Walter Olson, quoted by Ilya Somin, in "Why the Supreme Court is Highly Unlikely to Overturn Obergefell in the Kim Davis Case/My Cato Institute colleague Walter Olson explains" (Reason).
Should we "save [our] anger" if we don't want Obergefell overruled? Even if that's unlikely, now might be a good time to demonstrate how much it would hurt, before things escalate.
Meanwhile, I'm interested in Olson's dipping into the archaic to write "I get called rude names, as if I were consciously misleading people for some fell purpose." Fell! Why not "evil" or "nefarious"?
One answer is that he was influenced by the last syllable of "Obergefell." I don't think one would do that consciously.
I'd guess Olson felt motivated to sound deeply literary. Some historical examples of the adjectival "fell" from the OED):
1747 I will risque all consequences, said the fell wretch. S. Richardson, Clarissa1812 And earth from fellest foemen purge. Lord Byron, Childe Harold1813 His fell design. W. Scott, Rokeby1847 Even the fell Furies are appeased. R. W. Emerson, Poems
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150 comments:
there is no such thing as 'gay marriage' its the artefact of the Old Gods, of course Roberts fell for such subterfuge, the world outside our little bubble, is decidedly binary, sometimes savagely in Mamdani's old hood sometimes not,
The most common use of "fell" (other than past tense of "fall") is in the phrase "one fell swoop," which seems to mean decisive rather than foul. In any case, it's an odd word choice.
As for Obergefell, since there's no groundswell of support for overturning it, IMO, you should save your anger as spending it here will undermine your moral persuasiveness--people tend to tune out the needlessly shrill.
Gee willy willikers. People pretending like the 9th and 10th amendments don't exist again.
Every supreme court justice that voted for Obergfell should be impeached for being illiterate.
Marriage is mentioned right there in black and white. Marriage is not something the Federal Government gets to define much less 9 unelected robed priests who just make things up constantly.
the only reason we could explain it, well Paul actually addressed it in Romans,
It's too late. "Marriage" already no longer means what it did and there's nothing in it to preserve.
these are some of the reasons, why Gods judgement will be severe, same in Europe, where they have unlearned the wisdom of the ages,
because people indulge in ignorance, doesn't mean it should be catered to,
Should we "save [our] anger" if we don't want Obergefell overruled? Even if that's unlikely, now might be a good time to demonstrate how much it would hurt, before things escalate.
You should do some self reflection and ponder why your reasoning ability is so bad and you misled students for decades teaching "Constitutional Law."
Ninth Amendment
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Tenth Amendment
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Pretending that the Supreme Court has the constitutional authority to write a law like Obergfell is just grotesque dishonesty. You are not dumb enough to think the intent of the constitution was to have 9 robed priests or anyone in the federal government write marriage law.
"The most common use of "fell" (other than past tense of "fall") is in the phrase "one fell swoop," which seems to mean decisive rather than foul. In any case, it's an odd word choice."
The common phrase "one fell swoop" doesn't seem archaic, though it's interesting to examine why this adjectival usage of "fell" seems normal.
You're talking about what is the 7th meaning in the OED: "
1586– In weakened sense, with intensifying force usually determined by the context: exceedingly great, huge, mighty, sudden, strange, etc. Now chiefly in at one fell swoop...."
That's not Olson's meaning though. He's in the OED's fourth meaning: "Of a person or animal, their actions, mind, or attributes: fierce, savage; cruel, ruthless; dreadful, terrible."
I think Tolkien uses the adjectival "fell" a lot. He was going for the archaic, though writing in the middle of the 20th century. I haven't read it myself, but I'm seeing stuff like "Some heirloom of power and peril it must be. A fell weapon, perchance, devised by the Dark Lord."
Ha ha. Learn to talk like that and you can be a Hollywood screenwriter.
Olson doesn't mention the more practical reason why it won't happen. Any Justice who might be inclined to overturn Obergefell knows that there are not five votes for doing so. Granting cert would only result in reaffirming the decision.
Don't worry "Conservatives." I wont forget that you supported the federal government banning gay marriage either.
You all stupidly demanded that the Federal government define marriage as between a Man and a Woman. This is just as stupid as your attempts to pass a nationwide abortion ban.
You gave Ann and her leftists the sword they used to strike you down.
You all pretend the 9th and 10th amendments don't exist when you have power too.
a case like Bostock, built on the flimsy foundation of Obergefell,
The law school class Constitutional Law is about understanding and using the cases that interpret the Constitution so that students can pursue careers in the real world, where lawyers go into courts that are bound by precedent and make arguments that might work for the benefit of their clients.
Courts are only saying what the law is because it is their duty to resolve actual disputes. That's the lesson on the first day, after reading Marbury.
The other issue here is exaggerating the effects of overturning Obergefell. It seems likely to me that only a few of the deepest red states would reinstate a ban on SSM if Obergefell were reversed, and with the Respect for Marriage Act in effect, same sex couples in those states could still get married by going out of state to do so and the RfMA would force their home states to recognize those marriages.
Tom T. said...
Olson doesn't mention the more practical reason why it won't happen. Any Justice who might be inclined to overturn Obergefell knows that there are not five votes for doing so. Granting cert would only result in reaffirming the decision.
Even if you know you are going to lose, you need to force a vote. The supporters of Obergfell need to be put on record so their dishonesty and illiteracy can be recorded for history sake. The only way to destroy penumbras is to bring them into the light.
Of course we still have a generation of education to do to correct the damage the "Constitutional Law" professors have done to our country.
remember wise Nino's warning all the way back in Lawrence,
if marriage is not between a man and a woman, then what is it,
if we get fundamental things wrong, all else proceeds,
“One fell swoop” is Shakespeare (Macbeth, IV.3), with “fell” meaning foul/evil. As a cliche, though, it’s lost its original sense.
we can pretend all day long, and blue states, who choke on their own hallucinations will do so,
"lawyers go into courts that are bound by precedent" Often makes sense. But the Supreme Court is not bound by precedent. They can do whatever, for any reason, and they have. At least some lefty federal judges are unshackling themselves as well, spurred by lefty lawyers who learned the more practical lesson in law school that if you shop for the right judge and plead for the right outcome, you always have a chance, precedent be damned.
