NOM BLOG

9th Circuit Case Pending Before SCOTUS Could Threaten State Marriage Laws

 

FoxNews quotes NOM's Chairman of the Board John Eastman:

"As the debate over gay marriage intensifies on the heels of President Obama's endorsement, an under-the-radar case pending before the Supreme Court has the potential, some say, to invalidate traditional marriage laws altogether.

The latest ruling comes from the California-based 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which said that Arizona's recent attempt to strip health benefits for domestic partners of state workers is illegal.

... But one veteran 9th Circuit judge thinks his colleagues have declared a war on marriage.

Those judges "all but expressly held that opposite-sex-only marriage rules are unconstitutional -- indeed, that such rules are irrational per se because they can rest only on a 'bare desire to harm a politically unpopular group,'" Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain wrote in dissent of his court's decision not to grant the case further review. He said his colleagues were ignoring Supreme Court precedent and all but called upon the high court to take the case. Arizona's attorney general recently filed a brief with the justices asking them to accept O'Scannlain's invitation.

Lawyer John Eastman, with the National Organization for Marriage, called the 9th Circuit ruling "groundbreaking," and one that could render traditional marriage laws across the country "unconstitutional" if it takes hold."

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