Escape velocity is the speed needed to break away from a planet without eventually being pulled back by gravity. Hit it, and you can coast to the freedom of open space without hitting the jets again. For Earth, it’s about 25,000 mph. The escape velocity of a political movement can’t be calculated, but there is…
Paul Smith, the third leg of a victorious legal stool that includes Theodore Olson and David Boise (Prop. 8), has argued that same-sex marriage will be a reality in the United States by 2015 at the earliest and 2016 at the latest. Smith, who successfully argued Windsor v. United States in 2013 – which struck…
U.S. District Judge Michael McShane has ruled in favor of the plaintiffs in two consolidated marriage cases challenging Oregon’s ban on marriage equality, known as Measure 36. Judge McShane’s is the latest in a string of rulings striking down state laws or constitutional amendments that ban marriage for same-sex couples. The cases were both filed…
CHARLOTTE, N.C., — Defendants in the case, General Synod of the United Church of Christ v. Cooper, filed motions for a 30-day extension of time to respond to the lawsuit today in U.S. District Court in Charlotte. The Attorney General of North Carolina, Roy Cooper, on behalf of himself and all Defendant District Attorneys, specifically…
Last night, a federal judge ruled that Idaho’s ban on marriage equality is unconstitutional. In her ruling flagwrote, “Idaho’s Marriage Laws withhold from them a profound and personal choice, one that most can take for granted. By doing so, Idaho’s Marriage Laws deny same-sex couples the economic, practical, emotional, and spiritual benefits of marriage, relegating…
Since its now famous dual rulings on same-sex marriage –striking down both Prop. 8 and the Federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) – the United States Supreme Court has ushered in an era of challenges to same-sex marriage bans across the United States. No fewer than ten states have had their constitutional bans struck down…
Dan Haseltine, the lead singer for the hugely popular Christian rock band Jars of Clay, is under assault by Christians for his pro-gay Tweets, reports ChristianToday.com. In a series of short posts on Twitter last week, the Grammy Award-winning singer, having just watched 12 Years a Slave, noted that, “The treatment of people as less…
A new report from the Williams Institute, a progressive think tank on the campus of UCLA, shows that Utah stands to gain significant financial advantage, increase tourism and create jobs if it were, in fact, to legalize same-sex marriage. The authors, E.G. Fitzgerald, Christy Mallory and M.V. Lee Badgett, have released a report entitled “Estimating…
“We’ve really put a lot of time into this,” Milton Aguilar said about his and Daniel Greer’s wedding, as they celebrated being the first same-sex couple to get married at the Spreckels Organ Pavilion in Balboa Park last Saturday. This milestone in marriage equality in the San Diego community was born from the memories Daniel…
Today, U.S. District Judge Timothy Black struck down part of a constitutional amendment in Ohio that denies gay couples the freedom to marry and withholds legal respect for gay couples who have gotten married. He ordered the state to treat couples married elsewhere like any other couples who marry out of state — as married….
