Arguably there are more incentives for such in a polygamous system. OTOH, bringing the existing informal polygamous cultures into legalized marriages would bring more scrutiny and possibly make it harder to abuse.... and since there's no clear-cut answer and rational arguments on both sides, the courts are required to support the government's stated policy. Which means no polygamy until the legislature acts.Or, more polygamy until there is sufficient public demand. Which is pretty much how gay marriage and everything else in politics works.
How much public demand is necessary depends on a number of things, partly the practical, moral and legal arguments for it, partly how much that public demand is backed by or opposed by money, but without the demand, it won't happen. And near as I can tell, right now, it's a very small minority, without a strong voice.
This may be accurate. They have almost NO voice currently, unless you go into the serial polygamists (or serial monogamy), and even then people try to see a difference.
So, if it is based on popular support, it might never come about.
I hope that this isn't the case and judicially, the same things happen as what happened to Gay rights in their infancy...but in truth...it may not and what you say could be exactly what happens.
Unlike Gay Marriage, I don't see polygamy as EVER gaining popularity though.
Holy crap dude, I was just shown this video.
The crying at the end made me think of Glen Beck. And thinking about Glen Beck makes me confused and sad.
The 10:1 thumbs down votes did make me laugh a little...
The parody of it on there is pretty spot-on (not necessarily imaginative, but it's exactly what it needed to be). But I'm not gonna link it because it's also spoofing another issue we've been expressly asked to leave out of this thread. :P
Arguably there are more incentives for such in a polygamous system. OTOH, bringing the existing informal polygamous cultures into legalized marriages would bring more scrutiny and possibly make it harder to abuse.... and since there's no clear-cut answer and rational arguments on both sides, the courts are required to support the government's stated policy. Which means no polygamy until the legislature acts.Or, more polygamy until there is sufficient public demand. Which is pretty much how gay marriage and everything else in politics works.
How much public demand is necessary depends on a number of things, partly the practical, moral and legal arguments for it, partly how much that public demand is backed by or opposed by money, but without the demand, it won't happen. And near as I can tell, right now, it's a very small minority, without a strong voice.
This may be accurate. They have almost NO voice currently, unless you go into the serial polygamists (or serial monogamy), and even then people try to see a difference.
So, if it is based on popular support, it might never come about.
I hope that this isn't the case and judicially, the same things happen as what happened to Gay rights in their infancy...but in truth...it may not and what you say could be exactly what happens.
Unlike Gay Marriage, I don't see polygamy as EVER gaining popularity though.
Of course a generation or two ago, the current state of gay rights couldn't be imagined. Remember that Lawrence v Texas was only in 2003. Until then, in some states you could still be arrested for gay sex.
And that's the thing I keep trying to emphasis here, it's not about Gay Marriage and thus it just makes sense to extend to other forms of marriage. Gay Marriage is just a part of the much larger Gay Rights movement. Whatever the history of poly marriage vs gay marriage, the history of persecution of gays vs persecution of polygamists is very different.
If you think polygamists are distinct enough and have suffered enough discrimination & prejudice to be a suspect class, take up the cause and work to convince the country and the world that's true. That's the way to get to poly rights, including marriage.
In some ways I may have already.
What's interesting about the Gay Marriage item was I actually was a pretty early supporter. In my legal actions, I did some things in regards to Federal filing that promoted it extensively.
Then I met some people that were rather violently pro to the point that it seemed more like they were out for revenge rather than equality. That made me feel excessively uncomfortable supporting ANYTHING they were pushing. For a while, because of that, though I continued my paperwork that supported Gay marriage, inwardly I almost turned a 180 against it. In fact, even here there may be remnants of that period. Those were some very bad people that turned me in that way.
HOWEVER...my memories of what happened to the polygamist actually affected me and in recalling it at one point, I realized that just like them, a majority of the Gay movement were only after fair and equal treatment. I looked at it with a lot less bias, and separated my dislike of those few individuals from that of everyone else. I recognized that almost all those I had helped were very courteous and wonderful people, and once again I appreciated the things that were done. I realized I let my anger towards a few people make me biased inwardly (as I said, I continued my other work during that period in regards to Gay Marriage, but perhaps not as enthusiastically as I previously did) to a whole group that didn't deserve it. After my realization, I came more to terms with the ideas and hopes, and the desire to have the freedom and equality of everyone to be able to do as they choose without fear of retaliation or other items of discrimination and hate.