Anyway, if Roberts thought that Obergefell had nothing to do with the Constitution, should he now uphold it, simply because some fellow judges said SSM was kosher? Does any absurdity become binding once promulgated? He'll think of something, I'm sure. So many people rely on it, we can't change it now! Etc. So much for the, you know, Constitution.
The left are desperate for an issue to use to scare people.
Whatever happened to "Trump is going to kill all the gays!?'
oh right - same guy who started the lie about the border patrol agent on a horse who never whipped anyone. They are called reins, and all horse riders use them.
I despise the corrupt lying left.
as their cities burn and crumble until the Newcomers restore the balance,
Ann Althouse said...
The law school class Constitutional Law is about understanding and using the cases that interpret the Constitution so that students can pursue careers in the real world, where lawyers go into courts that are bound by precedent and make arguments that might work for the benefit of their clients.
Courts are only saying what the law is because it is their duty to resolve actual disputes. That's the lesson on the first day, after reading Marbury.
The Law school class is about adding support to the lies and legal justifications that allow 9 robed priests to write and define marriage law for the entire country.
Marriage was always and obviously intended to be a State issue just like abortion.
Both sides abused their power when they made it a federal issue. Once again just like in Roe v Wade the Supreme Court has seized power it was never meant to have from elected representatives all around the country and turned Gay Marriage into an unnecessarily divisive issue.
The Supreme Court has taken agency away from the voters of the country. Voters no longer have any way to have their voices heard on the subject of marriage. They are reduced to trying to influence 9 people who serve for life and will never face voters.
It was never meant to be this way. The Supreme Court by usurping this power from the voters in the States has turned this into a bitter divisive issue where the only way to influence the laws the court has written on marriage is to threaten sitting judges with violence.
This isn’t about Obergefell or gay rights. Kim Davis is only petitioning the Supreme Court because she doesn’t want to put her money where her mouth is. Rather than step aside and allow another clerk to issue the marriage license to a gay couple in 2015, she refused them the license. She was sued and lost in court – and ordered to pay $360K in damages and lawyers’ fees. Cert denied.
A public official must follow the law rather than act on personal convictions. If she can’t do this, then she shouldn’t be a public official.
The left want to abuse your children. The head of teacher's Union uses language that replaces parents with teachers.
Fake after school art club - is really gender confusion club.
it should be illegal for leftists to say to children "Do not tell your parents"
Also the left- their demented sick desire to normalize pedophilia.
it went from 'its only about love' to 'bake the cake' in a very short span of time, much as Sharia law went from curiosity to dicta, in the future Eurabia,
Leave Obergefell alone and bring back non-delegation.
Not going to happen and crazy to gin up concern that it will be overturned. The Left has to find something to attack Trump with and this is one item.
even in a red state, you must kneel to the Old Gods, this was something the Jews did willingly when they settled in Canaan,
I’m fallen and I can’t get up!
Anyone else ever feel like a fell wretch?
I do not like thee, Doctor Fell.
forgot the legality of it, Olson doesn't even care about the facts, how and why this country was founded, why is Islam growing in the West,
I've sometimes wondered why she accepted the job knowing that this obstacle was there, in plain view, as a potential catastrophe. I doubt the case will be convincing enough on its merits to be taken up in the first place, but I see it as a distraction intended to rob focus on more important things.
Meanwhile, I'm interested in Olson's dipping into the archaic to write "I get called rude names, as if I were consciously misleading people for some fell purpose." Fell! Why not "evil" or "nefarious"?
This is what happens when you impose a decision on people and they have no political recourse to change that decision.
The Supreme court stole power from voters. Now the only recourse citizens of the United States have to change Marriage Law is to influence 9 Robed Priests who serve for life and never face voters.
Any reasonable person with triple digit IQ can see where this system will lead. There is only one thing the average citizen can do to influence a supreme court judge.
The founders never intended this. Marbury v Madison is insanity. Cultists of the 9 robed Pharisees are creating an obvious invitation to political violence.
this is a greater problem, if we pretend around reality, then we wonder why chaos rains, when he not only don't rebuke sin, but encourage it,
I like the word 'fell' in this context. Rarely seen, gives it a more colorful impact.
FWIW, homosexual marriages between two men have a lower divorce rate than heterosexual marriages, but lesbian unions have the highest divorce rate of all. Some argue that the heterosexual marriages fail more because there is a woman involved while lesbian marriages fail the most because there are two women involved. I'm not a lawyer (thank you God!) so I don't know if that was a factor in the Obergfell decision.
why because she wanted men and women to marry, without that, you don't have a people
it doesn't matter what the people want, obama was clever enough to extort the court in his schemes,
perhaps the amicus indulged in sociology, as with much fake science around 'climate change'
why are Alito and Thomas, the only justices that listen to reason, instead of whatever fad has emerged from the ether,
If you don't support "extremists" like thomas or alito that the Democrats fight tooth and nail against confirming, you'll just get Liberal-lite judges who don't want to roll anything back.
You can always tell how good a SCOTUS nominee is by how upset the MSM and democrats are. they loved roberts and souter.
After watching gay activists and the State of Colorado cooperate in using gay marriage as a club with which to beat on devout Christian bakers who were otherwise harming no one, overturning Obergefell seems like merest justice.
And the case of William and Zachery Zulock down in Atlanta should tell one and all that single-sex married couples should never be allowed to adopt children.
when the conflicted judge Walker vetoed the will of the people with Prop 8, that when we should have known the game was afoot
Gay marriage was just another overeach by the Judiciary. These issues like abortion should be settled by the states and Congress. Conservatives gave up lost this battle a long, long time ago. Once you allowed the warren Court and Burger court to reshape American Society by Judicial fiat, you lost the game.
