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Constitutional Law

Oct. 30, 2009

What Lies Beneath the Ban on Gay Marriage?

Mike Willemsen of Santa Clara University explains why arguments against gay marriage lack credit as a basis for legislation.

CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS

By Mike Willemsen

The serious arguments against gay marriage, which led to the enactment of Proposition 8, are based upon traditional morality and religion. After Justice Anthony M. Kennedy's opinion in Lawrence v. Texas rejected similar arguments as grounds for sustaining criminal sodomy laws, litigants supporting laws banning gay marriage became leery of relying on them, and contrived new arguments unrelated to the purpos...

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