So, in many ways the fight for Gay Marriage and the ideas for the defense of many of those polygamist marriages are intertwined for me, even if on a whole for most people they aren't.
There's a snarky quip about martyr complexs there somewhere, but I'm too tired to nail it down.
I see what you did there. :)
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...
Ohhhh.
"Quip". Right. Haha. I get it. I'm hip.
This might be the spoof Kobold Cleaver is talking about. If not, still pretty funny but even it misses the point that the way they set up the video was an attempt to co-opt the great pain and uncertainty of the LGBT community in society for their frivolous ends.
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In that, if you watch the first 50 some seconds of the Not Alone Video you could be forgiven for thinking these are LGBT people about to share their stories. It is a pointedly deliberate attempt to compare the mild social stigma they face for having an unpopular opinion with generations of brutality and horror suffered by LGBT people at the hands of those who think like them.
In short: F%*+ that.
Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck that.
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Also, just on a random note, have you ever noticed how every person who ever had a racist/homophobic/etc opinion always has "Some black/gay/etc. friends." who are lovely people and don't take any offense or have any problem with their friend's out there opinions.
"Yes, none of my black friends care when I call them niggers and say they should take their spear chucking ways and go back to Africa where they belong. They're not offended when I say this to them each and every single day, why are you?"
I think at this point I'd listen more seriously to someone who said they have never even met a gay/black/etc person, at least then their opinions would make more sense.
What I'm seeing here, are any arguments AGAINST polygamy have no reasoning in legal or constitionality currently.
Only if you ignore entirely the element of epistemology.
"Gay Marriage should be illegal as it hurts society" is a valid argument, in the technical sense that if the premises are correct, the conclusion follows.
"Polygamous Marriage should be illegal as it hurts society" is also valid.
The premise of the first argument, however, is known to be false -- therefore, while the argument is valid, it's not correct, and the courts may not rely on it as a justification.
The premise of the second argument is not known to be false. Therefore, the courts may rely on it until and unless someone can actually demonstrate the falsity of the premise.
Saying "but the premise might be false" doesn't cut it. To use a baseball metaphor, ties go to the runner, or in this case, to the government. As I wrote earlier, "since there's no clear-cut answer and rational arguments on both sides, the courts are required to support the government's stated policy. Which means no polygamy until the legislature acts."
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm not convinced that "polygamist" is anything but a lifestyle choice (not a wrong one, but it's a choice based on developed preferences). Meanwhile, the science is in and settled on what homosexuality is. It ain't that. ;)
And that's one of the key epistemological points.
We "know" that gay isn't a lifestyle, despite certain conservative politicians and preachers keep telling you. I can point at the studies if you like, and I can similarly point the judge at those studies.
.... But I don't have any studies to point at for the proposition that "polygamous" isn't a lifestyle. And saying "well, you said that gay was a lifestyle, and you were wrong. Now you're saying polygamous is a lifestyle, and you might be wrong" isn't an argument that the courts are obliged to pay attention to. In fact, they're explicitly required to disregard that.
Which means simply that you need to talk to the sociologists for a long time before you can talk to the courts with any hope of success.
I'm gonna have to agree with Jawa here—one law prohibits a specific cluster of minorities from a government institution, while the other prohibits everyone from using a government institution in a very different way. It's the difference between saying "Lactose-free ice cream is illegal" and "Having two scoops of ice cream is illegal"—one obviously affects a specific minority (those with lactose intolerance), while the other just sort of affects everyone who prefers two scoops.
I have nothing against polygamy, but I believe that the argument for it will have to follow different tracks than the argument for gay marriage.
Not really, that's one of the EXACT same arguments used against gay marriage.
This should sound familiar...
In regards to Gay Marriage...opponents would say something like...
One law prohibits a specific cluster of minorities (interracial marriage) from a government institution, while the other prohibits everyone from using a government institution in a very different way (Gay Marriage). It's the difference between saying "Lactose-free ice cream is illgal" and having two scoops of ice cream is illegal. Those Homosexuals all have access to a marriage between a man and a woman. They are trying to redefine it to be something very different than what it is. One obviously affects a specific minority (those could be seen as two races and different), while the other just sort of affects everyone that prefers two scoops (two men together or two woman).
It's the same argument utilized against Gay Marriage worded just slightly differently.
I don't mean to single you out, it's just your item is the easiest to quote. All the arguments against polygamy in this thread that I've seen are the exact same arguments utilized against Gay Marriage.
