"Puerto Rico's government is supporting an effort to overturn a ban on gay adoption in the U.S. island territory. Puerto Rico's Supreme Court narrowly voted in February to uphold an island law banning adoptions by same-sex parents. The woman whose adoption request was at the heart of the case asked the court to reconsider that decision." (03/19/13)
http://tinyurl.com/cpwo66u"The U.S. Episcopal Church is poised to become the first major religious denomination in the United States to approve a rite for blessing gay marriages after its bishops overwhelmingly approved such a liturgy on Monday. The proposed blessing was agreed by the church's Chamber of Bishops at a meeting in Indianapolis and is expected to receive final approval from its House of Deputies later this week, Ruth Meyers, a chair of the Episcopalians' Subcommittee on Prayer Book, Liturgy and Church Music, told Reuters." (07/09/12)
http://reut.rs/OtJobf"Equivocal no longer, President Barack Obama declared his support for gay marriage on Wednesday in a historic announcement that instantly elevated a polarizing social issue to a more prominent role in the 2012 race for the White House. The announcement was the first by a sitting president, and Obama’s Republican rival, Mitt Romney, swiftly disagreed with it." (05/09/12)
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/world/54081053-68/story.csp
Reason "The marriage whose name the president dare not speak." (05/09/12)
http://bit.ly/Js2sYH"Immigration advocates have filed a lawsuit on behalf of several married gay couples, alleging a federal law violates their constitutional rights by preventing them from sponsoring their spouses for green cards. The complaint, which challenges the federal Defense of Marriage Act, was filed in federal court in Brooklyn by Immigration Equality, an advocacy group." (04/03/12)
http://abcn.ws/H7BYsg"A lawsuit being heard this week in Pennsylvania could rewrite how the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is applied across civil society, and potentially spark a dramatic expansion of the law’s terms that would force private companies to not recognize same sex spouses. The lawsuit boils down to benefits due to the spouse of Sarah Ellyn Farley, who died shortly after a legal same sex marriage to her wife, Jennifer Tobits, in Canada." (03/13/12)
http://tinyurl.com/8ygkafc"The Catholic Church in England has intensified its campaign against government plans to legalise same-sex marriage, urging the faithful to protect the 'true meaning' of matrimony for future generations. In a letter read in 2500 parish churches across the country during Sunday Mass, the church's senior archbishops argued that the proposed change would reduce the significance of marriage." (03/12/12)
http://bit.ly/ACWFS6
Cato Institute "That sound you don't hear is social change happening. Even as the Republican candidates fight to see who can get furthest to the right, acceptance of gay people and gay marriage in the United States is moving briskly along. Gallup finds support for same-sex marriage now at 53 percent, up from 40 percent in 2008." (03/04/12)
http://bit.ly/yhiahD
Adam Smith Institute "UK Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone want[s] to legalise gay marriage. Fine by me: I don't see why gay couples should not be able to sign up for the same obligations, rights and benefits that heterosexual couples observe and enjoy. She also wants gay couples to be allowed to marry in church, like heterosexual ones. Again, I have no problem with that, if the church is willing to do it." (03/05/12)
http://bit.ly/wZhtUZ"Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire is expected to announce Thursday when she will sign a measure to legalize same-sex marriage in the state. ... even before the Legislature had voted, opponents were making plans to overturn the measure at the ballot box. They have until June 6 to submit at least 120,577 signatures to put a referendum on the November ballot. If they succeed, the law would not take effect pending results of the vote. A simple majority would decide whether to retain the law, the Seattle Times reported.
