Radical Activist Judges forcing immoral homosexual marriage
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| U.S. Supreme Court building. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
2014 has started with a bang... a few days before the end of last year, an activist federal judge in Utah issued a ludicrous decision striking down that state's constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman.
He did this despite the Supreme Court ruling last summer (in the Windsor case) that clearly upheld a state's right to define and regulate marriage. He also ignored past legal precedent from the Supreme Court defending the legality of state constitutional marriage amendments. Rather than rely on precedent, he engaged in rampant speculation that eventually the U. S. Supreme Court would agree with him to make marriage genderless. Talk about imposing a personal viewpoint contrary to law!
Well, in the first few weeks of new year, another activist federal judge in Oklahoma has done the same thing — throwing out Oklahoma's constitutional amendment defending marriage!
This time, the judge, Terrance Kern, pretty much admitted his outright activism when he wrote in his decision: "There is no precise legal label for what has occurred in Supreme Court jurisprudence beginning with Romer in 1996 and culminating in Windsor in 2013, but this Court knows a rhetorical shift when it sees one."
Well, there is a legal label for this: judicial activism!
While Justice Kern may sense a "rhetorical" shift, there has been no legal shift — the U. S. Supreme Court continues to support a state's right to define marriage as it sees fit.
Fortunately, both Utah and Oklahoma are appealing these absurd rulings, and they stand on extremely firm legal ground. The Supreme Court has already intervened on Utah's behalf and unanimously granted its request for a stay against the enforcement of the decision, allowing them to defend the law in court in an orderly manner.
The fact that the Supreme Court intervened to stop this radical imposition of judicial will is an enormous victory! Many legal experts note that granting a stay like this suggests that the Court finds merit in Utah's position that it has the right to define marriage in its state.
Going forward, 2014 will be a critical year for marriage in our society. Despite what same-sex 'marriage' activists and the media want you to believe, there is a lot that we can do to successfully defend marriage.
NOM will support our strategic initiatives designed to:
- Elect a pro-marriage majority to the United States Senate — essential for advancing legislation at the federal level and blocking President Obama from appointing more extremist judges to the federal courts;
- Lobby for federal legislation that protects marriage, like Representative Tim Huelskamp's Federal Marriage Amendment; as well as legislation that protects ordinary citizens who believe in marriage from governmental reprisal — like theMarriage and Religious Freedom Act(sponsored in the House by Rep. Raul Labrador and in the Senate by Senator Mike Lee), and yet-to-be-introduced legislation that NOM is working on which will protect private business owners from having to abandon their beliefs under threat of government sanctions;
- Defend marriage on the state level — because when states redefine marriage, it makes advancing federal protections more difficult, impacts ordinary citizens residing in those states, and entrenches policies that affect children for generations to come;
- Advance marriage protections on the state level — states, when given the chance to vote on the definition of marriage and amend their constitution to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman, have overwhelmingly done so;
- Hold state legislators all across the country accountable for their votes to redefine marriage.
This is all in addition to our work holding the IRS accountable through our ongoing lawsuit, our national and state-based education campaigns, and special projects like this year's March for Marriage (the details of which I'll be sending you soon)!
You can be assured that the radical same-sex 'marriage' movement will not lessen its resolve to shoehorn their disastrous agenda through the legislatures and the court system in 2014.
