}

Saturday, June 27, 2015

Worth quoting: Justice Kennedy

“No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right.”

US Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, in the final paragraph of his majority opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges.

Exactly.

1 comment:

rogerogreen said...

Truth is that I don't know what the application of a less than sweeping ruling would have looked like. The logistics would have been nightmarish. Recognized federally (for the purpose of income tax, estate tax, etc), but not at the state level. I'm happy for the ruling, but I just couldn't see anything other than Loving v. Virginia II working, and so so it is.