http://lat.ms/x99ENi"The Ugandan parliamentarian who first introduced an anti-gay bill that carried the death penalty for some homosexual acts reintroduced the bill on Tuesday, raising concerns among rights activists who have been fighting the legislation. Parliamentarian David Bahati first introduced the bill in 2009 but it has never come before the full legislative body for a vote." (02/07/12)
http://tinyurl.com/87v4u9j"In a landmark decision in post-apartheid South Africa, four men were given 18 years in jail on Wednesday for stoning and stabbing to death 19-year-old Zoliswa Nkonyana for living openly as a lesbian. A crowd outside the court in Cape Town township cheered and danced after the sentencing was announced, the BBC News reported." (02/02/12)
http://tinyurl.com/7sp7kvm Adam Smith Institute "You don't have to believe that same-sex marriages existed in pre-modern times (though some academics do) to see their emergence now as a part of a healthy institution of marriage; what is necessary is for people to have the freedom to adapt. JP's point about the patchwork quilt of practices that existed before marriage's codification is important -- once the state gets involved with the messiness of life, it tends to impose its own kind of order on things without much care for why things were messy in the first place. " (01/31/12)
http://bit.ly/y8Wu0I
Center for a Stateless Society "The same-sex marriage debate is a perfect showcase for the anarchist argument against political government itself. For marriage is two things, neither of which require a monopoly state to enact, support, preserve or regulate." (01/09/12)
http://c4ss.org/content/9447"An Iowa judge has ordered the Department of Public Health to issue a new birth certificate listing both members of a same-sex marriage as legal parents of a 2-year-old girl, The Des Moines Register reports. ... The couple sued the state when the department refused to list both names on the birth certificate of their daughter, Mackenzie, who was conceived through use of an anonymous sperm donor." (01/05/12)
http://usat.ly/zvx1s8"More than 400 people, including a U.S. senator, have witnessed the first same-sex civil union in Delaware. Lawyers Lisa Goodman and Drewry Fennell were joined in the New Year's Day union by the Rev. Patricia Downing, rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in Wilmington. Seven other couples also obtained licenses Sunday." (01/01/12)
http://tinyurl.com/8475asq"The rebellion of Wisconsin public employee unionists against Gov. Scott Walker’s plan to take away collective bargaining rights generated crowds of 100,000 people or more at the state capitol in Madison. One of the most articulate and popular voices for the workers’ cause proved to be U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin, a seven-term veteran of the U.S. House of Representatives. Baldwin, 49, has launched a populist campaign for the U.S. Senate, seeking to replace the retiring Herb Kohl, a mildly liberal Democratic senator who has served since 1988." (11/29/11)
http://tinyurl.com/7xbph7d"The Kansas Equality Coalition, an LGBT advocacy group, hopes to pressure Gov. Sam Brownback (R) into repealing a state law that prohibits people of the same sex from engaging in intercourse. 'We believe that the current statute, while ultimately unenforceable, is an affront to thousands of law-abiding gay and lesbian Kansans,' Thomas Witt, chairman of the Kansas Equality Coalition, told LJWorld.com." (11/27/11)
http://tinyurl.com/7tw76p6"The sponsors of ballot propositions can step in to defend their initiatives from legal challenges if the governor and attorney general refuse to do so, California's highest court said Thursday. ... The coalition of religious and conservative groups that qualified Proposition 8 for the ballot and successfully campaigned for its passage have asked the 9th Circuit to reverse a federal trial judge's ruling in August 2010 striking down the measure as a violation of gay Californians' civil rights. Both former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Gov. Jerry Brown, in his previous role as state attorney general, took the unusual step of refusing to appeal the decision." (11/17/11)
"Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard says she favors allowing a parliamentary vote on same-sex marriage -- although she personally opposes changing the law. In an opinion piece published Tuesday in the Sydney Morning Herald and other Australian newspapers, Gillard said lawmakers 'should be free to vote in Parliament according to their own values and beliefs.'" (11/14/11)
http://tinyurl.com/6vclqo8"A group of married gay current and former military personnel sued the federal government on Thursday, seeking equal recognition, benefits and the same support as married heterosexual couples who serve in the military. The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Boston says the government's Defense of Marriage Act violates their constitutional rights and asks the military to recognize their legal marriages." (10/27/11)
http://abcn.ws/tnjxKR"A same-sex couple has been turned away at the Supreme Court in a cross-state dispute to have both of them officially listed as the parents of an adopted 5-year-old boy. The justices rejected the California couple's appeal Tuesday without comment. The couple claims that Louisiana, where the child was born, has an unconstitutional policy against adoption by unmarried partners. The state used that policy to justify naming only one of them on an amended birth certificate." (10/11/11)
http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/11/justice/us-scotus-same-sex-adoption/
Slate "By my math, Chris Wallace spent around 30 percent of his interview with Rick Santorum testing the limits of the senator's 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' stance. The interview didn't get us any closer to the heart of the question: What would a Republican president who opposes letting openly gay people serve in the military do, exactly?" (10/10/11)
http://slate.me/qvwikO"Two transgender people won an appeal in Australia's highest court Thursday giving them legal recognition as men despite not having had complete sex change surgeries. Transgender and intersex organizations praised the High Court's ruling as a precedent that would spare others from having to undergo medically unnecessary surgery to have their chosen gender recognized." (10/05/11)
http://www.vaildaily.com/article/20111005/API/1110051124
Gay marriage gains ground
by Michael Barone
"The Supreme Court could rule that the Constitution requires same-sex marriage everywhere. Or it could affirm the appeals court’s rationale, which applies to California only. Or it could say that the Constitution leaves this issue to the states. That’s the outcome that, as a supporter of same-sex marriage, I prefer." (03/18/13)
http://tinyurl.com/c3qy7bbNo Comments »