By now you’ve heard that Congress passed this into law. The main features legalize same sex marriages and inter-racial marriages. (We thought inter-racial marriages were legal a long time ago.) But there is also another provision in the law which seems to loophole its objectives. The law allows civil challenges to its applicability. In other words, a “red” state court could become involved with a legal action that falls within the purview of the Marriage Equality Act. If the matter is referred to the Federal Supreme Court (we use the term “supreme” loosely) there is room for a decision to be handed down that strikes all or part of the law. We doubt that inter-racial marriages would be challenged but it is very possible that same sex marriages could be voided, remanded to decisions by each state (as they were prior to this law) or altered in some unforeseen fashion. As an example of what COULD HAVE BEEN passed with finality, the Marriage Equality Act could have been added as a US Constitutional Amendment. If this had happened theoretically the Supreme Court would be barred from arbitrarily changing/interpreting its provisions. Kentucky tried this with its attempt to ban all abortions during the midterm election as Issue #2. The GOP wanted to insert an anti-abortion amendment to the Kentucky Constitution. The issue failed. But the point is: had the issue passed no Kentucky court could have heard a challenge to the abortion laws of the state because the basic legal foundation (that is, the Kentucky Constitution) could not be challenged. In our opinion, the passage of the Marriage Equality Act is just step one. We’ll see how it holds up under legal scrutiny.
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