I've been on the road, getting back late last night and have a buttload of items on my plate to take care of
at the office so I've got very little time though lots to say and link to about yesterday's decision.
I agree with Cardinal Dolan and Archbishop Cordileone who in a joint statement, bluntly called yesterday a tragic day:
Today is a tragic day for marriage and our nation. The Supreme Court has dealt a profound injustice to the American people by striking down in part the federal Defense of Marriage Act. The Court got it wrong. The federal government ought to respect the truth that marriage is the union of one man and one woman, even where states fail to do so. The preservation of liberty and justice requires that all laws, federal and state, respect the truth, including the truth about marriage. It is also unfortunate that the Court did not take the opportunity to uphold California’s Proposition 8 but instead decided not to rule on the matter. The common good of all, especially our children, depends upon a society that strives to uphold the truth of marriage. Now is the time to redouble our efforts in witness to this truth. These decisions are part of a public debate of great consequence. The future of marriage and the well-being of our society hang in the balance.
Rebecca Hamilton opines as to why the SCOTUS rules as they did on DOMA:
If you don’t show up in court, you lose the case.
It sounds unfair, and it certainly is arbitrary, but that’s usually the way the old cookie crumbles in American jurisprudence.
That, in a nutshell, is why the Supreme Court tossed the Proposition 8 case this morning. One side didn’t show up. Ironically, the “side” of the argument that didn’t show up was the one that is actually legally bound to be there.
The people of California didn’t get their day in court because their duly elected attorney general decided not to do her job. It really is as simple as that.
Part of the job of a state attorney general is to represent “the people” in court actions. What that means is that the AG has the responsibility to defend the laws of the state as they are promulgated either by a direct vote of the people in a referendum or by the people’s duly elected representatives in a legislative body.
The attorney general does not write or pass laws. Their job — let me repeat that — their job is to enforce the laws as they are passed and to defend them in court challenges. When a prosecutor at any level decides not to enforce a law because they disagree with it, that’s dereliction of duty. When they only enforce a law part of the time, that’s selective prosecution. When the chief law enforcement officer of a state refuses to go to court to defend laws that were legally passed either in a legal election or by legislative process simply because they don’t agree with the law, that should be an impeachable offense.
The reason the Supreme Court ruled that the proponents of Proposition 8 did not have standing in the case was that they were not the duly elected chief legal officer of the State of California. They had no “standing” to speak for the people of California. The person who does have this standing, Attorney General Kamala Harris, and who is the duly elected chief legal officer of the State of California, sat the whole thing out. In fact, she was flying the rainbow flag on her web site.
Frank Weathers has video of California's Attorney General gleefully announcing yesterday's decision.
Deacon Greg is pointing out that churches have already been sued over the issue.
Joanne McPortland says to keep calm and Catholic on.
The Anchoress is saying a schism is coming to American Catholicism.
The bottom line is that the American landscape is being bulldozed by radicals in places and positions of power. Sadly, many of them were duly elected.
America is reaping what America has sown.
It's was and is a tragic day.
God's mercy on us as we move forward.
God's strength as the faithful move into what is promising to be some very tough days ahead.
Carry on.
