No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right.
With those final words, the majority opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges made marriage equality the law in America. Thank goodness. In ruling that the right was protected by the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, the decision finally enshrines the fact that if marriage is a right, it is an equal right for all.
While this is a landmark decision and a great step forward in my country in actually living up to its stated ideals, there is still much to do on the LGBT equality front. The justices chose not to expand the opinion to include all statutes and ordinances dealing with LGBT-related restrictions. It could have required courts to review these laws under the standard of strict scrutiny, shifting the burden from the citizen to the government to prove its justification of the restrictive law. This would have been welcome. Still, while these legal battles are still to be waged, hopefully today's ruling will act as another bolt in the quiver of justice against these small-minded, hard-hearted laws that still dot our land.
And yes, many of the people behind measures such as those noted above decried today's decision using arguments that ranged from hateful to ignorant to illegal. And yet these simpletons, these misguided bigots, these false Criers-of-Wolf have lost. Lost directly in today's ruling, but also and much more importantly they have lost the war for this civil right. For as the everyday Joe and Jane in the nation sees that nothing has changed for them as the ruling is implemented, they will come to wonder what the fuss had been about. Why had they previously worried? They will go along to get along. Being gay will be what it actually is: no more interesting than being straight. It will be a case of no news is good news. It will be a nonissue. Woot.
And this change in attitude will also work to bring down the terrible laws still on the books. Woot again.
Life. Liberty. The pursuit of happiness.
These are a little more true today. Thank goodness indeed.
26 June 2015
1 July 2015 update: I'm going to let Stephen Colbert play us off.
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