RCOCEAN II said...
If you don't support "extremists" like thomas or alito that the Democrats fight tooth and nail against confirming, you'll just get Liberal-lite judges who don't want to roll anything back.
It is "extremist" to acknowledge that the 9th and 10th amendments exist and have words in them that mean things.
but one has to ask why, because it was about unmaking the nation,
Ann Althouse said:
“ Should we "save [our] anger" if we don't want Obergefell overruled? Even if that's unlikely, now might be a good time to demonstrate how much it would hurt, before things escalate.”
How much it would hurt???
Brilliant. Such female thinking, that law, our country’s organizing structure, should consider “how much it would hurt”.
Marbury should have resulted in judicial impeachment, conviction, followed by tar and feathers,
SCOTUS born as supreme asses.
Peewee listened to reason, narciso. PeeWee is dead now.
--- Meanwhile, I'm interested in Olson's dipping into the archaic to write "I get called rude names, as if I were consciously misleading people for some fell purpose." Fell! Why not "evil" or "nefarious"?
Perhaps the terribly sloppy thinking of the "post-modern" world, and its cousin relativism, have writers who would like to escape these trends reaching unconsciously for the clarity of older vocabulary. That vocabulary has a power that our sloppy gushing has lost.
there are so many delusion that are accepted, even though they never happened in history, except in the Dark times of the late Bronze Age, so some have assented to these figments,
Gorsuch again seems to have lost most anything his mother ever taught him
And the case of William and Zachery Zulock down in Atlanta should tell one and all that single-sex married couples should never be allowed to adopt children.
Of course, no heterosexual couple has ever molested their adopted children, and the sexual exploitation of heterosexual couples' natural children has never occurred in the history of mankind.
The Fells, also known as the Hay Estate, was originally the summer home of John Milton Hay, a 19th-century American statesman. It is located in Newbury, New Hampshire, on New Hampshire Route 103A, 2.2 mi (3.5 km) north of its junction with New Hampshire Route 103....
Hay named his property "The Fells", a British term for a rocky upland pasture, due to his Scottish ancestry.
there is plenty of tactful descriptions of what olson indulges in,
if law is to make sense it must be based on reason, and also a fair amount on the social arrangement that buttressed this country,
Big Mike said...
After watching gay activists and the State of Colorado cooperate in using gay marriage as a club with which to beat on devout Christian bakers who were otherwise harming no one, overturning Obergefell seems like merest justice.
And the case of William and Zachery Zulock down in Atlanta should tell one and all that single-sex married couples should never be allowed to adopt children.
People like Ann do not understand how to interpret history. They are only concerned with short term outcomes and getting what they want RIGHT NOW. They are morally juvenile.
Obergfell will fall. The pendulum is going to swing back. Gay people are going to lose what they have gained because they have pushed too far and they have embraced short term solutions.
Rather than wait and convince people to accept gay Marriage and pass it through constitutionally sound practices people like Ann stamped their foot and threw a tantrum and demanded what they want right now! Not that the Man-Woman marriage crowd was any better.
Until a critical mass of citizens are morally developed enough to handle the system the founders handed us we are going to have division and strife caused by failures like DOMA and Obergfell.
probably so, regretably, the man woman crowd had how much history behind them, yes it was arrangement in Ancient Times in the Roman Empire,
The founders attempted to create a system that would mitigate against the swinging pendulum nature of history and create a more stable and less politically juvenile social contract.
We still have a ways to go in the moral development of our citizenry and the building of individual virtue. We succeeded on abortion so there is progress but we still have some distance to cover.
Until then everyone is forced to participate in a feces throwing contest over gay marriage because that is where we are in our moral development.
Preening git.
narciso said...
probably so, regretably, the man woman crowd had how much history behind them, yes it was arrangement in Ancient Times in the Roman Empire,
The Man-Woman crowd chose the short path and pushed the pendulum their way by embracing federal overreach. They imposed their will on everyone outside the constitutional framework.
It was only a matter of time before the pendulum swung back on them. Now they are the losers in the feces throwing contest.
At some point when everyone grows up this issue will return to the States where it belongs.
I had forgotten that Reason had banned me from the main blog, the insanity that you see in the comments
marriage is between a man and woman, otherwise what is it,
yes civil divorce, had already corrupted the institution, but thats water under the bridge,
the point of the exercise, was to unmake the nation, they didn't care which tool they chose, which goes part of the way to explaining how Western ways are unwelcome in the Third World,
Freder Frederson said...
And the case of William and Zachery Zulock down in Atlanta should tell one and all that single-sex married couples should never be allowed to adopt children.
Of course, no heterosexual couple has ever molested their adopted children, and the sexual exploitation of heterosexual couples' natural children has never occurred in the history of mankind.
Both sides are arguing by anecdote. This is juvenile and stupid. Any law with a kids name on it is almost certainly a bad law.
Really any federal intervention in this subject is just going to be bad. The states should all be free to develop their own answer for their own people.
But if allowed to happen then the States that encourage and incentivize male-female pair bonded relationships raising children are going to show much better results than states that allow deviation from this pattern.
The evidence on this could not be more clear.
From the OED? Oh, you mean the *unlinkable* OED.
"“One fell swoop” is Shakespeare (Macbeth, IV.3), with “fell” meaning foul/evil. As a cliche, though, it’s lost its original sense."
According to the OED, "one fell swoop" uses the "fell" meaning "with intensifying force usually determined by the context: exceedingly great, huge, mighty, sudden, strange, etc."
So "one fell swoop" is about suddenness, not evil — "at one sudden descent, as of a bird of prey; hence, at a single blow or stroke."
Example of that without the "fell": 1612 :If she [sc. Fortune] give ought, she deales it in smal percels, That she may take away all at one swope." J. Webster, White Divel.