Which is odd as the events surrounding Gay Marriage and the arguments that were pushed against it are not old, and in fact very recent. I would imagine most people would remember these things.
Now, I've...
mm.
Thanks for sharing. That must have been a hard thing to watch.
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Also, just on a random note, have you ever noticed how every person who ever had a racist/homophobic/etc opinion always has "Some black/gay/etc. friends." who are lovely people and don't take any offense or have any problem with their friend's out there opinions.
"Yes, none of my black friends care when I call them n&++$+s and say they should take their spear chucking ways and go back to Africa where they belong. They're not offended when I say this to them each and every single day, why are you?"
I think at this point I'd listen more seriously to someone who said they have never even met a gay/black/etc person, at least then their opinions would make more sense.
yeah, it's a common internet retort. I strongly doubt it is based in truth.
However, I have encountered some people who do "joke" around like this. I have found they are usually in the military(or are cops/firemen after getting out)- salty folk who think nothing of cursing, poor jokes, or anything others are likely to raise an eyebrow at. In a tough environment you turn to rough humor to survive what you encounter on a mental level.
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Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm not convinced that "polygamist" is anything but a lifestyle choice (not a wrong one, but it's a choice based on developed preferences). Meanwhile, the science is in and settled on what homosexuality is. It ain't that. ;)And that's one of the key epistemological points.
We "know" that gay isn't a lifestyle, despite certain conservative politicians and preachers keep telling you. I can point at the studies if you like, and I can similarly point the judge at those studies.
.... But I don't have any studies to point at for the proposition that "polygamous" isn't a lifestyle. And saying "well, you said that gay was a lifestyle, and you were wrong. Now you're saying polygamous is a lifestyle, and you might be wrong" isn't an argument that the courts are obliged to pay attention to. In fact, they're explicitly required to disregard that.
Which means simply that you need to talk to the sociologists for a long time before you can talk to the courts with any hope of success.
Well... there is some research that supports the claim that humans nay not be inherently monogamous, and that the desire to have multiple partners might be suppressed by society in a similar way to homosexual leanings. I don't know enough of the subject to speak with any degree of confidence, and my google-fu seems insufficient to find a good looking scientific article on the subject, but it still makes some sense to me. Essentially, people have no problem with having multiple friends at the same time, and similarly bonding with one fellow human does not make other appear less attractive (both physically and emotionally). Or at least doesn't have to.
If such claims could be proven somehow, I think that will show that polygamy is not a "life style".
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Well... there is some research that supports the claim that humans nay not be inherently monogamous, and that the desire to have multiple partners might be suppressed by society in a similar way to homosexual leanings. I don't know enough of the subject to speak with any degree of confidence, and my google-fu seems insufficient to find a good looking scientific article on the subject, but it still makes some sense to me.
We "know" that gay isn't a lifestyle, despite certain conservative politicians and preachers keep telling you. I can point at the studies if you like, and I can similarly point the judge at those studies..... But I don't have any studies to point at for the proposition that "polygamous" isn't a lifestyle. And saying "well, you said that gay was a lifestyle, and you were wrong. Now you're saying polygamous is a lifestyle, and you might be wrong" isn't an argument that the courts are obliged to pay attention to. In fact, they're explicitly required to disregard that.
Which means simply that you need to talk to the sociologists for a long time before you can talk to the courts with any hope of success.
I agree, it makes sense. But simply making sense, especially to a small group of random nerds on the Internet, isn't enough to cause -- or even to allow -- the courts to act. Especially when the other side has an argument that also superficially "makes sense."
The court system is very rule-bound, and many of those rules boil down to "unless the executive and legislature is clearly underpants-on-head crazy, the judges are requres to assume that they know what they're doing."The claim that gay marriage would damage straight marriage is clearly pants-on-head crazy; no one has ever explained how it could happen.
The claim that gay marriage is against Natural Law is also clearly pants-on-head crazy, as there's no framework under which Natural Law can be shown to exist.
The claim that God insists that only straight people can marry is simply not binding because other gods have had other ideas and we can't pick and choose.
But the claim that gay marriage hurts children,.... well, that's not pants-on-head-crazy, at least initially. I can lay out a rational argument based on what we know about psychology and support it with peer-reviewed research. That's why the argument was taken seriously by the courts, and why it took a hell of a lot of further research that could be presented in order to persuade the judge(s) that that claim, though plausible, was untrue.
