This is an update on my previous blog post regarding same-sex marriage. I will begin in Blog 1. with an update on the legal movement to effect same-sex marriage; then in Blog 2. I will present an argument from a leading opponent of same-sex marriage; and finally—in Blog 3.–I will venture my own opinion with a modest proposal.
The march towards having the Supreme Court of the United States hear the arguments for and against same-sex marriage appears to be inexorable with a new challenge being added almost every month. This month’s challenge comes from Arkansas. A Pulaski County Circuit judge declared a 1997 state law and the 2004 Arkansas constitutional amendment banning gay marriage to be unconstitutional according to the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the U.S. Constitution (Windsor). The judge made his decision official after the close of business hours on Friday, May 9. Because he did not also issue a stay order, he set up a rush to some Arkansas county courthouses. Carroll County issued fifteen licenses to same-sex couples on Saturday, thus making Arkansas the eighteenth state of the union to allow same-sex marriages. The attorney general announced his support for same-sex marriage but put into motion the process of creating a stay. Both sides of the question must submit their arguments for or against the stay by noon, Tuesday, the thirteenth. The State of Arkansas now joins the list of Utah, Oklahoma, and Virginia, among others with orders to strike down same-sex marriage pending before the Supreme Court. On May 13, 2014, an Idaho judge struck down Idaho’s ban on same-sex marriage, thereby setting the wheels into motion to make it the nineteenth state to allow the performance of same-sex marriages. That number is approaching half of the states of the United States. continued…