Newsgroup: it.comp.console.playstation
Titolo: DOMA etc

 jay stevens
I don't think domestic partnership arrangements will ever be any good. 
Marriage is marriage and it kicks in all sorts of things that are not
state actions, like insurance, joint ownership, survivorship. even
living arrangements.  I was shocked to learn that in some states it is
illegal for a landlord to rent a one-bedroom apartment to two adults who
are not married.  I did not know that until a policeman in one of those
states clued me in.  I don't think a domestic partnership arrangement
would take care of that.  I don't think it would take care of cases like
two friends of mine had when one of them was recovering from surgery and
was asking for the other, but the other had to stay in the hall because
the surgical recovery rooms allowed immediate family only as visitors. 
Hospital policy, not state law.  Once I compiled a list of quite a few
things that only legal marriage could properly handle, but I don't have
it any more.  I only remember a very few.  Of course any domestic
partner laws that are passed will forbid adoption of children.  Most of
them will probably forbid children of one of the partners from living
with them.  I fear that if domestic partnership goes in, we will never
get legal marriage.
Jon
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 anti-miscegenation laws.
    I hope you're right, but I don't think so.  If you've been following the
recent decisions of the Supreme Court and the "new" doctrine of state
immunity from litigation brought by individuals or private companies, one
has to wonder.  First of all, some government entity must recognize the
inequality of limiting marriage to only heterosexuals.  Normally,  a state
legislature would do that through legislation. At least that would be the
case if you buy the arguments of conservatives that courts should not
legislate.  I think it's unlikely that most state legislatures are going to
pass laws recognizing same sex marriages.  If the legislature doesn't do it,
then an individual must have standing in a federal court or a state court to
claim a right under the U.S. Constitution (such as equal protection of the
laws as guaranteed by the 14th amendment)  or a state constitution.  But the
Supreme Court is now saying that state governments have immunity from law
suits brought by private individuals or corporations.  What does that mean.
Simply, that unless a state court chooses to allow us to sue, we don't have
standing.  As I read the recent decisions, only another state may now sue a
state.  That may not be a correct interpretation because the Supreme Court
has not finished defining its doctrine of state immunity, but my
interpretation isn't too far off given what the court has said recently.
But what is clear is that the court has changed since the civil rights
movement of thirty years ago.  The conservative majority on this court would
be very unlikely to declare state anti- miscegenation laws
unconstitutional.  No one knows for sure, of course.  But the issue of a
state recognizing a same sex marriage performed in another state is not
going to come before the court because no state now permits same sex
marriages.
    I don't disagree with you that in a perfect world same sex couples would
be allowed to marry, but the real problem, at least as I see it, is "getting
from here to there".  You either do it by legislation (yeah, sure!), or you
do it through the courts, and the conservative majority on the Supreme Court
seems to be elevating states' rights above the rights of people.  That is,
in my opinion, the principle legacy of the Reagan presidency.
    jay stevens
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