Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Equal rights


The right for same sex marriage has landed in the Supreme Court-
Humor me & take a walk down previous Supreme court rulings-- 
* note some of the verbiage has been changed to reflect the current court case:

Chief Justice Earl Warren's opinion for the unanimous court held that:
Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man," fundamental to our very existence and survival.... To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the sexual orientation classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State's citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious sexual discrimination. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of the same sex resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State.


 "it is simply not possible for a state law to be valid under our Constitution which makes the prohibition of marriage dependent upon sexual orientation, or gender of those wishing to be legally married. 

The case quotes above are from the Loving V Virginia landmark civil rights case about interracial marriage (1967). The State of Virginia had draconian laws that made it a felony crime to have interracial marriage and or sex. 

PBS News hour has some good discussion, but basically one speaker from the "Alliance for American Freedom (to discriminate", want to keep this a state by state feud. 
I contend it is not good enough to have this mish mosh of marital recognition, and would it be acceptable for the hetero crowd to have their marriages not honored natiowide. Cross the state line, lose your marital rights, how is that OK?

Just for fun...



Note in the below graphic--- Maine & Maryland have been added to the "gay marriage is legal" list. 







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