Women and children, to put it gently, are at stake. The opinion--which hopefully will be overturned--states clearly that the judge felt that there was no compelling reason for the State of California to deny the right to marriage to homosexual couples.
However, marriage and family law in general is not predicated on the state recognizing relationships, being interested in people falling in love, or even being able to get a joint checking account without shame (actual example from the case). Rather, marriage and family law is designed to provide a straightforward framework for what happens when a family falls apart, in order to protect the interests of the weaker vessels in a family.
So what has this judge argued? Effectively, the interests of women and children are of no interest to the judge. We won't see the side effects immediately, but if the decision stands, we will see them.
Here's a more scholarly analysis from the HSLDA on the same topic. Again, if you are a woman or child, or have a woman or child you'd like to protect from the state and others, this is a horrendously dangerous decision to you. The state is ever more working to infringe on the special domain of the family.
Update: WND reports that the judge is an open homosexual, raising the question of why he did not recuse himself in a case where he obviously has a personal interest. Sounds like reason to vacate his decision, and quite frankly also to remove him from the bench.
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4 comments:
The WND update reveals the self-refuting nature of recognizing classes based on behavior, and inadvertently WND is playing into the false assumptions. A man who practices homosexual acts is not de facto incapable of interpreting the law correctly (Gore Vidal, for example, who opposes homosexual marriage), and should not therefore be recused.
This judge should be impeached, and probably jailed, not for being a sodomite, but for waving an imaginary scepter and creating an imaginary class of men called "gay." WND accepts this imaginary class by calling for his dismissal on the grounds of his pretend sexual identity.
Not quite sure what you mean. We define a class for recusal based on behavior all the time--for example, a judge who owns large amounts of oil company stock would be expected recuse himself from issues regarding BP's big spill.
I would agree the bigger issue is the bizaare application of the 14th Amendment, but this is a real, smaller issue.
Bike, ISTM that a heterosexual judge would have to recuse himself on the same grounds, given that samesex marriage pretty much undermines everything for everybody. So I'm not sure WND's approach is all that productive, although pointing out his obvious bias is far from irrelevant.
If HSLDA and I are right about what's really at stake, everyone has a vested interest in the next generation--or lack thereof. Imagine being cared for in a nursing home by people who knew your generation had hung them out to dry! ("we'll give you a little extra on the morphine here....")
Recusal generally occurs, though, when someone can award himself something he otherwise would not have had, which does not occur for a heterosexual judge, but could for a homosexual. If it could be demonstrated that the judge desired to "marry," then recusal would have been very appropriate.
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