SCOTUS-Pocus: Misreading The Constitution, Diluting The Meaning Of Marriage
I start my SCOTUS-Pocus series about the dilution of the meaning of marriage in American society, thanks to a misreading of the Constitution.
There’s a reason why people say you should never discuss politics or religion in public… two subjects that are touch points for heated arguments.
Jumping Feet First
On June 26, 2015, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) jumped feet-first into both those areas in one fell swoop, rendering a majority opinion and ruling that affects all Americans, though it intended to affect only the approximately 4% of Americans who identify as gay/lesbian (percentage as of the latest Gallop Poll as of this writing).
The so-called “gay marriage” decision, in which SCOTUS, predictably along ideological lines, voted in a squeaker 5-4 decision to effectively force States to both license same-sex unions, and recognize such unions performed and granted in other States.
As would likely be expected, Ginsberg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan, all well-known liberal thinkers ideologically, were joined by so-called “swing voter” Kennedy, who himself is seen by many to have abandoned his prior decision on DOMA and states’ rights issues, to join with his strongly-liberal benchmates to render gay marriage mandatory. Predictably, the most conservative justices on the bench today, Thomas, Roberts, Scalia, and Alito, each rendered dissenting opinions.
I cannot say everyone, whether gay or straight, who expresses an opinion on this issue will have done this, but I took the time the other day to actually read through the entire text of the decision, and both majority and dissenting opinions.
Misinterpreting the Constitution
The majority opinion can be boiled down to the argument that the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution guarantees the right of gays to marry, making use of the “due process” clause to make this assertion as “equality under the law”.
The dissenting opinions viewed this as an overreach of the concept of due process, given the clear fact that that the Constitution does not specifically grant that “marriage” (or other issues like the right to vote) is a fundamental right in its “life, liberty, and property” provision for due process.
This is the reason why civil rights, right to vote, etc., have specifically been put into the Constitution via amendments. When something like “marriage equality” does not specifically exist in the Constitution (and it doesn’t), the People, if wishing to place a Federal stamp of approval upon it, need to draft an Amendment to the Constitution and go through the process of getting it ratified. But that didn’t happen here.
A bare majority of justices have taken it upon themselves to ignore their own Constitutionally-granted powers and attempt to legislate their own godlessly-liberal social engineering on the behalf of 3.8% of the overall population, while seeming to ignore the rights of the other 96.2% of the US population. By doing this, they have opened a Pandora’s box of problems, not only for themselves and the Supreme Court’s legitimacy, but also for our society. These five rogue justices have deliberately chosen to ignore the Constitution, natural law, and human history, while at the same time using the Orwellian “doublespeak” of saying they are upholding the Constitution and recognizing “changing definitions of marriage” within human history (which definitions are, in actuality, non-existent).
Playing SCOTUS-Pocus
Because of the hocus-pocus way that the majority “interpreted” the Fourteenth Amendment, they have in actuality, invalidated the effect of the Tenth Amendment, the one that deals with the concept of Federalism.
Since there is, in reality, no Constitutional phraseology that specifically mentions or mandates the Federal government to license, legislate, or control marriage at all, this clearly means that it is not the duty of the Federal government, but the States, to define, dictate, and license wedded unions and all the privileges and benefits that come along with the legal definition of “marriage”, in whatever manner the States see fit.
Put simply, it is the States – not the Federal government – that are responsible for defining what marriage is, who can be married, what privileges and benefits will be bestowed upon, and what responsibilities will be required of married couples.
So, what does their decision, that reads more like a campfire story that will end with Kennedy breaking out a guitar and leading everyone in a chorus of “Kumbaya”, mean for the States, for gays and straights, and for our society overall?
The immediate ramifications of this ridiculously-worded decision are obvious: the States would need to change their laws to accommodate the SCOTUS’s legislative overreach, and recognize the validity of same-sex unions filed in other states. Additionally, the States would need to modify their existing legislation governing unions of marriage, to include same-sex partnerships.
And don’t we wish that was all there was to it. Unfortunately, there’s more.
