On the USSC

[H2O Man]

“ ‘Justice is on our side and we won’t stop until equality reaches every corner of our vast country,’ Mr. Griffin said in a statement.”

Chad Griffin; President of Human Rights Campaign
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2012/1208/Same-sex-marriage-Waiting-now-for-the-Supreme-Court-to-act/(page)/2


I was pleased to see that the US Supreme Court will be hearing an appeal on the issue of marriage equality, with an opinion anticipated in June of 2013. It seems most likely to me that the Court will support marriage equality in a 5-4 vote. Interestingly, I’m confident that they majority will base their ruling on Amendment 14, while the minority will root their opinions based upon a purposeful misinterpretation of Amendment 1.

Let’s look first to the important section of Amendment 14‘s Section 1:

“No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

Marriage is both a civil and human right. “Equal protection” applies clearly to marriage equality. Obviously, our nation has denied both groups and individuals numerous basic rights in the past, and that unpleasant reality applies here. However, the times, they are a’changing. And it seems clear that five of the Justices on the Supreme Court will recognize, and rule upon, this very clear rule of law.

The “state” has no actual interest, in any legal sense, that justifies the denial of marriage equality. In order to claim a valid interest, the state would be required to identify some illegality that could result in that “due process of law” noted in Section 1. Previous USSC decisions -- or Constitutional Law -- has already shut the door on that.

Hence, the opponents of marriage equality -- those who wish to deny other people the very same rights they enjoy -- are reduced to making historically incorrect and religious arguments. In the above quoted/linked article, a church official states:

"The U.S. Supreme Court's decision to hear these cases is a significant moment for our nation. I pray the Court will affirm the fact that the institution of marriage, which is as old as humanity and written in our very nature, is the union of one man and one woman.”

This, of course, brings us to Constitutional Law as it applies to religion:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

There have been on-going disagreements on exactly what the relationship between church and state is, since the founding of the nation. Indeed, for years, this Amendment 1 restriction on government was interpreted as being exclusive to the federal government. Various individual states had laws that favored specific denominations, and restricted the rights of all others.

Even the great concept of a wall between church and state remains debated, and widely misunderstood to this day. While there are people on the political left who mistakenly believe that churches cannot and should not be active in things political at all, there are clearly far, far more on the political right that mistakenly believe that churches have an unlimited role in politics that is justified by their individual beliefs.

Thus, while progressive religious leaders have been involved in socio-political issues, such as the Civil Rights Movement and anti-war movement in the 1960s, they did not violate Amendment 1 in any way. Quite the opposite: those cases that were heard in the federal court system, including in the USSC, often helped give definition to those rights -- as in the case of Uncle Sam vs. Muhammad Ali. Clearly, what these types of cases have in common is that they seek to enhance the right of individuals and groups, in a manner that is legal and causes no harm to others.

The right-wing socio-political advocates of religion, on the other hand, consistently seek to limit the rights of those individuals and groups that do not subscribe to their particular viewpoint. The history of their attempts has never yet been based upon the target groups’ doing damage to anyone. This causes them to rely upon such weak arguments as their “way of life,” which could mean the tradition of restricting non-white people on public buses, or paying females less than males.

When their legal and historical errors are addressed, they then resort to their religious beliefs, which are by definition narrow and exclusionary. It’s a fact that they expect the state to endorse their particular religious beliefs -- as if others do not have an equal right to their own beliefs, or no religious beliefs at all. Sad to say that not only in the past, fundamental civil and human rights have been denied to individuals and groups, based upon corrupt religious rot ….but we can fully expect at least two, and probably four, of today’s Justices to rule in favor of religious intolerance and abuse.

It will be interesting.