If such claims could be proven somehow, I think that will show that polygamy is not a "life style".
Absolutely. And if you can get more points, you'll win the game. But they won't give you the trophy until you've actually scored more points.
GrayWolfLord is in the rather awkward position right now of claiming the trophy at halftime, when, according to the scoreboard, he's actually trailing. The evidence that exists, as far as I know, actually comes down against polygamy, and while it's certainly possible that the evidence is flawed, until he can show the flaws and produce evidence of his own, he's actually behind. Continuing the metaphor, we can point to his team's record of last-minute comebacks and point to the fact that the betting market has him as a substantial favorite,.... but it comes down to points on the board, and right now, he's behind on those.
Am I just massively more cynical than everyone else here? Do people really think the courts work this way? Do we really think the various state, district and finally the Supreme Courts have ruled the way they have on same-sex marriage strictly based on Constitutional and scientific arguments?
Well, that seems to have been what went on with Loving v. Virginia, or many of the other Warren court cases.
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To Orfamay Quest: I agree with everything you said about legalizing polygamy (except for calling me a nerd! I played basketball a couple of times so how dare you assume!). I was just pointing out that it might be possible to prove specifically that polygamy is a natural leaning for some humans, through biological and evolutionary scientific research and not through statistics or examples.
I am well aware that even had such a proof existed and was firmly part of the consensus (like homosexuality is now), much more than that will be needed before polygamy would have a chance of being legalized.
@ thejeff - It may be a small part, but negative scientific evidence is still a fatal problem. Courts have to consider evidence, at all. And if the evidence is against your position, then that makes an uphill battle all the worse.
@ Lord Snow - Oh, I'm sure monogamy is an artificial construct enforced by society (animals that engage in monogamous relationships are exceptions, after all) - but so's our education system, legal system, etc. We have a number of social constructs that exist to prevent the problems that would occur in their absence.
Our completely natural state would be illiterate anarchy =P
Am I just massively more cynical than everyone else here? Do people really think the courts work this way? Do we really think the various state, district and finally the Supreme Courts have ruled the way they have on same-sex marriage strictly based on Constitutional and scientific arguments?Well, that seems to have been what went on with Loving v. Virginia, or many of the other Warren court cases.I'm not sure which you're saying. That the Warren court was, (maybe unlike like other courts?), strictly legal scholarship based and unswayed by politics or public opinion.
Loving v Virginia would have been decided the same way by that court, even without the backdrop of the civil rights movement and all the changes that came with it?
To some extent, yes. Interracial marriage was still very much against public opinion when Loving was decided. In fact, there are a whole bunch of decisions that the Warren court issued in the teeth of public opinion because that's what the legal scholarship demanded (E.g. Miranda v. Arizona, Tinker vs. Des Moines).
A Federal judge who issues a decision without providing an actual rationale behind it is risks having it overturned on appeal. A Federal judge who issues a decision based on what is known at the time to be insufficient or incorrect evidence is basically handing the appellate court a reason to overturn it.
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Holy crap dude, I was just shown this video.
...there are like fifty things going through my head right now but I'll just let people make up their own minds about it.
Man, this is the second dumbest thing I've heard today. And that's only because I heard Trumpy's "Lol Mexicans" speech earlier.
The possibility is there, but currently it's a long shot....a very, very long shot. Until the evidence that exists showing the harm caused to society by polygamy is debunked or discredited by mainstream science then the courts will continue to rule against it.Am I just massively more cynical than everyone else here? Do people really think the courts work this way? Do we really think the various state, district and finally the Supreme Courts have ruled the way they have on same-sex marriage strictly based on Constitutional and scientific arguments?
And that they'll just do the same with polygamy if the right evidence and legal arguments get made?
Did you even read what I wrote?
My cynical view is that the scientific evidence is a very small part of the process.
Scientific evidence definitely affected public opinion. So in a manner of speaking, no, it's a very large part. Constitutional values against discrimination which have previously been backed up (such as laws against segregation) also influence public opinion. It's ingrained in our consciousness that "discrimination is bad" thanks largely to aspects like that. All it took was a mindset switch (aided by scientific evidence) that gays are a persecuted minority, not a bunch of weird lifestyle choosers. That is probably why public approval and marriage equality laws have been coming along so much faster for gays than they did previously for mixed race marriages.
So yeah, it's public opinion. But public opinion was pushed by the other things.
