Lauren Beth Czekala-Chatham
Posted on 11/26/2014 5:41:14 PM PST by Mrs. Don-o
Lauren Beth Czekala-Chatham
A Mississippi woman wants the state Supreme Court to recognise gay marriage – so that she can divorce a partner she married in San Francisco.
Lauren Beth Czekala-Chatham, a 52-year-old credit analyst, who already had two children from a failed heterosexual marriage, moved to California in 2008 so that she could marry Dana Ann Melancon. But the relationship soured and they separated in 2010.
When Ms Czekala-Chatham, who now has a new girlfriend, applied for a divorce, citing adultery and habitual cruel and inhuman treatment, she failed. The state predictably argued that Mississippi could not grant a divorce for a marriage which it did not recognise. It was a result that she found devastating. In her eyes, divorce was an important dimension of the social recognition of marriage.
“It's humiliating to know that you spend that money, that time to be in a committed relationship and for it to end. I mean, that hurts. But then to be in a state that doesn't recognize you as a human being, or recognize you for who you are, for who you love, it's hard. I'm not treated like the neighbors next door. I'm treated like a second-class citizen.”
She feels that the inability to get a divorce is clearly discriminatory:
“Why should I be treated differently, you know? When the courthouse is a few blocks from here, I should be able to walk up there and get married. I should also be able to go up there and get divorced.”
Making the right to divorce as important as the right to marry sounds bizarre, but it is a logical part of the package. It is already established in Massachusetts, the first state to legalise same-sex marriage. Peter F. Zupcofska, a Boston lawyer who was once featured in GQ magazine as the “Master of Gay Divorce”, has handled hundreds of dissolutions of same-sex marriages and partnerships – including the marriage of the lesbian couple at the centre of the State Supreme Court decision which legalised it. When two male egos are involved, divorce can be tempestuous, Zupcofska says.
"It's very often a War of the Roses situation. It's 'He said, he said. 'I've seen hundreds of thousands of dollars in property destroyed. People would rather break something than let the other party have it. 'Guess what he just did? He smashed our collection of Dresden pottery that was going to the Museum of Fine Arts!' It's soap-opera law."
And for lawyers like him, it has been a windfall. "There's more of a market for florists now. There's more of a market for caterers. And there's more of a market for lawyers," a gay activist told Details magazine.
It’s always sad to see a relationship break up in bitterness and recrimination, whether it is a marriage, a friendship or a same-sex partnership. But is one person’s personal tragedy enough reason to force a whole state to change its legal system? This sounds more like self-centred grandstanding than justice. In any case, if Ms Czekala-Chatham really needs a divorce to get on with her life, why doesn’t she dissolve in California what she created in California?
This case also proves that same-sex marriage is simply not the same as conjugal marriage. When a man and a woman tie the knot, they vow to remain together "until death do us part". The words may vary, but the expectation is the same: marriage is for ever and ever; it forges an unbreakable bond.
Sadly, marriages do founder and spouses do renege on their vows. For such couples, governments have created the possibility of divorce. But except in the wedding chapels of Las Vegas, men and women still embark upon marriage with the impossibly romantic notion of permanent vows and exclusive fidelity. Divorce has always been regarded as a regrettable exception, not as a normal part of the life cycle.
But permanence is not embedded in same-sex marriage. Would gays and lesbians ever dare to propose marriage without divorce? It's impossible to imagine. What they want is not conjugal marriage, but marriage-lite, a new type of relationship which is neither permanent nor exclusive. Since the law is a teacher, this new mindset will inevitably spread to heterosexual couples as well. The last thing that starry-eyed young lovers in America need is to be able to follow in the footsteps of Lauren Beth Czekala-Chatham.
Why? A few theories:
This brings to mind the old joke:
Weird? I’d say that is common. The same exact thing was tried in Texas.
What needs to be taken back is the idea of marriage outside of the State. People who cite old cases claiming it was always from the State depends on things like the State’s acknowledgement of widowhood for a soldier who died fighting, or initial cases of federal acknowledgement of State acknowledgement of marriage. These are red herrings, because they are only about acknowledgement - not empowerment.
Marriage is religious, and derives from a person’s faith. The only other definition is a tax definition, and if they want that alone they should just cut to the chase and demand that the IRS conduct marriages.
Two people pledging their lives together before God and each other? I’m not seeing the State in any part of that.
Its time to get this issue clear again - not having it clear has resulted in all sorts of hell over marriage rulings with zero comprehension that such rulings refer to a type of taxable business incorporation.
So much for the lie that it’s all about “two people who love each other”.
self-centred grandstanding
your 15 minutes are up
What an interesting and common-sense concept!
-JT
Related: I used to sell real estate, had a few gay clients. Made a fortune off them, every breakup meant sell the old house and buy another one. There were a lot of breakups.
When the whole gay marriage took off, the first thing I said was, “Some gay divorce lawyers are going to be very rich.”
I don’t think that the institution of marriage ever grew from the mere concept that two people “loving” one another, should simply and joyously celebrate and formalize their love in a ceremony and commitment.
I think it probably had to do with the acknowledgement of ancient people that the union of male and female resulted in a child. It was an honoring of their awe of the procreative act; of the awareness that the subsequent family unit constituted THE basic unit of human society; and their wise urge was to consecrate and institutionalize that union and unit.
-JT
If the courts can recognize cousin marriages in Iran for divorce purposes, should there really be a problem with recognizing “marriages” from Calif?
Here’s a case of a marriage between 2 cousins, which was invalid here. The court granted the divorce anyway despite the invalid marriage.
I bet there's one ex-husband here who gets a great big grin on his face every time he hears about his ex-wife, and who wakes up every morning and thanks God he's divorced.
The flooring went bad? Tongue and groove
Follow the money.
The divorce industry and marriage industry LOVE gay marriage.
Well with the number of lawyers in the US tripling in the last 35 yrs, they gotta have something to do, LOL.
I know of a few gay couples who got “married”, then decided they didn’t want to be together and just went their separate ways.
You want marriage like all of us “breeders”?
Then you get the Hell of divorce to go with it.
Exactly. Precisely. Right.
Here’s the problem with the reasoning:
Divorce is something that should not be important in marriage, it should be a last resort because situations of abuse are Severe enough that you have to separate yourself from the spouse to protect yourself and/or children.
Real estate likes it too. When a divorce or breakup happens, there’s a new renter, house buyer on the way. Wouldn’t expect it to be much different if a same sex couple divorced or broke up.
You hit on something I hear more and more people talking about. We need tax reform and your point is just one of many reasons why. Whether we are single or married should make NO difference in the tax code. If I live with my girlfriend, we get no special tax incentives; I believe the same should be true for married couples (And yes, I believed the same when I was married). It’s just more government intrusion into our lives where it does not belong.
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