4 years later, you get the Shakespeare phrase that we still use:
a1616 "Oh Hell-Kite! All? What, All my pretty Chickens, and their Damme At one fell swoope?" W. Shakespeare, Macbeth (1623) iv. iii. 220
part of the broadening experience, that brought the Taliban back to power, although Bachi Bachi, was a local custom not related to Western influence,
Obergefell was an enormous disservice to the LGB community as it removed the opportunity for their fellow Americans to explicitly embrace and accept gay marriage.
Without this ruling, some sort of federal law recognizing gay marriage would have passed by now.
Instead, the Supreme Court said "Regardless of what the rest of the country thinks of gay marriage, we're going to force them to accept it."
So they now get to use the word "marriage" , but they never received the actual acceptance.
'we will not allow you to be uninvolved' remember that, there is no retreat from their evil ways, those that dissent may be merely fined like kim davis, but if they want to jail you they will find a pretext,
H.P.Lovecraft used Fell a lot IIRC. Also Eldritch.
like the sisters of the poor they would not bow to moloch, nor hobby lobby, of course the cult of the jab, was nearly as relentless
that brings us back to the Old Gods, yes some of Lovecraft's other beliefs, put him in bad odor,
when people try to act more intelligent than they are by using certain words = performance art.
narciso said...
marriage is between a man and woman, otherwise what is it,
yes civil divorce, had already corrupted the institution, but thats water under the bridge,
the point of the exercise, was to unmake the nation, they didn't care which tool they chose, which goes part of the way to explaining how Western ways are unwelcome in the Third World,
The Man-Woman marriage crowd in the long term has the winning case. Outcomes for society are obviously better when following that norm and deviation results in poor outcomes.
Your failure was embracing federal power. You gave the weapon the marriage deviants used to destroy you and degrade society.
Before DOMA the best the deviants could have done was allow gay marriage and gay adoption in a few states. After a decade or so it would become clear that gay marriage had a "meh" result and that gay adoption was obviously a bad idea. About 1/3rd of the states would have full gay marriage, a few crazy ones would allow gay adoption, and most would end up with some combination of man-woman/civil union legislation.
The people who owned Clinton knew the long term outcome of DOMA. Now we have nationwide gay marriage and gay adoption because the Supreme Court said so. This just made the pendulum swings bigger. More kids are going to be damaged and more Colorado bakers are going to be persecuted. The blowback on gay rights will be larger.
The people who are trying to undermine the US understand the pendulum swing nature of history and they take advantage of the division and anger the bigger swings cause. Hopefully we can all start to understand how history works and how we can more effectively reach consensus.
The transgender spectrum (e.g. homosexual orientation) is not the issue, except in some narrow frames, including exercise of liberal license to construct a political congruence ("=") between couplets and couples. Civil unions for all consenting adults, right? #NoJudgment #NoLabels #LoveWins
The issue is not abortion (e.g. self-defense), but rather elective abortion a.k.a. planned parenthood the fourth choice the wicked solution. Still, under homicide laws, a baby... uh, "burden", can be legally aborted in the first six weeks.
Just following orders, right? A progressive path and grade with Diverse precedents. #HateLovesAbortion
you have to understand why things are put forward, gay marriage was not presented for good order, but to create strife,
because the traditional faiths in the metropoles have become hollow, since Engel v Vitale, vacated the public space,
so our indian interloper, who comes from a land which is so binary, that axes punctuate the difference, then pitches his tent in Gotham, and people are foolish enough to believe it,
well eloi people, of course many of these newcomers are decidedly binary,
But if allowed to happen then the States that encourage and incentivize male-female pair bonded relationships raising children are going to show much better results than states that allow deviation from this pattern.
The evidence on this could not be more clear.
So provide us some of this crystal clear evidence instead of just stating it as though it is an indisputable fact.
Until a critical mass of citizens are morally developed enough to handle the system the founders handed us we are going to have division and strife caused by failures like DOMA and Obergfell.
Of course, Achilles, who advocates the murder, imprisonment or exile of 30% of the population of the U.S. has reached the pinnacle of "moral development".
Commentary on forthcoming moves by the Supreme Court can have multiple agendas. Here. Olson seems to be trying to undermine nascent support for the right among gay and gay-friendly elements of the legal nerd world. All in a day's work, Walt.
I gay marriage an overreacharound?
Evolution has demonstrated that the marriage of couples and their natural Posterity is the optimally fit solution.
Aborting lives deemed unworthy of life, except in self-defense (e.g. rape), places humanity on a progressive path and grade.
Involuntary service, redistributive change, DEIsm (e.g. racism), political congruence, immigration reform, and now universal rulings from inferior courts have upended the 50 state laboratory experiment. Democrazis win? Let's hope cooler minds prevail.
Is.
why is a certain course of action promoted, it seemed counter to the American experience, particularly when they privileged
their own claims over the African American, who rightfully were due some justice,
Interesting, same-sex but bi-gender in couplets where each partner exhibits a complementary masculine and feminine behavior. Bisexuals are a purer, more honest breed. Simulants are just another victim in the progressive laboratory of liberal domain. All are in the transgender spectrum as a state or process. #NoJudgment #NoLabels #EquityInclusion, right? Oh, and lose the albinophobic ("Rainbow") rhetoric and symbols are in poor taste. Lose your Pro-Choice religion.
can you have a Dobbs mending, they don't even want to allow that with Dobbs, as we have seen in the last three years,
I thought "fell" was fun there. And while I think Obergefell was incorrect constitutional jurisprudence, I would bet anything it will be a "cert denied" without further comment from any justice.
With the progress of simulants as leverage, the irony of pushing women to the back of the bus, girls under the bus, and babies aborted, sequestered in liberal sanctuaries, is a queer, if not weird fetus... feature of Democratic domain.
yes, there is the game of standing, it's like magic eightball,
“One fell swoop”: Never mind OED, just look at what Macduff is saying. Is he stressing the suddenness or the cruelty of the blow? I appreciate that the meaning of “fell” included both senses, but to me it’s clear that the latter is intended. The Webster example shows that “one swoop” alone would already convey suddenness. I don’t read the addition of “fell” as merely reinforcing the meaning already contained in the rest of the phrase.
