of any such person that crossed the border ?
And marriages are supposed to be recognized by all 50 states, otherwise you have a legal nightmare.
Only up until 1996, my friend. The fact that DOMA is as unconstitutional as, well, as CIA torture of innocent people, makes no influence on this until a court gets around to declaring it unconstitutional – and is sustained on appeal.
I too am a strong supporter of SSM. But it makes sense to me that, if RI is refusing to recognize SSM, and sustained by Federal law in doing so, they have every righht to refuse to grant same-sex divorces.
That simply isn’t true. Link. Full faith and credit doesn’t compel a state to recognize a marriage that violates that state’s public policy, and that has nothing to do with DOMA.
But another, and even more important part, is to protect the majority and not allow minorities to arbitrarily change society in whatever way they please. That is why it is profoundly anti-democratic to grant yourself the right to override the principle of majority rule whenever you find yourself at odds with the majority. I have an awfully hard time believing that denying legal recognition to same sex marriages is such a horrifying violation of basic human rights that tossing out the principle of majority rule is morally justified.
Typically liberals appeal to the authority of the Constitution to justify doing this, which often leads to very strained reinterpretations of the Constitution. Conservatives wrap themselves in the flag, liberals wrap themselves in the Constitution.
Hmmm… has this ever come up in connection with other such differences in marriage requirements (e.g. if 17-year-old first cousins get married in Alabama and move to Michigan and want to get divorced, would they be in a similar bind)?
And to follow up what Steve said, what if a couple has a common law marriage in, say, Texas, and have been recognized as being married in Texas for a number of years.
Then they move to a state with no common law marriage. Is the couple considered legally married in the other state? After all, they didn’t FORM the common law marriage in the other jurisdiction, just continued the existing marriage (or lack thereof)
And like Steve, I’m curious how other states handle divorces for marriages that would have been/are invalid under their current law. First cousin marriage is a good example: legal in some states, illegal in others.
If a person marries his first cousin in a legal state, if they move to a state where such marriage would be illegal, are they considered NOT married?
This is exactly why we need a Constitutional ammendment guaranteeing gay marriage in every state of the Union.
Why? We already have one guaranteeing equal protection under the law. It’s incorporated, too.
Because it’s clearly insufficient to guarantee the right to marry for everyone. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be having this discussion.
Well, that’s wonderful and everything, but that doesn’t help them split up community property.
This is a very unfortunate situation, and as much as I do favor SSM, I have to say that these guys had to know what the consequences would be when they chose to marry in MA. Who wants to think about a potential divorce when you’re getting married, but reality bites sometimes.
We need nothing of the sort. There is no need whatsoever for gay marriage, and society has every right to prefer heterosexuality over homosexuality.