Yet
this is going to be an issue that will remain with us for some time, and I
found it amusing to read a Washington Post account of how this could merely
trigger another legal battle that will have to be resolved by the nation’s high
court.
MANY
ACTIVIST TYPES whom I have encountered seem to be going on the belief that gay
marriage’s time has arrived. A majority of the court will wind up deciding that
this is not an issue that should be settled state-by-state.
There
ought to be a single national policy, and the idea of a patchwork network with
some states going absolutely out of their way to say “No!!!” to the idea of gay
couples being married just isn’t workable.
However,
I also know from experience that anybody who tries to predict what a court will
do is a fool. This is a court with conservative leanings, and I noticed the
Post reporting that Justice Antonin Scalia said during Tuesday’s questioning
that he is reluctant to support anything that would be “unpalatable” to
religious-motivated people. I doubt he's alone.
There
may well be people who will “go down with the ship,” so to speak, on the issue
of preventing gay couples from being able to wed (and get all the legal
benefits that heterosexual married couples receive).
IF
WE GET a patchwork of laws on this issue, it would seem that Illinois would
remain a sympathetic place. Illinois may have been far from the first
Midwestern state to take on the issue, but it ultimately had a Legislature and
governor sign changes into law.
That
may well wind up being the biggest part of former Gov. Pat Quinn’s legacy –
although I’m sure there also are those individuals in Illinois who would want
to demonize him for that very fact.
But
those states who wound up having gay marriage imposed on them by courts
striking down their laws against it (which Illinois used to have, the two
mid-1990s years of Republican domination of state government included passage
of a law prohibiting marriage for gay couples) may wind up engaging in a mad
dash to see how quickly they could reinstate such conditions.
That
could well include Indiana, where certain political people are peeved that
their laws were taken down and that their attempt to make a symbolic gesture to
the conservative ideologues (in the form of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act)
drew so much hostile attention that they had to back off.
STATE
LINE ROAD could well become a barrier for certain people – a place where they
will have to make sure they don’t venture too far east for fear of getting
caught on the “wrong” side of the Chicago area after dark. Although some
Hoosier municipalities are trying to sway their Legislature to the “proper” side of
this issue.
As
for those couples who already have married, would they find themselves
invalidated. The Post reported that it could well turn into another legal battle
as to whether those marriages would be undone, or if we’d have certain gay
couples who got married on a technicality and others who can’t because of
timing.
It
seems like the easiest thing to do would be to just accept the reality of our
society these days. It’s here, and going nowhere – except perhaps in the minds
of the ideologues who think everybody else ought to live in their world in a
subservient position.
Although
I suspect that regardless of how the high court ultimately rules, it won’t
change the sentiments of some people with regards to marriage.
THEY’LL
BE THE ones who will grimace every time they see a gay couple together –
probably the same way they are bothered by the sight of an inter-racial couple.
The
essence of human nature won’t change.
But
what can change, and what should change, is the idea that those individuals’
hang-ups ought to have the protection of the letter of the law.
That
is what our Supreme Court will have to resolve in coming weeks.
-30-
No comments:
Post a Comment