Neff: In Texas, only gay marriage is til death do they part
Spouses can’t always take that bit about “till death do us part” literally.
And judges and lawyers don’t always take that bit about “till death do us part” literally either. Some dedicate their workdays dissolving such vows.
Yet in some states that don’t recognize same-sex marriages, same-sex marriages could last till death do they part.
Oh, these funny times.
A Dallas man, identified only as J.B. in court papers and the press, is trying to divorce a man he married four years ago in Massachusetts and separated from — amicably enough — two years ago.
J.B. was winning his case for divorce before District Judge Tena Callahan, when the Texas Attorney General tried to intervene and stop the process. It seems that because the state of Texas does not recognize same-sex marriages, the court shouldn’t divorce the two men, according to the AG.
Callahan ruled against the AG, which appealed her decision.
“My client is a married man and he needs a divorce. But for the actions of the attorney general, there would already be one less same-sex marriage in Texas,” attorney Jody Scheske told a three-judge appeals court panel in a hearing last week.
Oh, these funny times.
“The parties lack standing to file a divorce because they are not married. If you are not party to a marriage, you cannot file for a divorce,” an assistant Texas solicitor general argued last week before the federal appeals court.
The assistant Texas solicitor general said, the court should “void” the union not divorce the men.
An annulment, then, is Texas’ preferred alternative to a gay couple’s divorce.
Oh, these funny times.
The stakes in this Texas case are considerable, because in finding that she has standing to hear the gay man’s request for a divorce, Callahan also found that Texas’ 2005 constitutional amendment that defines marriage exclusively as a union between a man and a woman violates the right to equal protection and therefore violates the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
Had the Texas Attorney General not tried to intervene and block the court from hearing the divorce case, the district court judge might not have deemed the anti-gay amendment unconstitutional. We don’t know really. Callahan might have taken up the constitutional issue, or she simply might have granted the divorce.
Attorneys for J.B. say they didn’t want a constitutional fight or a federal case — just a divorce for their client.
“My client’s very private matter has become a public spectacle,” Scheske told the court last week.
Oh, these funny times.
J.B., seeking to end his marriage, is at the forefront of a legal dispute that could tear down a ban against gay marriage in Texas.
And opponents of gay marriage are worried, which is why the Plano-based right-wing Liberty Institute argued alongside the attorney general against what it called “judicial activism at it’s worst.”
Opposing J.B.’s divorce, Liberty Institute attorney Hiram Sasser said a gay divorce is an attack on same-sex marriage.
Oh, these funny times.
And Sasser, who said he represented the two authors of the anti-gay amendment that 76 percent of Texas voters supported in 2005, cited Bill Clinton in his defense of the Texas ban and his opposition to the gay couple’s divorce.
Clinton signed the federal Defense of Marriage Act that allowed states to refuse to honor another state’s same-sex marriage and defined marriage at the federal level as the union of one man and one woman.
“I think President Clinton said it best when he said we have to honor the decisions of the states,” Sasser said.
The former president, however, has said that his position on same-sex marriage is evolved and he “didn’t like signing DOMA.”
Oh, these funny times.
Prop 8 trial judge has history with gay rights activists
(San Francisco) The appointment of Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Richard Walker to the bench was held up for two years during the late 1980s in part because he had angered gay rights activists.
Now, he is presiding over the most important gay civil rights case in a generation.
Like a lot …
Judge shields signatures in gay rights referendum
(Olympia, Wash.) A federal judge on Thursday ordered the state of Washington to keep shielding the identities of people who signed petitions to force a vote on expanded benefits for gay couples.
U.S. District Judge Benjamin Settle in Tacoma granted the preliminary injunction involving petitions for Referendum 71 while a related …
IDs of gay partnership foes could be released next week
The names of people who signed petitions seeking to overturn Washington’s “everything but marriage” same-sex domestic partner law won’t be released publicly following a federal judge’s temporary restraining order.
Sponsors of Referendum 71 went to U.S. District Court in Tacoma Wednesday seeking the order. U.S. District Judge Benjamin Settle has set a full hearing on the matter for Sept. 3.
The names of everyone who signed Referendum-71 petitions are publicly available under open-government laws. A gay-rights group says it wants to post all the names online. But the R-71 campaign says that could lead to harassment.
Nick Handy, state elections director, said in a statement: “Referendum petitions become public records under the law once they have been turned over to us by sponsors. Our consistent practice has been to make these available upon public request. By early next week we will be in a position to make these available, and absent a court order, our intent has been to respond to public records requests in a timely way.”
Backers of R-71 turned in about 138,000 signatures Saturday. They need 120,577 valid voter signatures to qualify for the fall ballot.
Election officials suggest submitting about 150,000 signatures to offset any invalid signatures. Dave Ammons, spokesman for the secretary of state’s office, said usually about 18 percent of signatures checked turn out to be invalid.
The process of counting and verifying the signatures could go until the last week of August.
