Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
The race to the Supreme Court intensifies, with multiple new lawsuits and an expedited
schedule. Oregon won't defend its marriage ban in court, and a marriage lawsuit in Virginia
might have reached a premature end. Plus polling from Louisiana shows progress, but it's been
slow.
For the American Foundation for Equal Rights, I'm Matt Baume, and welcome to Marriage News
Watch for February 24, 2014.
This week's new federal marriage lawsuits are in Colorado and Ohio. Nine couples have
sued Colorado for the freedom to marry. The arguments are familiar: that the state's marriage
ban violates the due process and equal protection clauses of the US Constitution.
And a couple in Ohio has sued the state to obtain recognition of their marriage. This
week the plaintiffs in a separate Ohio case asked for an expedited briefing schedule.
That case is currently on appeal to the Sixth Circuit, so we could potentially have a Supreme-Court-ready
decision in Ohio before the end of the year.
Four couples in an Idaho lawsuit want to put their case on a fast track too. They've asked
the court to skip a trial and issue a ruling right away.
The attorney general of Oregon announced this week that she would not defend the state's
marriage ban. Ellen Rosenblum joins the attorneys general of California, Nevada, Virginia, Pennsylvania,
and Illinois in refusing to defend what she considers an indefensible law.
After AFER's huge victory in Virginia this month, the judge in another Virginia case
is mulling whether to proceed. That second case, filed by the ACLU, is on a slower timeframe
than AFER's and may no longer be necessary.
And now polls in Louisiana show incremental progress in turning public opinion. Just 28%
of voters favor the freedom to marry, an increase of only a few percentage points over the last
twenty years.
Those are the headlines. Subscribe here on YouTube to stay up to date on all these stories.
For the American Foundation for Equal Rights, I'm Matt Baume. Thanks for watching and we'll
see you next week.