ZOMG, DOMA'S DOWN!!!

[neadods]

SCOTUS STRUCK DOWN DOMA! SCOTUS STRUCK DOWN DOMA!

It's worse than election night, the way I keep hitting "refresh" on Google news and flapping my hands around. Will they go for the gold and slaughter Prop 8?

Comments

[easy-living.livejournal.com]

I went the easy route with the SCOTUSBlog live feed. Much less wear on my F5 key that way.

[neadods.livejournal.com]

Now that I know about that, I'll keep an eye on it next time.

[lagilman]

No standing on Prop8, so it remains invalidated.

[neadods.livejournal.com]

Huzzah!

[acroyear70.livejournal.com]

If they were going to repeal Prop 8, they would have had to have started by also invalidating DOMA section 2 (states do not have to recognize same-sex marriages from other states). That they didn't indicated to me that they were looking specifically to the federal->individual relationship that was violated (5th and 14th amendments) by section 3, which was indeed the only aspect of DOMA that was directly challenged in this case.

Section 2 will take a lot more time, as it is very similar to the Loving... case of so many years ago. It requires someone explicitly getting married in one state then demanding that their own state acknowledge the marriage license, and only when that doesn't happen will they have standing to sue...and along the way, they can't get divorced or the courts will throw the case out anyways under "standing". (this is similar to how SCOTUS punted on "Under God" - the father wasn't the primary caregiver so he had no right to sue. Similarly, many school free speech cases often get thrown out because by the time the case reaches SCOTUS, the student has graduated and the school is no longer responsible for the situation.)

By the time Section 2's challenge reaches the courts, more, probably a majority, of states will recognize marriage equality, just as it was with Loving... (where there were only 16 states left with anti-interracial marriage laws).

[neadods.livejournal.com]

I hope the Section 2 case will come along soon - although the court probably hopes not. Scalia might as well have summed up the objection as "Gay cooties! Didn't I warn you about gay cooties a decade ago in Lawrence v Texas?"

It's still a victory today, and I'll take it. :D