The Slippery Slope
Let’s drag this out even further down the slippery slope that Kennedy and the four liberal justices have pushed society down. Because of the way that the majority decision is worded, Kennedy has in actuality tacitly given a legal protection to any thought, word, deed, or belief that an individual citizen chooses, to be considered on the same exact status as the justices have afforded to gay “marriage”, regardless of whether or not such thought, word, deed, or belief is currently prohibited by any law of the States. Now follow me on this, because here’s where someone will say, “That can’t happen.”
As of this writing, I have already seen comments from an association that seeks to advance and protect the “rights” of known pedophiles that this ruling would apply equally to pedophiles, not as a prohibited practice and a “mental disorder”, but as a natural, alternative lifestyle, no different than gays, lesbians, or transgenders.
Can It Really Happen?
And before you say “that can’t happen”, read Kennedy’s decision AGAIN. This is EXACTLY what SCOTUS has done – they have enabled anyone who chooses to do so, to claim that their words, deeds, beliefs, or lifestyle has equal protection under the law, regardless of their moral or legal standing.
So, a pedophile could be caught in the act, arrested, and in his or her defense, make the claim that they have equal protection under the SCOTUS’s interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment. And despite the fact that many would still consider pedophile practice to be illegal and abhorrent, the Court, legally bound to be governed by the mandate of Friday’s SCOTUS decision on gay “marriage”, would be powerless to prosecute the pedophile.
Here’s another slippery slope issue that is in reality, a double-edged sword for homosexuals and others. Recall the Sweet Cakes by Melissa issue in Oregon, when the owners Aaron and Melissa Klein were sued by Rachel Cryer and Laurel Bowman under that state’s flawed “equal rights” law. Recall that the administrative judge sided with the lesbian plaintiffs, and fined the Kleins over $100,000 for supposedly “violating the rights” of the plaintiffs.
Now again, this requires you to think through the process.
Is It Really Equal?
Now that SCOTUS has given legal protection to any thought, deed, action, or belief in the name of “equal protection under the law”, this equal protection MUST also apply to Christians who choose not to honor or recognize the wedded union of homosexual partners, or even those who choose to speak out against the practice of homosexuality, because of the person’s religious belief that homosexuality is a sin. Because of the way Kennedy worded the decision and opinion, Christians will have a clear and equal right to speak out against homosexual practice without fear of being sued or targeted by others or by the government, which is clearly not what homosexual activists wanted or intended with this decision.
Equally, consider a discussion I read over the weekend on BearingArms.com that holds Barack Obama and other gun-control advocates hostage by the same SCOTUS ruling they so dearly fought for (and some allege they bribed Justice Kennedy up to $1.5 million for). There are a number of states (interestingly the same number of states who prior to Friday, had gay “marriage” laws) who have concealed-carry gun laws. Because of the SCOTUS decision, the same logic they used to mandate that gay “marriage” must be permitted in all 50 states, is the same logic that must now allow persons with concealed-carry permits in one state to carry a firearm in a state that would otherwise have prohibited concealed-carry.
Unintended Consequences
And if you think about it, there more examples than gay “marriage” and firearms protections that can and will apply in all States, because of the SCOTUS decision on Friday. It will only be a matter of time until all these come out of the closet (pardon the pun) and are litigated.
President Obama, the mainstream godlessly-liberal media, and the ultra-liberal “militant gay faction” has, with the stroke of Kennedy’s pen, shot themselves in the foot with this new-found “equality under the law” for gay “marriage”. They have created a raft of unintended consequences that will, in the final analysis, do one of several things.
One, it could push this country toward finding a way to repeal the SCOTUS decision. Two, it could drag this country into a morass of lawlessness under the guise that anything one can do or say can be considered “equally protected”. Three, it could pull this country apart in a new American Revolution, one that will pit a tyrannical government that deliberately and maliciously refuses to honor the Constitution, against those of personal faith and morality who love their country and want to see it continue to be blessed by the G-d of all creation.
Next: Dispelling the Myths
