9th Circuit Tosses Marriage Bans And Cruz Panders To Right By Promising Amendment To Guarantee Inequality

(The photo at left was found of the Facebook page of the inimitable Juanita Jean -- owner of the world's most dangerous beauty salon.)

A couple of days ago, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear 5 cases appealed from three Circuit Courts of Appeal -- letting stand the rulings from those courts that a state ban on same-sex marriage was unconstitutional. After seeing that, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals saw no reason for more delay or discussion, and yesterday they issued a ruling that the state bans on same-sex marriage in Idaho and Nevada were unconstitutional. The court said:

“We hold that the Idaho and Nevada laws at issue violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because they deny lesbians and gays who wish to marry persons of the same sex a right they afford to individuals who wish to marry persons of the opposite sex, and do not satisfy the heightened scrutiny standard we adopted in SmithKline.” 

In addition to Nevada and Idaho, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals also covers Alaska, Arizona, Montana, California, Oregon, and Washington. Alaska, Arizona, and Montana still have same-sex marriage bans -- but I expect they will soon be declared unconstitutional by a U.S. District Judge now that the appeals court and the Supreme Court have made their positions clear.

There are still cases pending in some other Circuit Courts of Appeal, but I expect they will now be disposed on pretty soon. It looks like we may be finally nearing the end of the arguments over this equal rights issue.

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 Meanwhile, the Senate embarrassment from Texas, Ted Cruz, saw a political opportunity in the Supreme Court's refusal to hear those cases (and uphold the marriage bans). He promised to introduce a constitutional amendment in Congress that would guarantee the LGBT community could continue to be treated unequally in the United States. He said:

“The Supreme Court’s decision to let rulings by lower court judges stand that redefine marriage is both tragic and indefensible...When Congress returns to session, I will be introducing a constitutional amendment to prevent the federal government or the courts from attacking or striking down state marriage laws. Traditional marriage is an institution whose integrity and vitality are critical to the health of any society. We should remain faithful to our moral heritage and never hesitate to defend it.”

Of course, Cruz's silly amendment has absolutely no chance of actually becoming a part of our Constitution. It would have to get a two-thirds vote in both the Senate and the House, and then be ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the states -- and it has less chance of clearing any of those hurdles than a snowball does of surviving in the Mojave Desert at the height of Summer.

But Cruz knows that. He is just playing politics. He wants to run for president in 2016, so he is pandering to the teabagger/evangelicals in his party -- because he knows they will have the biggest say in who the Republicans nominate in 2016. There is no depth to which Cruz will not stoop to feather his own political nest.

(The caricature of Ted Cruz above is by DonkeyHotey.)