There are also those who claim it violates their religious liberty to marry people of different races. They should feel free to engage in civil disobedience in defense of their beliefs but should also be prepared to accept the consequences.
The Left has not had a new idea since the late 1950s or early 1960s. They are a protest in search of a cause. A party in search of a reason for being. And so, they spend their weeks throwing around their greatest fears, almost all of which are made up in their heads. And they get repeated, and repeated- in media, by politicians. And after a while, they start to lose sight on where the fiction began and the truth dropped off. And so they believe their own fictions after a time. And with more time, fervently- as if it's a matter of life and death. You'll see them this weekend in DC protesting in favor of more crime, less law enforcement. They can't help themselves.
And so, yeah, I can see all of these things being brought up. How many of you have seen videos or know some woman personally who told you that if Trump is elected, women's lives are in danger? How many of you know men who stood behind those women nodding in approval of what they just said?
They'll keep trying. It may not mean any change is coming. But they'll keep trying. It's the old "throw enough shit at the wall, something is going to stick" approach.
Sure, Obergefell was in his mind when he wrote "for some fell purpose," but it is an established idiom or cliche, most common (according to Google Ngrams) in the 1850s/1860s in Britain and in the 1890s in the US. According to Ngrams it's been having quite a revival recently in the US.
Would there have been a federal gay marriage law without Obergefell? Isn't marriage a matter for the states to deal with as they see fit? Would it have taken a constitutional amendment to federalize the matter? Probably we would eventually have gotten a court decision to the effect that states would have to recognize gay marriages valid and legal in other states, which I guess is sort of what we got with Obergefell. It is true, though, that the court decision wasn't a victory for democracy, but its preemption by a ruling from on high.
I would have gone with "baleful" because I always liked that word, but "fell" is pretty good too.
We are Spoonerized in one swell foop.
Marriage is a Christian sacrament and symbolizes the relationship between Jesus and the Church. Otherwise civil union would have been perfectly adequate for gay activists and their catspaws and far less ridiculous. Obergefell will not be overruled because it would be inconvenient. No matter. Gay marriage is not blessed by God regardless of what Episcopalians think. Thomas and Alito will likely vent. I hope they keep it brief.
Freder said…
Of course, Achilles, who advocates the murder, imprisonment or exile of 30% of the population of the U.S. has reached the pinnacle of "moral development".
Using hysteria and straw man arguments is a sign of poor moral judgment and intellectual cowardice.
Just to make sure you understand because we all know you are stupid I am telling you that you are a moral retard and an intellectual coward.
You can’t even pretend to address my arguments.
It was early in my commenting on Althouse when I expressed my view that all, or nearly all, male homosexuals were pederasts, or would be except for legal consequences. A lesbian took me task, and between discussing the this with her and with gays she knew I felt that my prejudice was wrong in point of fact. I felt as though I learned something.
Now I feel that I was lied to. All, of nearly all, male homosexuals are pederasts, and lesbians provide cover for them. The Zulocks, and people like Freder who defend them, are pederasts and unspeakably evil. Obergefell was a mistake, and the two boys that the Zulocks abused and pimped out to their friends paid a terrible price. The justices who voted for it should be forced to pay out of pocket for the therapy those boys will need.
I also hate pedophilia, but that’s a different comment for a different Althouse post.
Anybody discussing the Zulock case should research it. It's so much more horrifying than parents molesting "their" kids. These guys made their money off of trafficking children to clients - over a dozen kids were affected. Their Sunday School co-ordinator was in on it. It was a whole ring of pedos funding their lavish lifestyle. Absolutely evil. And really should give us pause when allowing gay men to adopt.
The marriage rates are falling. No one cares. Gay marriage is about a revenue stream for divorce lawyers. Lesbians have the highest divorce rates. Gays have the lowest divorce rates.
Men who get married have a sense of duty. Women are feckless.
The legal principle of reliance cautions those who would ponder changing a law to consider those who have organized their lives around it. To overturn Obergefell no matter one’s opinion on how it was decided would throw the lives of thousands of citizens into chaos.
Property ownership would be overturned, the parentage of children would be in doubt, and intermingled finances would have to be disentangled. I suspect few judges would want to be responsible for that pain.
Not just the Zulocks. Try reading about Moira Greyland, the daughter of Marion Zimmer Bradley. She is on record as saying that she preferred it when her dad raped her... because it was so, so much better than what her lesbian mother did to her.
But it was Marion Zimmer Bradley, the famous author, delight of the leftists at the time, and she had all of those great parties that featured Moira and "friends!" Who would dare speak up against her? Certainly not people like Freder or Inga! Not until Marion Bradley was safely dead did any of this come out.
Seems like most Leftists love, love, love pedophilia when it's LGBT people doing it. They certainly defend it and demand no one investigate it, ever!
The primary purpose of marriage was to codify family formation and provide a structure that protected children. Along the way, we (not necessarily your or me, but that's beside the point) decided marriage was about happiness and personal fulfillment instead. Since that's the prevailing view now and it's not likely to change in the immediate future, challenges to Obergefell aren't going to succeed. Meanwhile, we're essentially a decade into a longitudinal study of the prevailing view. Perhaps our grandchildren will look at things differently, but I see no reason to disturb the arrangements my gay friends and colleagues have made in the last decade.
"A public official must follow the law rather than act on personal convictions. If she can’t do this, then she shouldn’t be a public official."
I think there's a fine point that needs to be ironed out. If she had the duty to follow the law, was it the law as it seemed based on the prevailing Supreme Court interpretation or the law as it would become if the Supreme Court changed the interpretation?