Overwhelmingly the change in public opinion was pushed by gay people coming out and convincing their on-the-fence friends and families that they weren't some weird dangerous Others after all. Along with a similar process in the media, with celebrities that people already liked coming out and LGB characters becoming more prevalent. Scientific arguments...
So yeah, it's public opinion. But public opinion was pushed by the other things.
[citation needed]
Overwhelmingly the change in public opinion was pushed by gay people coming out and convincing their on-the-fence friends and families that they weren't some weird dangerous Others after all. Along with a similar process in the media, with celebrities that people already liked coming out and LGB characters becoming more prevalent. Scientific arguments...
Public opinion is really the most important thing here. All anyone has to look at is everything in the media dealing with climate change/vaccinations/GM foods/evolution to see that you can have an opinion strongly backed by a large body of scientific research and still have politics work against you.
Having studies backing your opinion is great, but unless you can also bring out the public support, it's unlikely you can overcome the existing inertia of laws and regulations. Gays have pretty much had that going for the last few decades, and Transpeople are also getting more support in the media.
To really start the process of legalizing marriages involving multiple consenting adults, you need to get more people to come out in support of such relationships to indicate that such relationships can be healthy and pedestrian, something that really hasn't happened yet. And you will need a lot of that to counter all the Warren Jeffs and people of similar ilk in the media
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[citation needed]Overwhelmingly the change in public opinion was pushed by gay people coming out and convincing their on-the-fence friends and families that they weren't some weird dangerous Others after all. Along with a similar process in the media, with celebrities that people already liked coming out and LGB characters becoming more prevalent. Scientific arguments...
So yeah, it's public opinion. But public opinion was pushed by the other things.
For those who skim, when public opinion polls identified people who changed their minds in support of SSM, a plurality of those respondents cited personal experience with LGBT family members, friends, or coworkers as the reason they changed their position.
Part of the problem with doing research for polygamy is comparing legal traditional to illegal polygamy. Of course if the act is illegal it is going to be related to higher incidents of illegal activity. This has less to do with the institution itself and more with the people willing to participate in an illegal activity. Also the cases that are most likely to be seeing by the public at large are the ones with drastic abusive practices as those are the ones that are statistically more likely to be noticed by the authorities. So first you'd need to remove the criminal punish to the activity, so that those that are "good" actors can come out into the light and present as statistically significant practitioners.
Of course one could examine countries where the practice is legal. Yet in that case you'd have to compare the practice to other marriage situations within the country itself. That is you can't compare legal polygamy as practiced in say Libya with legal traditional marriage in the U.S. There are so many other cultural differences between the two that abuses might seem the fault of polygamy, but may instead be due to the larger culture. So you'd have to compare traditional marriage in Libya to legal polygamy in Libya and see if there is a great chance of abuse. It may be that there is no statistically significant difference between the two.
EDIT: As to public support, I just saw a stat that said support has gone from 5% in 2006 to 16% now. That is a more than 3x increase in less than 10 years.
[citation needed]Overwhelmingly the change in public opinion was pushed by gay people coming out and convincing their on-the-fence friends and families that they weren't some weird dangerous Others after all. Along with a similar process in the media, with celebrities that people already liked coming out and LGB characters becoming more prevalent. Scientific arguments...
So yeah, it's public opinion. But public opinion was pushed by the other things.
For those who skim, when public opinion polls identified people who changed their minds in support of SSM, a plurality of those respondents cited personal experience with LGBT family members, friends, or coworkers as the reason they changed their position.
It's why LGBT rights have progressed faster than African-American rights (if you compare societal awareness of it being an issue to when things started to change for the better). You can meet someone, get to know them, trust them and love them for years... and THEN find out that they belong to the LGBT spectrum. Where as you typically already know if your family members are black or not (there are some notable exceptions and stories about this).
Your son isn't likely to come home one afternoon and tell you "Dad, I'm black." Well, he might, but you probably already knew this bit of information about him.
A lot of it has to do with general shifts in society. Despite all our problems we are more inclusive than we were 50 or 100 years ago. So when people are confronted with the choice of sticking to old thought patterns or loving and accepting their family member, more and more are leaning towards acceptance, which then pushes society to be more accepting as a whole.
This doesn't mean I think it's an ever marching progress, just how the process is feeding into itself right now and particularly on this issue.
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yeah, it's a common internet retort. I strongly doubt it is based in truth.Also, just on a random note, have you ever noticed how every person who ever had a racist/homophobic/etc opinion always has "Some black/gay/etc. friends." who are lovely people and don't take any offense or have any problem with their friend's out there opinions.
