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Judicial Review: Supreme Court ruling on homosexual marriage
by Joseph Earnest June 26, 2013
Newscast Media WASHINGTON—Two important rulings were issued by the United States Supreme Court today, however, it is still an uphill battle for supporters of homosexual marriages.
The first ruling had to do with the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) that defines a marriage as being between one man and one woman. Today's ruling paved the way for the government to give homosexual couples health benefits just like traditional couples. The case was Windsor v. United States in which the Supreme Court with a split 5-4 ruling said that DOMA was unconstitutional because it violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The Fourteenth Amendment was actually written to protect Blacks who were enslaved and then freed by providing them equal protection and due process, to prevent them from losing their private property rights, liberties and immunities without due process, but since then, every other group is using it for its benefit as long as they can classify themselves as minorities.
Homosexuals have surprisingly been able to claim that the acts they practice are a civil right, even though no law enforcement agency has ever prevented them from doing what they do in their own privacy. I guess gay is the new Black.
"DOMA violates basic due process and equal protection principles applicable to the Federal Government. The Constitution's guarantee of equality must at the very least mean that a bare congressional desire to harm a politically unpopular group cannot justify disparate treatment of that group," Justice Kennedy wrote.
What many do not seem to understand is that the ruling does not legalize homosexual marriage, it just says that in the handful of states where gays can marry, the federal government should not discriminate against homosexuals by denying them health benefits and so forth.
In states like Texas and 37 other states where homosexual marriage is illegal and marriage is defined in the state constitutions as a union between "one man and one woman", homosexuals cannot marry nor can they receive government benefits.
Article I section 32 of the Texas Constitution states:
MARRIAGE. (a) Marriage in this state shall consist only of the union of one man and one woman. (b) This state or a political subdivision of this state may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage. (Added Nov. 8, 2005.) (pop-up)
The Supreme Court in fact recognizes the power of the States to define marriage as that between a woman and a man, and in today's ruling opined:
"Subject to certain constitutional guarantees, see, e.g., Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1, regulation of domestic relations is an area that has long been regarded as a virtually exclusive province of the States, Sosna v. Iowa, 419 U. S. 393, 404. The significance of state responsibilities for the definition and regulation of marriage dates to the Nation’s beginning; for when the Constitution was adopted the common understanding was that the domestic relations of husband and wife and parent and child were matters reserved to the States. Ohio ex rel. Popovici v. Agler, 280 U. S. 379, 383–384. Marriage laws may vary from State to State, but they are consistent within each State."
Chief Justice John G. Roberts and Antonin Scalia opined that the Supreme Court lacked jurisdiction to hear the case, and that the law (DOMA) should have been left in place defining marriage as a union between one man and one woman.
Scalia, in dissenting said the Supreme Court lacked the power to redefine or overturn what was voted on and signed into law by the president who at the time was Bill Clinton:
"This case is about power in several respects. It is about the power of our people to govern themselves, and the power of this Court to pronounce the law. Today’s opinion aggrandizes the latter, with the predictable consequence of diminishing the former. We have no power to decide this case. And even if we did, we have no power under the Constitution to invalidate this democratically adopted legislation. The Court’s errors on both points spring forth from the same diseased root: an exalted conception of the role of this institution in America," Scalia wrote.
"That is jaw-dropping. It is an assertion of judicial supremacy over the people’s Representatives in Congress and the Executive. It envisions a Supreme Court standing (or rather enthroned) at the apex of government, empowered to decide all constitutional questions, always and every- where “primary” in its role.
"This image of the Court would have been unrecognizable to those who wrote and ratified our national charter. They knew well the dangers of “primary” power, and so created branches of government that would be “perfectly coordinate by the terms of their common commission,” none of which branches could “pretend to an exclusive or superior right of settling the boundaries between their respective powers.” The Federalist, No. 49, p. 314 (C. Rossitered. 1961) (J. Madison)," Scalia added.
Scalia then goes rogue and talks about direct confrontation with the president:
"To be sure, if Congress cannot invoke our authority in the way that JUSTICE ALITO proposes, then its only recourse is to confront the President directly. Unimaginable evil this is not. Our system is designed for confrontation. That is what "[a]mbition . . . counteract[ing] ambition," The Federalist, No. 51, at 322 (J. Madison), is all about."
"If majorities in both Houses of Congress care enough about the matter, they have available innumerable ways to compel executive action without a lawsuit—from refusing to confirm Presidential appointees to the elimination of funding. (Nothing says "enforce the Act" quite like ". . . or you will have money for little else.") But the condition is crucial; Congress must care enough to act against the President itself, not merely enough to instruct its lawyers to ask us to do so. Placing the Constitution’s entirely anticipated political arm wrestling into permanent judicial receivership does not do the system a favor. And by the way, if the President loses the lawsuit but does not faithfully implement the Court’s decree, just as he did not faithfully implement Congress’s statute, what then? Only Congress can bring him to heel by . . . what do you think? Yes: a direct confrontation with the President."
Scalia ends by saying:"...The Court has cheated both sides, robbing the winners of an honest victory, and the losers of the peace that comes from a fair defeat. We owed both of them better. I dissent."
California Proposition 8 ruling - round two is on its way
As for Prop 8 that was voted into law by Californians defining marriage between one woman and one man, the Supreme Court essentially ruled that the Appeals Court lacked jurisdiction to hear the case therefore any order that emanated from those proceedings was void since the petitioners lacked standing. The Court then remanded the case to the lower court and vacated the previous judgment.
This means the battle to define marriage in California is just beginning. Since the case has been sent back to the lower court, the options are either to file a motion in federal court for a new trial or start all over again in the state courts with a brand new case. Either way, since the Democrats own the courts in California, this case is likely to go back the US Supreme Court, since they refused to interfere with or redefine the state's description of marriage. Add Comments>>
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