Would the new interpretation apply retroactively? Would she get the advantage of the change in the law or is her violation of her duty the same, regardless of whether it later becomes apparent that the law she had a duty to enforce was a nullity?
In Tolkien, "fell" is sometimes a term of approval, more or less meaning "badass".
they didn't give a toss when the upset the apple cart, in fact they delighted in the pain they caused, and celebrated in the dominant media,
Ann Althouse said...If she had the duty to follow the law, was it the law as it seemed based on the prevailing Supreme Court interpretation or the law as it would become if the Supreme Court changed the interpretation?
My understanding of constitutional law (correct me if I'm wrong) is that when the SC says something is or is not constitutional, the holding is applied retroactively--it is regarded as always having been whatever the court says it is now. (For one thing, otherwise, people who successfully get a decision overturned, wouldn't get a benefit from their victory.)
The best satire is indistinguishable from what it mocks, which is why I hesitate to say the comments have jumped the shark.
"The legal principle of reliance cautions those who would ponder changing a law to consider those who have organized their lives around it. To overturn Obergefell no matter one’s opinion on how it was decided would throw the lives of thousands of citizens into chaos...."
This is my biggest concern. It's one thing never to have recognized this right, another thing to take it away prospectively, but still much worse to pull out a foundation after you've provided it and after people have built their life on it.
But I'm thinking the Court could finagle a way to make the change prospective only. There are some examples of doing that in constitutional law. So... grandfather in the existing marriages but allow states to proscribe them going forward. That seems awful but might satisfy some people who want the substantive due process "privacy" right completely rejected.
It makes me think of the way Casey preserved Roe on the ground that women had relied on the right to abortion by forming their view of life around reproductive freedom. That seemed a little weak to me, since each pregnancy is new, but in the case of marriage, you have all these financial and other interests based on marriage.
"It makes me think of the way Casey preserved Roe...."
But then, of course, Dobbs took it away, rejecting the Casey justification for stare decisis based on reliance.
Civil unions for all consenting adults: couples, couplets, polygamist, etc. Why recycle political congruence as a viable construct? Trans/homosexuals and society have been poorly served by this virtuous mockumentary.
Doesn't the 2022 federal Respect for Marriage Act moot this petition?
That ship has sailed. And probably to our betterment.
The fact that the ship has been hijacked by the trans community and run aground is another issue.
In my personal analysis, and mine alone, Bostock was actually having trouble at work because he was white, not gay, in a previously rural south Atlanta county (Clayton) that had become, overnight, almost entirely black because Clinton and Shalala moved all the worst project dwellers out of Atlanta before the Olympics and put them there with Section 8s, and the situation led to hive collapse. I didn't entirely disagree -- the good and decent tenants, old ladies and such -- were given new, safe, integrated housing in Atlanta, and I was grateful for that. Meanwhile, in Clayton County, where Bostock was located, the new, incredibly corrupt Chief of Police actually fired all white officers and staged his thugs with swat weapons on the roof of HQ as the fired police were thrown out of the building. Property values dropped by 80%. Every nutcase black politician who couldn't be tolerated elsewhere flocked to Clayton County, and, in this region, that is a very low bar.
After my husband finished a federal clerkship, we came back to the home we owned in south Atlanta, and I visited Bostock to apply for a volunteer CASA stint (Court Apointed Special Advocate for Children). He struck me as compassionate, competent, disciplined, and scared.
I'm not dumb. I spent a day at their offices. It was a mess, except for him. Lots of hostility. His problem wasn't being gay. It was being white, but that was unspeakable. That's only my opinion.
I refused the volunteer gig. I knew the worst streets of Atlanta, but I didn't know the really bad parts of Clayton County, and so going into strangers' houses there who had been accused of child abuse was too dangerous.
But I feel strongly that the Supreme Court missed the facts of that case. I don't blame Bostock. Others left: he stayed. He seemed to give a damn about abused children. I'd use whatever tools I had at my disposal too.
The case will die because the court will not take it now.
I like the slight of hand that instantly converts the people who have illegally slunk, or in the Biden years, proudly marched across our borders in contravention of the duly passed laws by our duly elected Congress as our "population" and now any enforcement of those duly passed laws is called "ethnic cleansing," I see.
Remember that these people always use projection. They know what they are doing stinks, and they have to pin the stink to the other side, it's the old "who smelt it, dealt it" rule from middle school. They are re-engineering our "population" ethnically, in a scheme to gain a permanent electoral majority, but they can't say that, even though they have said it many times in books like "The Emerging Democratic Majority." If that isn't a kind of "ethnic cleansing," the deliberate diluting of the political power of an ethnic group in order to gain unbridled control of the government, it's a close cousin. Hence the need for projection.
The legal principle of reliance cautions those who would ponder changing a law to consider those who have organized their lives around it. To overturn Obergefell no matter one’s opinion on how it was decided would throw the lives of thousands of citizens into chaos.
Property ownership would be overturned, the parentage of children would be in doubt, and intermingled finances would have to be disentangled. I suspect few judges would want to be responsible for that pain.
I don't agree with this. First, if a case is wrong then it is wrong. People once built their lives and industries around legal slavery - how much consideration of the disruption to their lives should be given? Second, if Obergfell were overturned, it would (a) not invalidate all gay marriages that took place since then (those were legal under the then-current law and would be respected in the same way a sate that does not allow gay marriage has to recognize a gay marriage performed in a state where it is legal); and (b) not result in a federal/Constitutional bar on gay marriage, it would simply throw the issue to the states, much the way abortion has bee treated post-Doe-repeal, and the world did not end as a result of that decision.
In terms of the likelihood of overturning Obergfell, that decision was 5-4, with Justices Kennedy, Ginsburg and Breyer (all of whom are no longer on the Court) in the majority. Only Scalia is absent from the minority. Meanwhile, the new Justices are Barrett, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and KBJ, and the pro-Obergfell side would require three of these four to go their way, which is certainly not a given.
