Ungodly victory for same sex marriage

An age-long advocacy for marriage equality yielded fruit Friday with the US Supreme Court legalizing gay marriage amid missed reaction, EMEKA EJERE, writes

It was a dream come true for advocates of same sex marriage as the United States Supreme Court last Friday gave a ruling that legalized marriage between people of the same sex.
Striking down state marriage bans, the ruling means all US states must grant marriage licences to gay and lesbian couples and recognise such marriages that have taken place in other states. The Friday landmark ruling comes more than 40 years after the Supreme Court rejected a gay couple’s request for a marriage license.
In 1996, the US Congress passed and President Bill Clinton signed the Defence of Marriage Act, a law that prohibited federal recognition of same-sex marriages. But the ruling, a culmination of a long legal fight by gay rights advocates, followed steady gains in public approval in recent years for same-sex marriage.
In 2003, Massachusetts became the first state to legalise same-sex marriage after some judges ruled the state constitution allowed gay marriage, and marriage licences followed shortly after that. In the following years, a handful of states passed gay marriage bans while others began working towards allowing same-sex unions – either by court order or legislation.
A high-profile ban occurred by referendum in California in 2008 after courts had previously allowed same-sex marriage. This continued across the US until the Supreme Court heard a challenge to the Defence of Marriage Act in 2013.
What the justices decided
Jim Obergefell brought a lawsuit against the state of Ohio after the state refused to recognise his marriage to his late husband.
The justices, who had previously stopped short of resolving the question of same-sex marriage nationally, had to consider whether or not states were constitutionally required to issue marriage licences and if states were required to recognise same-sex marriages performed elsewhere.
Before the ruling
Before the ruling, 36 states were issuing marriage licences to same-sex couples, as well as Washington DC, which sets its own marriage laws, although it is not legally a state.

 
A referendum on gay marriage in California in 2008 put the legal status of previously performed marriages in question.
A critical turning point came in October 2014, when the Supreme Court chose not to hear appeals against lower court rulings that had overturned same-sex marriage bans – expanding the legality of gay unions to many more states.
In other states, same-sex marriage has been approved either through legislation or voter referenda. Michigan couples were briefly able to marry before a court stayed a ruling overturning its ban.
Key Supreme Court rulings
On 6 October 2014, the court turned away appeals from five states with gay marriage bans on the books that had challenged court rulings overturning those bans. In challenging the gay marriage bans, proponents relied on a 2013 Supreme Court ruling in the case of United States v Windsor.
Edith Windsor was the plaintiff in the last gay marriage case at the Supreme Court. In that case, the court overturned the Defence of Marriage Act (Doma), which barred the federal government from recognising same-sex marriages.
Under Doma, for example, individuals in same-sex marriages were ineligible for benefits from federal programmes such as the Social Security pension system and some tax allowances if their partners died.
Another key case, Hollingsworth v Perry of 2013, was filed by two lawyers, Theodore Olson and David Boies, working together on behalf of their California clients, Kristin Perry and Sandra Stier and another couple, Jeffrey Zarrillo and Paul Katami.
They argued that the Supreme Court should strike down a state law, called Proposition 8, which stated that marriage is between a man and a woman. The law, approved by California voters in 2008, overrode a state Supreme Court decision that allowed for same-sex marriage.
Life after the verdict
Immediately after the decision, same-sex couples in many of the states where gay marriage had been banned headed to county clerks’ offices for marriage licenses as officials in several states said they would respect the ruling.
President Barack Obama, appearing in the White House Rose Garden, hailed the ruling as a milestone in American justice that arrived “like a thunderbolt.”
“This ruling is a victory for America,” said Obama, the first sitting president to support gay marriage. “This decision affirms what millions of Americans already believe in their hearts. When all Americans are treated as equal, we are all more free.”
The Obama administration has always argued on the side of the same-sex marriage advocates. Former Secretary of State and Democratic presidential hopeful, Hilary Clinton described the ruling as a victory for marriage equality and commended the advocates of same sex marriage for their courage and determination.  She said, “Proud to celebrate a historic victory for marriage equality and the courage and determination of LGBT Americans who made it possible.
As night fell, the White House was lit in rainbow colors – a symbol of gay pride – to mark the high court’s decision.
The ruling, the culmination of a long legal fight by gay rights advocates, follows steady gains in public approval in recent years for same-sex marriage.
Conservatives say no
Conservatives denounced the ruling. Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee called it “an out-of-control act of unconstitutional judicial tyranny.”
Wisconsin Republican Governor Scott Walker, who is expected to run for president, called for amending the U.S. Constitution to allow states to again ban same-sex marriage. Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott said, “Marriage was defined by God. No man can redefine it.”
Archbishop Joseph Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said, “It is profoundly immoral and unjust for the government to declare that two people of the same sex can constitute a marriage.”
Opponents say same-sex marriage’s legality should be decided by states, not judges. Some opponents argue it is an affront to traditional marriage between a man and a woman and that the Bible condemns homosexuality.
Gay marriage is also gaining acceptance in other Western countries. Last month in Ireland, voters backed same-sex marriage by a landslide in a referendum that marked a dramatic social shift in the traditionally Roman Catholic country.
Ireland followed several Western European countries including Britain, France and Spain in allowing gay marriage, which is also legal in South Africa, Brazil and Canada. But homosexuality remains taboo and often illegal in many parts of Africa and Asia.
The Supreme Court’s ruling came in a consolidated case pulling together challenges filed by same-sex couples to gay marriage bans in Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee .