C'mon, TRG. I understand that we disagree, but I don't accuse you of promoting a "lie". I've repeated several times that I do not view civil marriage as a "right" - but that once the state decides to marry individuals and afford them valuable benefits, it must do so consistent with equal protection.
The lie you keep repeating is that gay "marriage" is somehow under the protection of the 14th Amendment.
It's not. And you lie every time you claim it is.
I'll say it again, slowly - the right that is violated isn't the right to marry, it's the right the equal protection of the law.
And you have a serious comprehension problem with the fact that marriage...gay straight or otherwise never had been nor should it ever be a "right".
It's not a right for me or for you. You are advocating for a carve out for a special interest group that the majority of the 320 million Americans do not have.
For example, a state can get out of the marriage business altogether, leave marriages up to the churches, and afford no legal protections or benefits for such marriages.
They can't now thanks to advocates on the bench disguised as judges and people like you that think it is protected by the Constitution.
For example, a state can affirm civil unions for all competent adult couples, gay or straight.
For example, a state can affirm civil marriage for all competent adult couples, gay or straight.
Not.any.more.
Because people completely ignorant of the Constitution like yourself and judges who see things in the Constitution that aren't there...the states ability to do things like that..which is afforded to them under the 9th and 10th Amendment has been completely stripped away.
Each of the foregoing is consistent with equal protection. But the state cannot afford protection and benefits to opposite civil marriages but not same sex civil marriages. That's not a "lie", it's the considered opinion of a century of equal protection jurisprudence, applied ultimately to the circumstance of civil marriage by the Supreme Court of the land.
The ateempt by the gay "rights" mafai in this country to usurp what the 14th Amendment was written for is shameful.
Again let me spell it out for you.
Marriage is NOT a right.
No one is denying gays a seat at a lunch counter.
No one is telling them to sit at the back of a bus. Gays are not being given literacy tests or being subjected to any Jim Crow style laws where voting is concerned.
Gays are not being denied the right to vote or own property. There are not "Gays Only" water fountains and restrooms.
They are not being forced into "separate but equal" segregated schools on the other side of the tracks.
Gays are not being lynched. They aren't being told that because they are gay they are not considered citizens of the U.S.
All of the above are clear violations of the 14th Amendment and actual violations of the separate but equal clause you keep misusing.
There is no rights violation if a state doesn't have a provision in their laws that does or does not allow two gay people to get married.