Perry and Windsor

2021 ◽  
pp. 147-155
Author(s):  
Michael J. Rosenfeld
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
Federal Court ◽  
Court System ◽  
Heterosexual Couples ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
The Social ◽  
Legal Challenges ◽  
Tax Benefits

A 2010 federal trial in California, Perry v. Schwarzenegger, ruled that Proposition 8 was unconstitutional and showed that the expert witnesses brought in to testify against marriage equality were either unconvincing or entirely lacking in credibility. Perry was a triumph for the social science consensus supporting gay rights. Moving up the federal court system at the same time was Edith Windsor’s challenge to DOMA, which prevented the federal government from recognizing Windsor’s marriage to Thea Spyer, and therefore prevented Windsor from enjoying the estate tax benefits that married heterosexual couples enjoy. The 2013 U.S. v. Windsor decision overturned a key provision of DOMA, the federal ban on recognizing same-sex marriages and opened the door to legal challenges to every state ban on same-sex marriage.

scholarly journals Current Explanations for the Variation in Same-Sex Marriage Policies in Western Countries

2012 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 526-557 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Pettinicchio
Keyword(s):  
Gay Marriage ◽  
Policy Outcomes ◽  
Heterosexual Couples ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
Gay Couples ◽  
Western Countries ◽  
National Comparison ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
Cross National

Abstract Over the last ten years, several western countries have recognized gay marriage either by providing gay couples the same rights as heterosexual couples, or by allowing civil unions. Other western countries have not. What accounts for this variation? This paper reviews and analyzes the key demographic, institutional and cultural arguments found in the literature on the legalization of gay marriage – especially as these pertain to cross-national comparison – and raises questions about assumptions regarding the extent to which there is variation on these variables across western countries. I argue that institutional and cultural explanations are only meaningful in explaining legalization when their combinations are specified in order to shed light on favorable (or unfavorable) circumstances for policy outcomes.

Same-Sex Relationships

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanna L. Grossman ◽  
Lawrence M. Friedman
Keyword(s):  
Family Law ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Marriage And Family ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Family ◽  
Traditional Marriage ◽  
The Right ◽  
Constitutional Analysis

This chapter describes what might be the last battleground over “traditional” marriage—same-sex marriage, and the social and legal revolution that brought us from an era in which it was never contemplated to one in which, depending on the state, it is either expressly authorized or expressly prohibited. Same-sex marriage has posed—and continues to pose—a challenge to traditional definitions of marriage and family. But, more importantly, the issue implies broader changes in family law—the increasing role of constitutional analysis; limits on the right of government to regulate the family; and the clash between the traditional family form and a new and wider menu of intimate and household arrangements, and all this against the background of the rise of a stronger form of individualism.

‘Belief shifts’: Ireland’s referendum and the journey from Gemeinschaft to Gesellschaft

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eugene O’Brien
Keyword(s):  
Social Relations ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Irish Society ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
Fantasy Fiction ◽  
The Social ◽  
Organic Community ◽  
German Sociologist ◽  
Definition Of

This chapter examines the implications for Irish Catholicism that the ‘Yes’ vote in the May 2015 referendum on same-sex marriage may have for the social and cultural position of the Catholic church in contemporary Ireland and in the future. His analysis channels the thinking of Ferdinand Tönnies, an early German sociologist and a contemporary of Durkheim and Weber, who used the German words ‘Gemeinschaft’ and ‘Gesellschaft’ to distinguish between two fundamentally different structural paradigms for social relations. O’Brien sees marriage as a core ideological signifier of ideological hegemony, and using the fantasy fiction of Terry Pratchett’s satire on religion entitled Small Gods as a lens, he looks at the referendum as a significant turning point in the definition of marriage, and by extension, in the transformation Irish society from the organic community of the Gemeinschaft, to the more postmodern and pluralist notion of the Gesellschaft.

scholarly journals Human Rights and the Same-Sex Marriage Debate in Australia

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 60
Author(s):  
Bede Harris
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
The United States ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
Heterosexual Couples ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
The Right

Australia is currently confronting the issue of whether to legalise same-sex marriage. Thus far debate has been conducted with little reference to human rights theory. This article draws on the theories of John Rawls and John Stuart Mill and analyses whether, by confining the right to marry to heterosexual couples, the law infringes the right to privacy and, conversely, whether the legalisation of same-sex marriage would infringe religious rights of those who are unwilling to provide goods and services to same-sex couples. In so doing, the article adopts a comparative approach, drawing on case law from the United States. The article examines the way in which political debate on the issue has been conducted by the major parties in Australia, and concludes that both the Liberal-National coalition and the Labor party have been motivated by a desire to appease the religious right within their ranks, at the expense of human rights principles.

The Church and the Tax Law: Keeping Church and State Separate

2015 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-53
Author(s):  
Mary Ann Hofmann
Keyword(s):  
Nonprofit Organizations ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
Church And State ◽  
Federal Court ◽  
Establishment Clause ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
Tax Law ◽  
Tax Benefits ◽  
Financial Transactions ◽  
The Church

ABSTRACT In a democracy characterized by the separation of church and state, what role does the federal government play in regulating the activities and the financial transactions of churches and other religious nonprofit organizations? What are the current federal requirements regarding tax exemption for churches, tax deductibility of donations to churches, and political activity by churches, and are these requirements justified? Rather than interfering with the free exercise of religion, does the federal government actually come closer to violating the establishment clause of the First Amendment by providing inappropriate tax benefits to churches and clergy? This paper discusses tax laws and federal court decisions relating to these and other issues.

What Obergefell v. Hodges Should Have Said

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Movement ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Constitutional Law ◽  
Gay Rights ◽  
Political Struggle ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
Same Sex Couples ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Right

The authors of this book, sitting as a hypothetical Supreme Court, rewrite the famous 2015 opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges, which guaranteed same-sex couples the right to marry. In eleven incisive opinions, the authors offer the best constitutional arguments for and against the right to same-sex marriage, and debate what Obergefell should mean for the future. In addition to serving as Chief Justice of this imaginary court, the book's editor provides a critical introduction to the case. He recounts the story of the gay rights litigation that led to Obergefell, and he explains how courts respond to political mobilizations for new rights claims. The social movement for gay rights and marriage equality is a powerful example of how — through legal imagination and political struggle — arguments once dismissed as “off-the-wall” can later become established in American constitutional law.

scholarly journals Marriage Equality: On the Books and On the Ground? An Experimental Audit Study of Beliefs and Behavior towards Same-Sex and Interracial Couples in the Wedding Industry

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathryn Mary Kroeper ◽  
Katherine Muenks ◽  
Mary Murphy
Keyword(s):  
Social Norm ◽  
Federal Court ◽  
Interracial Couples ◽  
Court Decisions ◽  
Actual Behavior ◽  
Heterosexual Couples ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Same Sex Couples ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
Industry Professionals

In the U.S., same-sex and interracial couples benefit from federal court decisions recognizing and protecting their marital unions. Despite these legal protections, prejudiced beliefs and subtly-biased behavior toward these groups may still be socially normative. The present studies surveyed Americans’ beliefs about the acceptability of prejudice toward same-sex, interracial, and white heterosexual couples and then examined actual behavior among wedding venue professionals towards them. In Study 1, Americans felt it more socially normative to express prejudice toward same-sex couples than toward interracial couples and heterosexual couples; they also forecasted that same-sex couples would experience more discrimination by wedding industry professionals than interracial couples. Study 2 used experimental audit methods to examine whether the actual behavior of wedding venue professionals aligned with Americans’ social norm beliefs. Results revealed that same-sex couples and, to a lesser extent, interracial couples experienced more discrimination by wedding industry professionals than did white heterosexual couples.

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