Federal Court Rules Against Nebraska's Marriage Amendment -- GOPUSA

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Federal Court Rules Against Nebraska's Marriage Amendment
By Melanie Hunter
CNSNews.com Deputy Managing Editor
May 13, 2005

(CNSNews.com) -- A federal court in Nebraska Thursday declared the state's voter-approved marriage amendment unconstitutional after a challenge by two homosexual advocacy groups -- Lambda Legal and the American Civil Liberties Union's Lesbian and Gay Project.

U.S. District Judge Joseph Bataillon said the amendment, which defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman, "imposes significant burdens on both the expressive and intimate associational rights" of homosexuals. It also "creates a significant barrier to the plaintiffs' right to petition or to participate in the political process," he said.

"Any blanket prohibition on any type of legal recognition of a same-sex relationship not only denies the benefits of favorable legislation to these groups, it prohibits them from even asking for such benefits," said Bataillon.

A conservative legal group was disappointed with the ruling but said the "decision is the catalyst the United States Congress was looking for as an example of why this country needs a federal marriage amendment."

"A single judge has overturned the vote of the people in Nebraska, essentially holding that any amendment that seeks to do anything more than define marriage as the union of a man and a woman is unconstitutional," said Mathew Staver, president and general counsel of the Liberty Counsel.

"Since some of our judges do not understand common sense, it's time for the people to spell it out in our United States Constitution - marriage is the union of only one man and one woman," Staver added.

According to the Liberty Counsel, the judge decided that the marriage amendment prohibited state recognition or creation of civil unions, domestic partnerships and other similar same-sex relationships.

He also ruled that the amendment violated First Amendment associational rights because it allegedly impaired the formation of groups or associations to lobby for changes in legislation that would benefit same-sex couples, the Liberty Counsel noted.

Bataillon said the amendment has far-reaching ramifications that go beyond "defining marriage as between a man and a woman."

The "broad proscriptions could also interfere with or prevent arrangements between potential adoptive or foster parents and children, related persons living together, and people sharing custody of children as well as gay individuals," the Associated Press quoted Bataillon as saying.

"Today's ruling marks the first time a marriage-protection amendment has been overthrown by the whim of a federal judicial tyrant," said Focus on the Family Chairman Dr. James Dobson in a statement. He added that the judge "single-handedly rejected the will of 70 percent of Nebraska's voters" under "the guise of 'equal protection.'"

"But to argue that supporters of same-sex marriage are disenfranchised by the amendment is ludicrous; they have every right to undertake the amendment process themselves and get a different measure passed - that's the way democracy is designed to work," Dobson said.

"Last year when the Marriage Protection Amendment was being debated in the U.S. Senate, some senators - including Nebraska's own Ben Nelson - used the excuse that the MPA was 'not needed,' and that the crucial matters MPA addresses could be handled at the state level. Apparently not," said Dobson.

"Now we have dramatic evidence that this legal fig leaf is easily stripped away by judicial activism," he said, who urged Congress to pass a federal marriage amendment "or we will see an untenable patchwork of marriage definitions, forever subject to the federal judiciary."