Gay marriage Ban Struck Down in Utah.

[SteveRogers]

This is a federal case. Doesn't this mean gay marriage has to be legalized throughout the whole country?

Not yet. The District Court only has jurisdiction over Utah. Next it'll go to the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. As in the California case, expect the appellate court to issue a stay on the ruling pending appeal. If the 10th Circuit upholds the decision, that would create a binding precedent in four additional states. Because this is overturning a state ban, that would likely mean immediate legalization in those states because it's unlikely that the 10th circuit would be able to draft a narrow ruling like the 9th circuit did which limited the application to California alone.

THEN it's on to SCOTUS. If they take the case and uphold the ruling, then it's game over. Gay marriage everywhere. The other big difference between this and the Prop 8 case is that Utah will actually be defending the law, so the Supreme Court can't punt the case on a standing technicality.

Exciting stuff.

[SteveRogers]

I agree.  This is the case that will go to the Supreme Court.  I think Windsor vs. United States was the groundbreaking case, but the case from Utah has got to wind up coming before Justice Kennedy and I think he is going to be the fifth vote to repeal all of the marriage bans.

I don't get why people think Kennedy is so rock solid on this issue. Just because he overturned DOMA? Any real conservative would be against DOMA because it violates states rights. The difference is that Kennedy isn't a hypocrite whereas most of the GOP (including Scalia, Thomas, Alito, and Roberts) is.

No doubt Kennedy is playing his cards close to his chest on this issue. There's no way to know for sure what he'll do. But he's given a few hopeful signs. Like you said, everyone expected Kennedy to vote to overturn DOMA on state's rights grounds, but the equal protection language in his decision in Windsor was way stronger than anyone expected it to be. You had all the state's rights stuff, but then he threw in the "bare animus" language. Now its true that in that case state's rights and equal protection pointed in the same direction while when it comes time to overturn state bans the two will be in tension. However I think Kennedy knew that state courts would start citing Windsor to overturn their own bans (as NJ and New Mexico have done). If he didn't plan on that happening, he would have just couched the Windsor decision in strong states' rights language.

The other promising sign is that, contrary to expectations, Kennedy ended up dissenting on the standing issue in Hollingsworth, meaning he was ready to decide the issue on its merits.

[SteveRogers]

At this point, the only hope of SSM opponents is that one of the five justices in the majority on Windsor leaves the Court and either Obama messes up and appoints a SSM opponent or that the GOP retakes the Senate next November and blocks all Obama nominations in hopes of having a Republican win the White House in 2016.  I just see no way that anyone who signed onto Kennedy's opinion in Windsor could uphold the existing SSM bans.  The only reason the court moved slowly was to give the country more time to change its views on its own before the inevitable decision is handed down.  The court does not want SSM to become another issue like abortion where it moved way ahead of public opinion and prevented it from forming on its own.

Don't you think some case is going to reach the Supreme Court before 2017 though?  I think the only real hope is either that Kennedy has a come to Jesus moment and decides to draw some arbitrary line in the sand or that one of the 4 Democratic appointed justices or Kennedy leaves the court suddenty and Republicans can delay a new appointment by an unprecedented amount of time.

Or maybe the Republican congress could take away the subject matter jurisdiction of the lower courts over same-sex marriage cases.  That's impossible too though because it would require a veto override or a Republican President. 

The time between the District court ruling and the Supreme Court decision in the prop 8 case was about 2 years and 11 months. So if this case were to follow a similar timeline we'd be talking about a decision in late 2016 or early 2017. We won't get a Supreme Court ruling before then.

[SteveRogers]

A question for those comparing this to Roe.

What Percentage of Americans would have to back gay marriage for you to say:     

"Okay, the Country is ready for this now."  ?

I'd say 60% and 37-40 States should be good.

The cause for marriage equality seems to have a pretty bright future through State initiatives, and the SC decision could be limited to making the last few opponents abide once everyone else already has.

The country didn't have that level of support for Brown in 1954. There was backlash. It was bad. People got over it. We all recognize it as being the right decision today.

State initiatives have been moving along at a surprising pace, but sadly we're still talking about leaving gays in the South high and dry until sometime in the 2030s if change is limited to the state by state approach.

I'd like to think the big difference between this and Roe is that once a state has had gay marriage for a little while and people see that letting gay couples get marry does not in fact lead to the "destruction of marriage" or the unraveling of society as we know it, all of the right's arguments against gay marriage start to ring hollow. This is the first deep red state (atlas blue, I know). Let's see how that plays out.

[SteveRogers]

http://fox13now.com/2013/12/22/10th-circuit-court-denies-utahs-emergency-motion-for-temporary-stay/

10th Circuit Court denies Utah’s Emergency Motion for Temporary Stay

Utah Gov. Gary R. Herbert filed seeking an Emergency Motion for Temporary Stay following a federal judge’s ruling that struck down Utah’s ban on same-sex marriage, and on Sunday the United States Court of Appeals Tenth District denied the motion.

According to court documents, “The Defendants-Appellants ask this court to stay the district court’s order pending the district court’s ruling on a motion for stay pending appeal that is currently pending in that court.”

According to the documents, the filing for an Emergency Motion for Temporary Stay did not address nor satisfy the factors that must be established to be entitled to a stay pending an appeal. The denial is without prejudice if the defendants-appellants file a motion for stay pending appeal that complies with regulations.

Hahaha it's a Christmas miracle!

[SteveRogers]

The people and representatives of Utah together banned it. The federal government needs to respect the will of the citizens of Utah and California to maintain and enforce their bans of gay marriage. Article 1 Section 8 and the 10th Amendment apply in this case. Keep standing against this activist judge and enforce the ban in the name of the Constitution.  Liberty without Morality is anarchy

So what do you think of the 14th amendment? Cite the 10th amendment all you want, but the 10th amendment gives powers to the states except for "those prohibited by it [the constitution] to the states". The 14th amendment expressly prohibits the states from passing certain laws. Whether or not those laws are backed by ballot initiatives is entirely irrelevant. So do you have a rebuttal to a 14th amendment argument, or are you just going to keep parroting the same nonsense?