See IDs of gay partnership foes could be released next week Seattle Post Intelligencer
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Federal Judge Stresses Trial Record on Calif. Gay-Marriage Ban
Whatever Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker winds up deciding on Proposition 8, it’s clear he wants an airtight trial record to support it.
Holding his first hearing Thursday on the controversial measure that outlawed same-sex marriage, Walker repeatedly stressed the importance of establishing a record that will stand the test of time.
He told a packed courtroom that he was “reasonably sure” that the challenge launched by two high-profile litigators is “only touching down in this court” and merely a “prelude” for things to come.
“How we do things here,” Walker said, “is more important than what we do.”
He noted that other courts have rendered decisions on same-sex marriage without holding full trials, which he suggested was a “problem.”
Perry v. Schwarzenegger, 09-CV-2292, was filed in May by Theodore Olson, who represented George W. Bush in the landmark Bush v. Gore case, and David Boies, who represented Al Gore. Boies wasn’t present on Thursday. The suit attacks Prop 8 on equal protection and due process grounds.
Walker had already issued a tentative order allowing Prop 8 proponents to intervene and denying a preliminary injunction (pdf). He stood by both orders during Thursday’s 50-minute session.
Olson, a partner in Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher’s Washington, D.C., office who has argued before the U.S. Supreme Court 55 times, nonetheless made a fleeting attempt to persuade Walker to change his mind on the injunction.
“Every day that Prop 8 is enforced perpetuates a tragic injustice” on gays and lesbians, he argued, saying it “brands” them as “second-class citizens, unworthy and different.”
“The Supreme Court,” Olson argued, “has held again and again and again that the right to marry is the most important relationship in life.”
Representing the Prop 8 proponents, Washington attorney Charles Cooper, who was a top Justice Department lawyer during the Reagan administration, warned that the lawsuit could “sweep away” not only Prop 8, but the definition of marriage in 43 states and the federal government.
The Cooper & Kirk partner also argued that marriage has by tradition always been the union of a man and a woman, and said that every Supreme Court case that describes marriage has noted that its central purpose is procreation.
See Federal Judge Stresses Trial Record on Calif. Gay-Marriage Ban Above the Law
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Self-proclaimed ‘Christian’ group asks to fight suit on gay marriage
A self-anointed ‘Christian’ group that raised – and spent – pent more than $37 million in leading the campaign to pass Proposition 8 is now seeking to formally fight a federal lawsuit aimed at overturning California’s gay marriage ban.
The Alliance Defense Fund filed court papers Thursday asking U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker to allow it to defend the constitutionality of Proposition 8. Did you ever wonder how mnuch money they raised for ‘fighting gay marriage’ went to pay their own saleries?
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Transsexual wins $500,000 lawsuit
A federal judge has awarded a former Army Special Forces commander nearly $500,000 because she was rejected from a job at the Library of Congress while undergoing a gender change from man to woman. Diane Schroer of Alexandria, Va., applied for the terrorism analyst job while still a man named David Schroer. He was offered the job, but the offer was pulled after he told a library official that he was having surgery to change his gender. U.S. District Judge James Robinson ruled Tuesday that Schroer was entitled to $491,190 in back pay and damages because of sex discrimination. Schroer said she was happy with the judgment but more importantly that the judge recognized her treatment as job discrimination. She said it’s a problem many transgendered people face. “They are hugely underemployed, at best,” Schroer said. “If they are fortunate enough to get something, it’s well below their capabilities. It’s not just about money, it’s about knowing you are a valuable person.” Schroer said she feels more fortunate than many transsexuals who face job discrimination because her friends have helped her get work as a national security and counterterrorism consultant.
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Judge: Gay student club can’t be banned
(Jacksonville, Florida) A federal judge has ruled that a student club that promotes tolerance for gays at a north Florida high school must be allowed to meet.
U.S. District Judge Henry Adams issued the decision Wednesday in a case involving two students from Yullee High School near Jacksonville.
Adams ordered a local …
Gay Rights: Lesbian Sues Hospital Over Denied Access To Dying Partner
As her partner of 17 years slipped into a coma, Janice Langbehn pleaded with doctors and anyone who would listen to let her into the woman’s hospital room.
Eight anguishing hours passed before Langbehn would be allowed into Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center. By then, she could only say her final farewell as a priest performed the last rites on 39-year-old Lisa Marie Pond.
Jackson staffers advised Langbehn that she could not see Pond earlier because the hospital’s visitation policy in cases of emergency was limited to immediate family and spouses — not partners. In Florida, same-sex marriages or partnerships are not recognized. On Friday, two years after her partner’s death, Langbehn and her attorneys were in federal court, claiming emotional distress and negligence in a suit they filed last June.
Jackson attorneys filed a motion to dismiss the case on grounds that the hospital has no obligation to allow patients’ visitors.
Following a hearing lasting more than an hour Friday, U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan said he would try to decide soon whether the case could proceed to trial. He gave no specific date.
See Gay Rights: Lesbian Sues Hospital Over Denied Access To Dying Partner
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