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Wisconsin's same-sex marriage ban struck down in court

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Wisconsin's same-sex marriage ban struck down in court

A federal judge in Wisconsin last week struck down the state's ban on same-sex marriage on the grounds that it unconstitutionally denies gay and lesbian couples' access to rights and benefits afforded to opposite-sex couples.

In an 88-page ruling issued Friday in U.S. District Court in Madison, Wisconsin, Judge Barbara Crabb said the 2006 amendment to the state's constitution outlawing same-sex marriage violates gay and lesbian couples' rights to equal protection and due process under the U.S. Constitution.

“This case is not about whether marriages between same-sex couples are consistent or inconsistent with the teachings of a particular religion, whether such marriages are moral or immoral, or whether they are something that should be encouraged or discouraged. It is not even about whether the plaintiffs in this case are as capable as opposite-sex couples of maintaining a committed and loving relationship or raising a family together,” Judge Crabb wrote in her decision. “Quite simply, this case is about liberty and equality, the two cornerstones of the rights protected by the United States Constitution.”

Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen said he planned to appeal Judge Crabb's ruling, and Monday filed an emergency motion with the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in an effort to postpone the ruling's implementation until the legality of state-level same-sex marriages bans is settled by the U.S. Supreme Court.

“As Attorney General, I have an obligation to uphold Wisconsin law and our Constitution,” Mr. Van Hollen said in a statement released Friday. “While today's decision is a setback, we will continue to defend the constitutionality of our traditional marriage laws and the constitutional amendment, which was overwhelmingly approved by voters.”

Judge Crabb said her ruling was not an invalidation of the voter referendum process nor was it intended to paint those who voted for the ban in 2006 in a negative light. Rather, she said, her decision was an affirmation that any law passed at the state level — whether by voter referendum or through the legislature — must operate within the boundaries of the U.S. Constitution.

“In reaching this decision, I do not mean to disparage the legislators and citizens who voted in good conscience for the marriage amendment,” Judge Crabb wrote in her ruling. “To decide this case in favor of plaintiffs, it is not necessary, as some have suggested, to 'cast all those who cling to traditional beliefs about the nature of marriage in the role of bigots or superstitious fools.' Rather, it is necessary to conclude only that the state may not intrude without adequate justification on certain fundamental decisions made by individuals and that, when the state does impose restrictions on these important matters, it must do so in an even-handed manner.”

Since the U.S. Supreme Court's June 2013 ruling in U.S. v. Windsor — which invalidated provisions of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act that defined marriage for federal purposes as the union of one man and one woman — federal courts in Utah, Oklahoma, Virginia, Texas, Idaho, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Oregon and now Wisconsin have wholly overturned those states' bans on same-sex marriage, while bans in Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee and Indiana have been partially overturned.

Additionally, a state judge in Arkansas overturned that state's constitutional ban on same-sex marriage.

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