SCOTUS Irony re: Gay Marriage

TIDE-HSV said:

That's pretty much the rule now. A priest, pastor or rabbi should be just in a different category from a shopkeeper. That really should be a 1st Amendment issue, as you indicate. If you'd asked me about five years ago, I'd've said that it was a settled issue. Scalia, of course, raised that bugaboo in orals the other day. Kagan disagreed. If the holding favors SS marriage, I wouldn't be surprised at all if the opinion didn't contain some legal limitations, to keep away from the 1st Amendment question in the future. In fact, the test case is already ready, out of Idaho, of all places. Coeur d'Alene has an ordinance requiring clergy of any sort to perform gay marriages. The owners of a wedding chapel (clergy!?!?) have been fined, for refusal to perform such. I also wouldn't be surprised to see a test case out of Alabama. Our statutes list who may perform marriages, not who must. Some judges of probate (Mobile) have declined to perform any marriages at all. This obviously raises the same issue. As I said, the supreme court may choose to solve this in advance, with a 1st Amendment protection built-in, if SS marriage is upheld. JMHO, but Kennedy's questioning didn't look good for SSM. OTOH, Roberts' questions showed some surprising twists. As I think I've said above, some place, at this point, I wouldn't be totally surprised by a decision favoring SSM, but with Roberts writing a separate, concurring opinion, based narrowly on sexual discrimination, rather than a broad constitutional right. Going to be interesting...

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Although the word dignity has appeared in more than 900 Supreme Court opinions, Justice Kennedy, as Kenji Yoshino of NYU has noted, has been especially drawn to it. He has referred to “dignity” in cases ranging from partial-birth abortions to prisons. As Yoshino puts it, “When Justice Kennedy ascribes dignity to an entity, that entity generally prevails.” Kennedy’s recognition of the dignity interests of LGBT couples has been influential in persuading lower court judges to strike down bans on same-sex marriage. But although Kennedy’s description of the dignitary interests of LGBT couples is inspiring, and it accurately describes their social experience, the roots of the right to dignity in constitutional text, history, and tradition are harder to discern.

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What courts would do when confronted with the clashing dignitary rights of the religious wedding photographer and the gay couple, or the hunter and the victim of gun violence, is anyone’s guess, because dignity is such an abstract concept that its boundaries are difficult to discern.

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CajunCrimson said:

I never thought I'd live in a world where I would be allowed to marry seebell.....

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Originally Posted by TIDE-HSV
That's pretty much the rule now. A priest, pastor or rabbi should be just in a different category from a shopkeeper. That really should be a 1st Amendment issue, as you indicate. If you'd asked me about five years ago, I'd've said that it was a settled issue. Scalia, of course, raised that bugaboo in orals the other day. Kagan disagreed. If the holding favors SS marriage, I wouldn't be surprised at all if the opinion didn't contain some legal limitations, to keep away from the 1st Amendment question in the future. In fact, the test case is already ready, out of Idaho, of all places. Coeur d'Alene has an ordinance requiring clergy of any sort to perform gay marriages. The owners of a wedding chapel (clergy!?!?) have been fined, for refusal to perform such. I also wouldn't be surprised to see a test case out of Alabama. Our statutes list who may perform marriages, not who must. Some judges of probate (Mobile) have declined to perform any marriages at all. This obviously raises the same issue. As I said, the supreme court may choose to solve this in advance, with a 1st Amendment protection built-in, if SS marriage is upheld. JMHO, but Kennedy's questioning didn't look good for SSM. OTOH, Roberts' questions showed some surprising twists. As I think I've said above, some place, at this point, I wouldn't be totally surprised by a decision favoring SSM, but with Roberts writing a separate, concurring opinion, based narrowly on sexual discrimination, rather than a broad constitutional right. Going to be interesting...

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Crimson1967 said:

I think we had a thread about that Idaho case a while back.


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Tide1986 said:

Here's an interesting article on the "right to dignity" and Justice Kennedy:

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/04/the-dangerous-doctrine-of-dignity/391796/



Seems like Kennedy will rule in favor of ssm, regardless of the slippery slope that the "right to dignity" represents (if in fact he decides to assert this right once again). And, seems like we will still have a conflict with the right to religious freedom, which is expressly protected by the Constitution. Conservative Christians simply need to claim their right to dignity to live as Christians and not be ostracized and demeaned for their religion when they don't want to bake cakes, perform marriage ceremonies, arrange flowers, or even perform music for a ssm.

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