United States Supreme Court Redefines Marriage

Today is June 26, 2015.  Another one of those dates that will stick out in Americans' minds for the rest of time.  Our nation's Supreme Court issued its opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges, the "gay marriage" case that has now federalized the right of same sex couples to marry.  Very soon, we'll have other mixes of marriage, a man with 5 wives, two husbands and two wives, etc.  but that is another post for another time.

This is a very, very sad day.  Sad for personal reasons and sad for corporate reasons.  As a Christian who tries to follow God and obey the Bible, I cannot help but grieve for my nation.  My nation has defied the Lord and defiled His Word.  Marriage is not a right of the state.  It is sanctioned by God.  And in yet another realm, America has taken an official stand of opposing God.  That is a stance it will lose.  Abraham Lincoln bemoaned in 1863 that "we have forgotten God."  We have not forgotten Him, though.  We are actively warring against Him.  How foolish we are.

The Court was almost predictable with its 5-4 decision.  Anthony Kennedy was indeed the "swing" vote, siding with the liberal Stephen Breyer and the radical feminist Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the Obama appointees Kagan and Sotomayer.  The four conservatives, Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito each wrote their own dissenting opinions.  Something that is virtually unheard of.

The Court didn't really use the Constitution to justify its decision.  To be sure, they used the 14th Amendment's equal protection, due process clause, as the "legal" basis of their imperial edict.  But everyone on the Right and the Left knows exactly that these judges tinkered and gerrymandered our laws to fit a philosophical persuasion.

The Minority was scathing in their response.  Each dissenting judge took the unique step of issuing their own opinion.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote:

…this Court is not a legislature.   Whether same-sex marriage is a good idea should be of no concern to us.  Under the Constitution, judges have power to say what the law is, not what it should be…Although the policy arguments for extending marriage to same-sex couples may be compelling, the legal arguments for requiring such an extension are not.

Today, however, the Court takes the extraordinary step of ordering every State to license and recognize same-sex marriage.  Many people will rejoice at this decision, and I begrudge none their celebration.  But for those who believe in a government of laws, not of men, the majority’s approach is deeply disheartening…The majority’s decision is an act of will, not legal judgment.  The right it announces has no basis in the Constitution or this Court’s precedent.

Antonin Scalia wrote:

I join the Chief Justice’s opinion in full.  I write separately to call attention to this Court’s threat to American democracy...

This practice of constitutional revision by an unelected committee of nine, always accompanied (as it is today) by extravagant praise of liberty, robs the People of the most important liberty they asserted in the Declaration of Independence and won in the Revolution of 1776: the freedom to govern themselves.

Clarence Thomas bemoaned the tinkering of "due process" to fit whatever judges want it to fit, then said:

By straying from the text of the Constitution, substantive due process exalts judges at the expense of the People from whom they derive their authority.

 And Samuel Alito gave a prophetic warning to the overwhelming number of Americans who do not share this viewpoint of marriage:

I assume that those who cling to old beliefs will be able to whisper their thoughts in the recesses of their homes, but if they repeat those views in public, they will risk being labeled as bigots and treated as such by governments, employers, and schools.

Chief Justice John Roberts had asked somewhere in his dissenting opinion, "just who do we think we are?"  We think we are better than God.  We think we are higher than the Constitution.  We are a country bent on doing our own thing, whatever that takes.