The domino effect …
From Justice Antonin Scalia’s DOMA dissent:
“As I have said, the real rationale of today’s opinion, whatever disappearing trail of its legalistic argle-bargle one chooses to follow, is that DOMA is motivated by ‘bare . . . desire to harm’ couples in same-sex marriages. How easy it is, indeed how inevitable, to reach the same conclusion with regard to state laws denying same-sex couples marital status.”
How easy, how inevitable, indeed. And disdainful eye-rolling by Justice Scalia becomes precedent for district court judges across the country.
Federal Judge: Virginia Gay Marriage Unconstitutional
A federal judge ruled Thursday that Virginia’s ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional, making it the first state in the South to have its voter-approved prohibition overturned.
U.S. District Judge Arenda Wright Allen issued a stay of her order while it is appealed, meaning that gay couples in Virginia will still not be able to marry until the case is ultimately resolved. Both sides believe the case won’t be settled until the Supreme Court decides to hear it or one like it.
Allen’s ruling makes Virginia the second state in the South to issue a ruling recognizing the legality of gay marriages.
“Through its decision today, the court has upheld the principles of equality upon which this nation was founded,” the plaintiffs’ lead co-counsel, Theodore B. Olson, said in a statement.
The Virginia Attorney General’s Office took the unusual step of not defending the law because it believes the ban violates the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. In her ruling, Wright Allen agreed.
Kentucky Judge Turns Gay Marriage Tide in the South
On Wednesday, a federal judge with deep ties to the Republican Party became the first in the South to rule in favor of gay marriage, offering the best proof yet that the balance in the nation’s long and contentious clash over how to define marriage has been tipped irrevocably in favor of gay rights.
The brief but remarkable ruling by U.S. District Judge John G. Heyburn, a former lawyer for Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell who was put on the bench 22 years ago by President George H.W. Bush, invalidates a key part of Kentucky’s ban on gay marriage, and requires the state to recognize as valid same-sex unions sealed elsewhere.[…]
Borrowing heavily from Kennedy’s reasoning in last year’s decision, and in plain language aimed directly at the many voters in Kentucky who still oppose gay marriage, Heyburn found gay marriage laws are illegal for the simplest of reasons. At worst, he ruled, they are aimed at hurting gays and at best, are based on religious convictions that can’t pass constitutional muster.
“Kentucky’s laws treat gay and lesbian persons differently in a way that demeans them,” wrote Heyburn. Since none of the reasons put forward to justify that treatment can withstand constitutional scrutiny, he ruled that the laws are invalid.
More …