Stephen Hyland, a partner with GLBT Couples Law, a member of the New Jersey Civil Union Review Commission, and author of New Jersey Domestic Partnerships: A Legal Guide, and Andy Koppelman, professor of law and political science at Northwestern University and the author of Same Sex, Different States: When Same-Sex Marriages Cross State Lines, talk about a recent court case in which a New Jersey judge broke legal ground by granting a divorce to gay couple.
Comments [13]
hjs: why do we have to work on outlawing divorce? Shop it to a judge and force it on everybody that way. That's the model you folks want to follow. Be consistent.
Kate: The Supreme Court should only interpret the law, not make the law.
If not, then what are legislatures for?
longstreet
divorce is new only about 30 years since it's become common place. human rights are only about 300 years old, only about 30 years also since it's become common place here in the land of the free.
letting about 5% have the right to marry who they want will not "turn everything on its ear"
if u are such the traditionalist lets work together to outlaw divorce. seems that has more impact on your "Millennia of tradition and law " than a few queers looking for legal protection of their shared assets.
"if you two want to turn everything on its ear, then do the hard work of convincing people to amend the laws, change their hearts, etc. That's how laws are made and changed all the time in the USA."
What is the purpose of the Supreme court, then?
HJS: Millenia of tradition and law are merely "whims." You are funny, my friend.
Kate: I guess you are calling for another civil war?
My point remains: if you two want to turn everything on its ear, then do the hard work of convincing people to amend the laws, change their hearts, etc. That's how laws are made and changed all the time in the USA.
But I guess that would actually be hard to do, so just take the easy way out and go to an ACLU-type judge to get what you want.
longstreet
"In other words" under our system we have 3 equal branches of government.
human rights should not be based on the whims of the majority
Longstreet,
I suppose it would have been a better idea for Lincoln to have waited for the Southern states to decide on their own to free the slaves?
hjs: In other words, if you know you can't win legislatively, then force the people to accept what you want by judicial decree.
It's funny how judges can always be relied on to find novel rights and entitlements that are nowhere mentioned in the law.
Nice try, pal.
Get married in churches get divorced in courts. It makes no sense.
longstreet
the courts have always had the function of protecting the rights of citizens and interpreting the constitution.
If I have a binational marriage from Canada and come back to the states can I sponsor my partner in NY/NJ?
This totally destroys the sanctity of the institution of divorce in New Jersey!
Perhaps your guest could address the fatal flaw in the homosexual lobby's strategy, which is always asking judges to short-circuit the democratic process?
Shouldn't those seeking to overthrow the established order be the ones who have to try to amend state constitutions? Why do those citizens, like me, who are content with the ways things have always been have to resort to amending the laws and constitutions in reaction to judicial decisions? It should be the other way around, and in a normal country, it would be.
By always shopping cases to sympathetic judges, homosexuals are ensuring that people like me never, ever join their cause because they don't respect the American legislative system.
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