Enidigm
5939
Religious people aren’t advocating civil unions as an “alternative” to marriages. At least, as far as i know. I think you’re arguing the theory, and i’m arguing the reality.
If Obergefeld is reversed, you’re not living suddenly in a lovely world where the word “marriage” has been changed to “civil union”. You’re living in a world where a new category called “civil union” has been created by religiously oriented people to shunt people they don’t want under the category of “marriage”. Maybe that’s all just airy fairy category nonsense to you, but i’m pretty sure it’s going to be seen as a demotion in status by millions - which it’s intended to be. And once categories have been split, then rights and duties between them can be split as well (inheritance, medical, spousal support, divorce, ect). It may not appear out of the air complete, but it would be inevitable if the distinction is sustained over time just by the additive nature of law.
There’s another argument about the nature of civil unions vs marriages around the world abstractly, of course, but i was talking more specifically about the SCOTUS implications (just to be clear).
magnet
5940
When I (and others) say that the state should get out of the marriage game, we are obviously not describing the world we live in today.
And even if the idea of state-issued civil union certificate partially overlaps with the goals of religious leaders, that doesn’t mean the goals completely overlap.
Enidigm
5941
Oh sure, but that’s a more abstract argument than what i was addressing, the very real nature of an Obergefell reversal, which is entirely about getting government back into marriage to preserve the category “marriage” from secularization, and the very real harm this category demotion is intended to inflict.
Nesrie
5943
This is a no no, not allowed, not legal.
Enidigm
5944
Sorry, you’re right, i was mixing up applying vs filling out your HR forms after hiring (for medical, ect).
Nesrie
5945
Just making sure we’re all on the same page. Marriage is not as entrenched as others think it is, and it doesn’t have to be that tied where those questions are legally asked either… and yeah they might ask your status on some but these days… things are already changing.
This is one of those areas where the so called, well I don’t know, the people who can’t handle change, who are often white, and call the oppression of women and minorities something warm and fuzzy like “tradition” so others can run with it without those pesky people debating them on their bigotry. Those are the same people insisting marriage must be as is.
Alstein
5946
The Dems boycotting to me is a warning shot that if they get the Senate- they will stack in response if they can get 50 Dems (which probably means you need 52 Dems to deal with Findspine and Munchkin)
Nesrie
5948
Give me a break, this again.
Oh my! Will the Republican Senators do the morally-correct thing that would salvage some remnants of our shredding democracy, or will they pander to the GOP voters in order to remain in office?
The suspense is almost too much to take!
I think the McCain surprise down vote thing has them permanently spooked. They used to play this game where they had so many moderates who got passes to vote against it. Now they don’t even go that far, they can still play the moderate card by waffling right up to the vote. And GOP voters are dumb enough to buy it.
I guess the part that I’m never going to quite understand about the SCOTUS is why it was allowed to become this powerful in the first place. For sure - it’s the High Court of the land, etc., but at the end of the day, it is President/Senate/Congress that should rule the land - not the Supreme Court. I find it hard to understand why the other branches of government have continued accepting this state of affairs, given that it is absolutely within their power to “fix” it. I don’t think I know of any other other country where the Supreme Court is as important as in the US.
I don’t really know what the other branches could do to ‘fix’ it, at least not these days. Appoint enough justices to overturn Marbury v Madison? I guess that would work, but there isn’t really anything else on the table. They can change the philosophical bent with packing, but that just gets you judicial review from the other perspective.
Is judicial review wrong? I don’t know. I think it is not wrong, but it is certainly yet another check / balance that makes America on the whole more conservative and slower to change.
Constitutional amendment: “The Supreme Court shall sit down and shut up!”
Enidigm
5954
This is entirely because one party has ceased to be interested in governing and works more or less constantly to prevent the other party from governing as well. In effect without the Supreme Court, American civic culture would be more or less exactly the same as it was in 1965. This is why the GOP is so centered today on kludging their way into dominating the judiciary - they see the future situation reversed, and want to use the judiciary to prevent a functioning government when they lose control of the other branches.
Timex
5955
One thing that you need to keep in mind, is that in many cases with the SCOTUS, the remedy for what you want is that Congress could simply make actual laws saying certain things, but they choose not to.
Or in other cases, the result isn’t that the scotus is more powerful than the president and Congress, but rather that the individual STATES have power over certain things.
Well, Marbury v Madison is basically the Supreme Court ruling that it has the power of Judicial Review, right? This is apparently not that uncommon (I know the Danish High Court pretty much did the same - ruled its own judicial review power into existence), but at the end of the day, this power only exists because the other arms of government have agreed to respect it. The difference is that whereas in Denmark, the threshold for striking down an act of parliament as unconstitutional is extremely high (I think it’s happened a handful of times in history), the SCOTUS seems to be a lot more free with its decisions. And the fact that the appointment of a single judge is enough to cause the consternation that we are now seeing, is obviously a sign that the powers of the court are way out of whack. Either that, or the laws are incredibly badly written.
I don’t think Judicial Review is a bad thing, as such, but it assumes that the various institutions involved are acting in good faith. That we are even discussing that the SCOTUS might overturn laws passed by Congress on the slimmest of technicalities is absurd - and Congress really should make it very clear that they will not accept those kind of rulings.
The GOP are the one’s who are acting in bad faith, but the Democrats do need to set steel against steel, and hold the SCOTUS to account for their acts. And in cases like this, it is - from what I’ve understood at least - the power to change the makeup of the Court (which seems clearly within the power of Congress), as well as - if I have understood correctly - stripping jurisdiction from the SCOTUS to try cases.
A fight between the branches of government is obviously not something anyone wants, but at the end of the day, the power of the People should be sovereign, and that power rests in Congress. And Congress should not allow other branches - whether it is the executive or the Courts - to usurp its power.
Succinctly put. And I guess that is the real thing I don’t understand. SCOTUS rules on the law, but it is Congress that makes the laws.
I mean, obviously the problem is that laws have a very hard time getting passed in the US at the moment, but if the Democrats get both Senate and Congress… well, they really need to focus on passing those laws. Frankly, the way the US works at the moment, it seems like each party needs to spend its years out of power to prepare a vast portfolio of laws so that they can pass as many of them as possible during their 2-year windows of opportunity.
Which is no way to govern a country, obviously, but seems to be what the US is being reduced to.
Well, the Democratic party, anyway. Currently the only thing the Republican Party seems to want to pass is ways to undo whatever the Democratic party passed. And tax cuts for the rich, of course.
I’m not sure this is fair. I doubt that there was anyone who thought that the federal government lacked the power to force an expansion of Medicaid eligibility that the federal government was effectively funding. The federal government created Medicaid in the first place, and it was voluntary, but being in the program obligates a state to comply with the rules of the program. Those rules have certainly changed over time, and no one doubted the power of the federal government to change them further.
