Other than further lame attempts to amend the Constitution, it is true that there’s not much left that the backwards states can do to make things worse. What remains to be seen is what unintended consequences the SSM bans will have.
I think you’ll start to see corporate pressure, for one thing.
There are corps who already provide benefits to SS partners and don’t want to lose valued employees over this nonsense. Even more, the corps that are operating in states where they are required to recognize and provide for equal marriage benefits are NOT going to want to keep separate rules for those states that forbid anyone from giving marriage benefits to SS couples.
There is already stiff competition between states/cities to bring in new business opportunities. Once corps start saying “no SSM, no dice - we don’t want to play by your stupid rules”, I think you’ll start seeing some serious internal pressure in those states to dump the bans.
How long it will take for that pressure to overcome the bigots remains to be seen. I look forward to the internal dissonance of the locals though. “But MONEY…but but but SODOMY…but MONEY MONEY MONEY.” Their heads will be spinning like pinwheels in an Oklahoma breeze.
Ohio is going to have to either violate its marriage amendment or change its tax code to deal with federal tax returns filed by married same-sex couples.
Even if the IRS only allows a same-sex couple to file their federal taxes as a married couple in states where their marriage is allowed, there will probably be married same-sex couples with Ohio income living in equal marriage states. And they have to file their Ohio taxes as a married couple, but the state constitution bans the state from processing it.
11 states passed same-sex marriage bans in 2004. My opinion is that this was the result of two factors: 1, Massachusetts approved same-sex marriage earlier that year, so it was a backlash reaction to that, and 2, Republican strategists worked hard to get anti-SSM amendments on the ballots in as many states as possible, because they believed (rightly, IMO) that this would be a hot-button issue that would get social conservatives off their asses and out to the ballot booth, where they would also vote to re-elect George W. Bush that November.
Edit: The states were Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon and Utah.
Which is a utterly ridiculous response that would cause total chaos. It’s about as likely to happen as a state trying to secede.
AFAIK no state actually prohibits private companies (as opposed to local municipalities or state colleges) from giving same-sex couples the same benefits as married couples, but there may be tax disincentives (at least for the couple involved).
Not just “Republican strategists”…Ken “The Quisling” Mehlman, who is himself gay. He came out a couple years ago, trying for a “Hey, guys! No hard feelings, right?” thing. Fuck that…
I don’t know about other states, but the California return closely follows the federal return. No problem here, now, but I can imagine that non-SSM states where gay married couples move will make filing state taxes a lot more complicated.
Backwards states like Texas are always trying to poach jobs from California. As top companies have more married gay people working for them, it is going to get harder to move to a place like Texas without people jumping ship. When we start seeing executives with SSMs it is going to even tougher.
That’s correct and it’s probably more common than not among public companies. M company has given benefits to same sex couples for many years and I live in a state where SSM is not legal…for the next couple of weeks!
Oh, that’s a good point, I’d forgotten about that. I wonder if the availability of non-civil marriage (sectarian as well as by non-state non-religious groups) would suffice?
Scalia argues in dissent that the decision will have that effect, but Kennedy’s opinion makes clear in the next-to-last paragraph that it does not decide this question. Plainly there wasn’t a majority for the broader ruling, which is what the Second Circuit case under review had held. Roberts, in his dissent (based mainly on the standing issue), accepts the majority opinion at its word. Importantly, the majority opinion is based heavily on federalism concerns, which by definition will not be implicated in a direct challenge to any state’s anti-SSM laws.
What most commentators suggest is that several justices (especially Roberts and Ginsberg) want this issue sorted out by the political process rather than by judicial fiat. Frankly, I disagree (I’m pro-SSM), but can understand their hesitation. In any event, this decision very definitely didn’t resolve the issue. Intentionally so.
I’m not entirely sure it’s a matter of no majority, but of SCOTUS’ inherent conservatism in rulings. Not conservative in terms of right and left politics, but more the doctrine of ‘just enough and not more’ in terms of rulings. Even the justices who are pro-SSM might be willing to put off a blatant ruling like Roe v Wade to allow the politics to evolve a bit more so that the change isn’t as politically disruptive as the last 40 years have been on the abortion issue.
As for the future? Yes, right now there are doubtless political strategists in the pro-SSM camp arranging for couples from states where SSM is banned to get married in California or Massachusetts or whatever. Those couples will have a fabulous honeymoon and return to Virginia or Texas or wherever and file suit claiming that by not recognizing their marriage the state is violating Article IV, Section 1 of the Constitution which says:
And then we see how fast (use a stopwatch) it gets in front of SCOTUS. I think Scalia is on the nose with this one. The downstream result of this week’s decision will be to bring SSM legality to the entire country. We took a big step this week, but it’s only one step. The next step is setting up for the kill.
IANAL, but I don’t think that the Supreme Court found that discrimination against gays in marriage is unconstitutional. I don’t think they were even asked to consider that. They found that the DOMA, as written, or at least most of it, is unconstitutional, and now the federal goverment has to recognize marriages performed in states that permit such marriages. That’s all.
The Court did not find a right to same-sex marriage in the Constitution.
This. And significantly so. The court seemed careful about not going beyond this limited finding. Significantly, they left Section 2 of DOMA in effect, so not only did they find no such right in the Constitution, they also found no right of persons married in states that permit SSM to expect a state that does not permit SSM to recognize their marriage if they should move there. As I understand, they did not even find a right to federal recognition of SSM performed in a state where it’s legal if the couple then moves to a state where it isn’t, so their finding – though hugely significant – is pretty narrowly limited.
They were. The main contention at the trial level was the equal protection argument. It took a back seat at the appellate level because the appellate court only upheld the trial court’s decision on the basis of the federalism argument.
Dang, if I had a legal SSM, that’d be enough to make me try to get some Ohio income somehow. Just to screw with 'em.