"Yes, none of my black friends care when I call them n&++$+s and say they should take their spear chucking ways and go back to Africa where they belong. They're not offended when I say this to them each and every single day, why are you?"
I think at this point I'd listen more seriously to someone who said they have never even met a gay/black/etc person, at least then their opinions would make more sense.
Surprisingly, it's often more true than you think. It occurs due to a manifestation of cognitive dissonance that I've heard called the Good Ones effect. Basically, someone with prejudice deals with a person from a group they dislike, but as is often the case they find out when having social contact that the person isn't at all the bad thing they know the group to be. For some, this moment of awareness leads to them beginning the long journey away from prejudice. For others it presents an impossible reality, they cling to the prejudice despite evidence of it's inaccuracy. That impossibility can be resolved by declaring the out-group individual to be "one of the good ones", thus having risen above the shortcomings that the prejudice insists upon.
As to the making of racist jokes, there are a disappointing number of people who will simply let such things go without comment rater than risk any social blowback from confronting the speaker.
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Your son isn't likely to come home one afternoon and tell you "Dad, I'm black." Well, he might, but you probably already knew this bit of information about him?[citation needed]Overwhelmingly the change in public opinion was pushed by gay people coming out and convincing their on-the-fence friends and families that they weren't some weird dangerous Others after all. Along with a similar process in the media, with celebrities that people already liked coming out and LGB characters becoming more prevalent. Scientific arguments...
So yeah, it's public opinion. But public opinion was pushed by the other things.
For those who skim, when public opinion polls identified people who changed their minds in support of SSM, a plurality of those respondents cited personal experience with LGBT family members, friends, or coworkers as the reason they changed their position.
Polygamy is unlikely to get a judicial fix, except perhaps for making it legal. The judiciary can say "marriage exists, it has these law books applying to it, just cross out the one line (if that) or understanding that it was a man and a woman. A polygamous marriage would require shelves worth of law books to be written, something the judiciary has a harder time requiring.
They'd most likely let congress handle that before they heard a case.
On occasion the court has said that some existing condition is unConstitutional and ordered the government to fix it without specifying how, leaving it up to the legislature and the executive to implement.
Example? Was anything remotely this complicated? Marriage works because is two people, its inherent in the legal contracts. If a spouse dies the other spouse automatically inherets their stuff. Medical decisions are made by your spouse if you're a vegetable,
Example? Was anything remotely this complicated?On occasion the court has said that some existing condition is unConstitutional and ordered the government to fix it without specifying how, leaving it up to the legislature and the executive to implement.
Usually, as GL says, it's over finances; the Court says "you must allocate more money to X". A recent example, albeit reversed, is Chris Christie's argument about pension funding in New Jersey. A lower court had ruled that the New Jersey was not paying enough money into public worker union pension funds, and the state supreme court reversed it. Had the original decision been upheld, the New Jersey legislature would have been ordered to do something to restore funds to the appropriate level, presumably either by raising taxes or cutting money elsewhere.
There's precedent, again in New Jersey, for this kind of thing w.r.t. marriage laws. In Lewis v. Harris, the Supreme Court of New Jersey found that same-sex couples were entitled to all the benefits of marriage, but not necessarily marriage itself, and ordered New Jersey to provide "either marriage or an alternate system that would provide equality," thus leaving matters in the State's hands.
Of course, the State mucked it up and two years later, the same plaintiffs were back in court after New Jersey itself admitted that civil unions were insufficient.
I don't have the links, but in a couple of states it has happened over school funding.Example? Was anything remotely this complicated? Marriage works because is two people, its inherent in the legal contracts. If a spouse dies the other spouse automatically inherets their stuff. Medical decisions are made by your spouse if you're a vegetable,On occasion the court has said that some existing condition is unConstitutional and ordered the government to fix it without specifying how, leaving it up to the legislature and the executive to implement.
Ohio is one. The state supreme court ruled the current school funding model (each district funded by property taxes in their area) unconstitutional. They didn't offer an alternative, and basically tossed it to the state legislature.
Nothing has ever come of it.
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I do have to say.. congrats on "gay" marriage (the gay is unnecessary)... I support marriage for all. Including poly... I say this being poly.. though marriage is nothing I am looking for anymore.
Personally I believe the gov should get out of marriage. The licenses should be "ceremonial". "We're married." "OK, here is your license."