A federal judge in Alabama who ruled the state must grant marriage licenses to same-sex duos now apparently is demanding the state Supreme Court justices adopt her view of the issue.
Callie V.S. Granade this week issued a permanent injunction against the state, forbidding it from enforcing its state law and the state constitutional definition of marriage as the union of one man and one woman.
The judge admitted that the state’s attorney general has confirmed the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2015 decision in Obergefell by a bare majority of five liberals is being followed in the state.
But Granade wrote that current or future state and county officials “may disagree about Obergefell’s applicability to the challenged Alabama laws or otherwise resist the decision.”
“This court agrees that the need for a permanent injunction is clear.”
She blasted state Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore, currently suspended while the state’s oversight board for judges pursues “political” charges against him, and others on the state’s highest court for expressing critical opinions about the Obergefell case.
The conflict developed with the behemoth federal judiciary, which just two years earlier had ruled that states had determinative authority over marriage, when the state Supreme Court reviewed the Constitution and found that the state’s marriage law and constitutional definition are legitimate.
Granade had ruled otherwise.
Then when the U.S. Supreme Court created same-sex marriage, the state court left its ruling standing, putting itself in direct conflict with the U.S. Supreme Court. The dispute has yet to be challenged in the U.S. Supreme Court, the only court that can overrule a state Supreme Court.
Granade cited Moore saying “the Obergefell opinion, being manifestly absurd and unjust and contrary to reason and divine law, is not entitled to precedential value.”
She noted “the concurring opinions of several other Alabama Supreme Court justices also expressed disagreement with Obergefell.”
“Justice [Michael] Bolin and Justice [Tom] Parker also stated that the order dismissing the mandamus petitions was not a ‘decision on the merits,’ indicating that the mandamus order finding Alabama’s marriage statutes constitutional was still in effect,” she wrote.
She said such opinions had to be set aside.
“The failure of the Alabama Supreme Court to set aside its earlier mandamus order and its willingness to uphold that order in the face of the United States Supreme Court’s ruling in Obergefell demonstrate the need for a permanent injunction,” she wrote.
Scott Smith, who answered Granade’s U.S. District Court telephone, told WND she would not be commenting on active cases.
When WND pointed out her order this week was “permanent,” he changed his statement to confirm Granade would not comment on “cases.”
Granade suggested the dispute could carry well into the future.
“The court finds that as long as the Sanctity of Marriage Amendment and the Alabama Marriage Protection Act remain on the books, there continues to be a live controversy with respect to which the court can give meaningful relief,” Granade wrote.
Mat Staver, the chairman of Liberty Counsel, which has defended traditional marriage in Alabama, said, “Granade has no authority over the Alabama Supreme Court but she is acting as if she is the top appellate court in the state.”
He said the only court that has authority over the Alabama Supreme Court is the U.S. Supreme Court.
“The other parties are free to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case but they have refused to do so. Judge Granade is not the U.S. Supreme Court.”
He said the order “only validates the case that Justice Moore needed to address these conflicting orders.”
“This is what we have said from the beginning. It clearly states the Alabama Supreme Court left the 2015 orders in place.”
At the U.S. Supreme Court, Associate Justices Elena Kagan and Ruth Ginsburg were targeted with motions for recusal since they had publicly advocated for same-sex marriage even while the case was under review in what some analysts considered a clear violation of judicial ethics.
As WND reported, Ginsburg has performed same-sex wedding ceremonies and made supportive public statements. Kagan also has performed same-sex weddings and promoted “gay” rights at Harvard’s law school while she was at its helm.
Critics contend the two justices appeared to be violating judicial ethics rules that require recusal from a case in which there is even the appearance of a conflict of interest.
A brief from the Foundation for Moral Law, for which Moore worked before he was elected to the court’s highest position in Alabama, explained that Canon 3A(6) of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges provides: “A judge should not make public comment on the merits of a matter pending or impending in any court.” 28 U.S.C. sec 455(a) mandates that a justice “shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned.”
The foundation pointed out in a submission to the Supreme Court: “Four weeks after this court granted certiorari in these cases, Justice Ginsburg was asked whether parts of the country might not accept same-sex marriage being constitutionalized. She answered: ‘I think it’s doubtful that it wouldn’t be accepted. The change in people’s attitudes on that issue has been enormous … It would not take a large adjustment.’”
Ginsburg’s interview was with Bloomberg News.
The controversy resurfaced later because even after being told of the appearance of a conflict of interest, Ginsburg again officiated at a same-sex wedding, as the New York Times reported.
The paper said that with “a sly look and special emphasis on the word ‘Constitution,’ Justice Ginsburg said that she was pronouncing the two men married by the powers vested in her by the Constitution of the United States.”
from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2016/06/09/federal-judge-orders-state-think-like-me-about-marriage/
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