Kansas and South Carolina Join Marriage Equality States

Despite what looks to be a brief victory in the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals under an opinion that is making some White supremacists proud, the opponents of gay marriage had another losing day yesterday as (i) the U.S. Supreme Court refused to continue a stay delaying marriage equality in Kansas and (ii) a federal court in South Carolina struck down that states marriage ban based on the precedent of Bostic and the state's inability to any rational basis for the ban.   Metro Weekly looks at the news.  First highlights on Kansas which would suggest that Judge Sutton's anti-gay ruling at the 6th Circuit is fated for reversal:

The U.S. Supreme Court ended the hold on same-sex marriages in Kansas Wednesday, thus allowing same-sex nuptials to proceed in the state.

In an order issued this afternoon, the nation’s highest court denied the request for a stay by Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt of a lower court ruling striking the state’s ban on same-sex marriage.

Schmidt had filed the request with Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who oversees the 10th Circuit. Sotomayor issued a temporary stay while the request was considered and referred the stay request to the entire Supreme Court. The order notes that Supreme Court Justices Anthonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas would have granted the stay.

Kansas is one of the states in a circuit impacted by the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last month declining to hear arguments in cases challenging same-sex marriage bans in five states — Utah, Oklahoma, Virginia, Indiana and Wisconsin — thus allowing lower court decisions legalizing marriage equality in those states to stand. Because the Supreme Court left intact rulings by the 4th Circuit, 7th Circuit and 10th Circuit Courts of Appeals striking down same-sex marriage bans in those five states, those appeals courts’ decisions applied to six other states in those three circuits: West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Kansas, Colorado and Wyoming.

Note that only Scalia and Thomas would have granted the stay.  Yet, not surprisingly, Kansas GOP governor Sam Brownback, homophobe extraordinaire, says he will appeal, although its unclear where he can appeal to.   South Carolina finds itself in a similar posture as Kansas: the ruling in the 4th Circuit which was allowed to stand by the U.S. Supreme Court is binding on that state.  A federal judge made that official yesterday.  Despite the inevitable, Republicans say that they will appeal.  Again, the question is where to - the 4th Circuit and Supreme Courts have spoken.  Here are additional highlights from Metro Weekly.

A federal judge struck down South Carolina’s ban on same-sex marriage in a ruling handed down Wednesday.

U.S. District Court Judge Richard Mark Gergel found South Carolina laws prohibiting same-sex couples from marrying “unconstitutionally infringe on the rights of Plaintiffs under the Due Process Clause and Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution and are invalid as a matter of law.”

According to Gergel, the decision by the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals striking down Virginia’s same-sex marriage ban “controls the disposition of the issues before this Court and establishes, without question, the right of Plaintiffs to marry as same sex partners.”

Although Gergel denied a stay pending appeal due to the unlikelihood that the South Carolina ban will be upheld, he did grant a temporary stay until noon on Nov. 20 to allow South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson to petition either the 4th Circuit or the U.S. Supreme Court for a longer stay.

The willingness of Republican officials to seek appeals that are clear dead ends underscore the desperate desire of these individuals to prostitute themselves to the Christofascists.  Meanwhile, all they are doing is wasting taxpayer funds which they might just as well place in a pile and set on fire.