Once you realize that they are forced to use projection, because they can't totally hide what they are doing, and can't openly talk about it, you can see through what they are doing almost completely through their "confession by projection."
The news is rife with it, the media is rife with it, the propaganda merchants in these threads make these threads rife with it. And it's very hard to tell the sincere dupes from those with truly malevolent motivations.
“ Should we "save [our] anger" if we don't want Obergefell overruled? Even if that's unlikely, now might be a good time to demonstrate how much it would hurt, before things escalate.”
Maybe. IF the left could "demonstrate" by cal, reasoned arguments (outside of this blog and damn few other spots)... maybe.
But the more likely outcome, should the left get wound up on the issue is lots of leather (as a whole, damn little per individual), streets blocked, bull horns, death threats to Justices, signs misstating the issue, the reasoning and (most of all) the existential threat.
Consider a relevant precedent: the polygamy battles in the 1800s. The Church of Jesus Christ, quite rightly, relied on their interpretation that the 1st Amendment meant they could engage in plural marriage as a religious doctrine. For decades they practiced it, and litigated it thoroughly. Finally, God basically said "tis better to give up the principle rather than give up the people" as the country was rapidly moving towards genocide.
So the Church in 1890 gave up teaching plural marriage. That was "taken away." No more plural marriages were entered into, at least legally (some still tried it for a time).
What happened to the existing plural marriages, though? They basically were left alone. No NEW marriages, but the existing ones were sort of grandfathered in.
If Obergefell was overturned, I see the exact same thing happening. No new gay marriages, but the existing would be "left alone." Apparently lots of divorce happens anyway, so many if not most gay marriages would dissolve on their own.
Who would dare speak up against her? Certainly not people like Freder or Inga!
You are a fucking asshole. Find one comment where either Inga or I defended pedophiles. You can't.
I await with bated breath your sincere apology.
Using hysteria and straw man arguments is a sign of poor moral judgment and intellectual cowardice.
Just to make sure you understand because we all know you are stupid I am telling you that you are a moral retard and an intellectual coward.
Would you like me to go back and find the numerous times you have advocated mass murder, exile, or imprisonment (and where you specifically said 30% of the U.S. was included in your genocidal plans)? It will be a pain in the ass but it was fairly recently.
“You are a fucking asshole. Find one comment where either Inga or I defended pedophiles. You can't.”
Of course he can’t, he’s just another Trumpie taking up the mantle of lying about left wing commenters since poor Drago is out of commission. I actually used to think Vance and Drago were the same person, they used very similar techniques.
@Inga, we aren’t discussing pedophilia (I was explicit about this). We are discussing whether Obergefell has provided cover for pederasty. Freder defended gay marriage providing cover for pederasts in this very thread at 9:11 am.
Trump is not against gay people or gay marriage. He has come out against some trans issues like biological men in women's sports, but the last time I checked, he supported gay marriage.
"In his first on-camera interview since last week's election, President-elect Donald Trump proclaimed he's "fine" with same-sex marriage."
https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/trump-says-he-s-fine-gay-marriage-60-minutes-interview-n683606
Achilles said...
"Don't worry "Conservatives." I wont forget that you supported the federal government banning gay marriage either.
You all stupidly demanded that the Federal government define marriage as between a Man and a Woman."
Don't forget that Bill Clinton signed The Defense of Marriage Act, so both parties were complicit.
If you want a legal principle of reliance, just do what should have been done in the first place. Make them civil unions, same rights as marriage but different dynamic. There was always support for that.
The reason that a marriage is between a man and a woman is that it deals with standing relations between men and women (Wm. Kerrigan):
"We are men and women. It almost always matters which we are. Men and women are aggressive. Their regard for each other is clouded by grudges, suspicions, fears, needs, desires, and narcissistic postures. There's no scrubbing them out. The best you can hope for is domestication, as in football, rock, humor, happy marriage, and a good prose style."
Marriage refers to domesticaion of that, which does not happen between same sex.
“Freder defended gay marriage providing cover for pederasts in this very thread at 9:11 am.”
He did no such thing. I believe that Freder is pointing out that just because a same sex couple has children, the likelihood that their children will be sexually abused by them is no different than in a male/female marriage with children.
Also Vance is the person who was making scurrilous accusations, not Freder.
Vance @ 11:02…
“But it was Marion Zimmer Bradley, the famous author, delight of the leftists at the time, and she had all of those great parties that featured Moira and "friends!" Who would dare speak up against her? Certainly not people like Freder or Inga! Not until Marion Bradley was safely dead did any of this come out.”
"Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full
Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood;
Stop up the access and passage to remorse,
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
The effect and it!"
- Either Lady Macbeth or Hillary Clinton.
@Inga, either improve your reading comprehension or go comment elsewhere.
And if you people truly cared about children who are victims of pedophilia wether by a gay person or a straight person, you would be demanding Trump release the Epstein files so we can see who Epstein’s clients were. This notion that homosexuality is akin to being a child sexual molester is disgusting.
Big Mike, try to not get comments by others directed at others mixed up.
Freder defended gay marriage providing cover for pederasts in this very thread at 9:11 am.
As Inga pointed out, your reading comprehension sucks. Actually, I don't think you are that dumb and were instead maliciously and purposefully misunderstanding what I wrote.
Really? I use "fell" frequently. Maybe because I'm archaic myself. I usually use the word like this, "I fell and can't get up."
Hallucination? Google AI
Ann Althouse's blog,
Althouse often uses the phrase "domestication" to describe how one might deal with deep-seated negative emotions like grudges. According to Althouse, these feelings, along with suspicions, fears, needs, desires, and narcissistic postures, cannot be completely eliminated. Instead, the most one can hope for is their "domestication".
This concept of "domestication" likely refers to managing or bringing these raw emotions under control, rather than eradicating them entirely. In essence, it suggests a process of learning to live with and channel these feelings in a more constructive or less destructive way, much like how humans have domesticated wild animals over time.
While the blog posts found do not explicitly mention "Kerrigan" in the context of "grudges" and "domestication", the phrase "domestication of grudges" is used to describe a way of approaching these strong emotions, including grudges. It is important to note that the context for this phrase is often a broader discussion of human nature and the challenges of managing our inner lives.
Idiot #1…
“The left want to abuse your children. The head of teacher's Union uses language that replaces parents with teachers.
Fake after school art club - is really gender confusion club.
it should be illegal for leftists to say to children "Do not tell your parents"
Also the left- their demented sick desire to normalize pedophilia.”
Idiot#2…
“Now I feel that I was lied to. All, of nearly all, male homosexuals are pederasts, and lesbians provide cover for them.”
And Vance is Idiot#3
How about you stick to the topic of this blogpost which is same sex marriage, instead of trying to smear people on the left, people in same sex marriages and gay people of pedophilia?
@Freder, go back and read what you wrote. You explicitly responded to my remarks about a gay couple adopting young boys so that they could sexually abuse those boys by asserting (unfortunately correctly) that there are heterosexual couples where children are abused. In what universe are both not utterly heinous. But reversing Obergefell closes out one of these heinous acts, ergo Obergefell needs to be reversed immediately.
The only issue I have with Obergefell is protecting religious exemption from those that have no interest in performing same sex marriage (SSM). You can't tell me that the ruling wasn't used to demand others not only recognize SSM but to participate in them. And while the Supreme Court addressed this in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission; it didn't stop the harassment of Masterpiece Cakeshop by the Colorado government nor other religious, almost all Judeo-Christian, to perform SSM. I'm not seeing protests against Mosques for not performing SSM.
If you want to keep your ruling; stop harassing others and giving them a reason to test it.
Freder, go back and read what you wrote. You explicitly responded to my remarks about a gay couple adopting young boys so that they could sexually abuse those boys by asserting (unfortunately correctly) that there are heterosexual couples where children are abused. In what universe are both not utterly heinous. But reversing Obergefell closes out one of these heinous acts, ergo Obergefell needs to be reversed immediately.
Maybe I give you too much credit. Maybe your reading comprehension is that bad.
The only issue I have with Obergefell is protecting religious exemption from those that have no interest in performing same sex marriage (SSM).
Of course there is a religious exemption that allows clergy not to perform gay marriages. You are just full of shit.
Baking a cake is not performing a marriage ceremony.
It has been over 50 years since Loving v. Virginia. How many private citizens have been sued or charged for refusing to marry a mixed-race couple? The answer is zero. Civil ceremonies are an entirely different matter.
“In what universe are both not utterly heinous. But reversing Obergefell closes out one of these heinous acts, ergo Obergefell needs to be reversed immediately.”
Is this guy serious? OF COURSE child sexual abuse is a heinous act in either a straight marriage or a same sex marriage.WHO is arguing against this? So if a church leader sexually molests the children in his church, should all churches be shut down? Should male pastors be prohibited from being around young boys or girls?
You are a confused person.
Simply another case of the left making up imaginary battles - with imaginary enemies - and then declaring war on an issue that's already been decided.
Nobody's going to overturn your precious Obergefell.
“Nobody's going to overturn your precious Obergefell.”
I’m not worried and I don’t see a great groundswell of worry on the left. This is another instance of the right trying to make it look like the grand majority of the left are worried about same sex marriage being overly turned. We are not, so stop trying to create an issue where there is not one, or at least not a huge concern.
A gay duo definitely and a lesbian duo is highly unlikely to 'have children' in the same sense a straight couple does.
Sure. Just like it was the right who was going batshit crazy over some good-looking white chick wearing jeans ...
The thing is, you don't even understand yourself or your fellow leftists. You just spin in a circular rage and then blame the right when we laugh at you.
Jim, the thing is I do understand the way you Trumpies like to create incidents that the left supposedly has done so you can have your daily outrage fix. I’ve been reading and commenting on this blog for over 13 years, I know full well what most of you are all about.
This is the wrong way to overturn Obergefell.
Before Obergefell marriage was between:
1. Two people,
2. Unrelated,
3. Of age,
4. Of sound mind,
5. Currently unmarried,
6. Of The opposite sex.
If obergefell can overturn marriage laws based on item 6, being an unequal protection under the law, then why not 5, or 3, or 1? Or 2?
This is an honest question. If the court says requiring the couple to be of the opposite sex is an unconstitutional abridgement of rights, what is to prevent a throuple or a polycule from suing under the same legal precedent?
Transgenders have always been tolerated as individuals, not as couplets, etc. Well, not trans/bisexuals in trans/homosexual clubs. And not simulants in pride parades. The effort to socially distance homosexuals from others in the transgender spectrum is nothing short of a cacophonious dissonance with liberal elements of progressive consensus.
Trans/homosexual females milk males in sperm banks and trans/homosexual males tend females on womb farms. Unfortunately, there are minority precedents for both, and more with social progress on a forward-looking basis. Eyes up here seems so quaint, archaic, even.
Civil unions for all consenting adults. Never forget the liberal bigotry of political congruence ("=") past, present, and progressive. #HateLovesAbortion
No discrimination for sexual orientation (e.g. homosexual, pedophilia, sadomasochism, etc), really? Just do it!
With Diversity, Equivocation, and Indoctrination (DEI) on top. Lose your Pro-Choice ethical religion.
I had a prof in law school who used to say that (if you want to think effectively about constitutional law) you need to have both a theory of constitutional interpretation and a theory of precedent. I think that Obergefell is unlikely to be overturned because the reliance interests at stake are stronger than those in, say, the case of Roe (as was mentioned by Althouse at 11:19 a.m., above).
I am not at all sure that Thomas would overrule Obergefell. He suggested in Dobbs that he would like to reconsider the underpinnings of cases like Obergefell, implying that the outcomes of some of those cases might be properly grounded on the privileges and immunities clause rather than substantive due process.
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