New Mexico Supreme Court: Same-sex marriage legal

Seattle PI ^ | 12/19/2013 | Associated Press

[Alter Kaker]

SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico's highest court has legalized same-sex marriage, declaring it is unconstitutional to deny a marriage license to gay and lesbian couples.

The state Supreme Court issued its ruling Thursday. New Mexico joins 16 states and the District of Columbia in allowing gay marriage.

Eight of the state's 33 counties have started issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples since August, when a county clerk in southern New Mexico independently decided to allow the unions.

[TitansAFC]

“Unconstitutional.” The word hasn’t had any actual meaning since FDR took over.

If only the Constitution were the actual measuring stick these judges used nowadays.

[Viennacon]

This is insane judicial tyranny!

[Iron Munro]

Homosexual “marriage” stinks.

[GeronL]

courts should not be able to make law

[ZULU]

They do it because they can.

As long as the majority of Americans sit around watching reality TV and the Superbowl while their country goes to hell in a handbaske, these idiots will go on and on with this crap.

Not until people rise up and force this garbage to stop will it end.

[sickoflibs]

Didnt make it legal, instead forced it on the state.

[edcoil]

What is unconstitutional about it? That it treats American differently time for us taxpayers to sue as we are treated differently by different rates and we are treated differenly because we pay while other Americans are given our stuff?

Time for the taxpayers to sue.

[VanDeKoik]

“New Mexico’s highest court has legalized same-sex marriage, declaring it is unconstitutional to deny a marriage license to gay and lesbian couples.”

Then tell us whom CAN you deny it to. And then spin us some BS as to why THAT is ok.

[Grandma Conservative]

They will be pushing incest next. Who is to say that two (or more) consenting adults shouldn’t do what they want in the privacy of their own bedroom? Slippery slope indeed.

[AuH2ORepublican]

IIRC, NM was the one state that had not legislated on marriage, one way or the other, since the AK and HI situations in the late ‘90s made the possibility of same-sex marriage salient. I’m sure NM Republicans said “we don’t need to amend the state constitution, since such a lawsuit would never succeed here”; just like those idiot GOP members of Congress who refused to push for a Federal Marriage Amendment around 2003, when clearly we had 2/3 of votes for passage in both houses of Congress and would have gotten 38 state legislatures to approve. “We don’t need that; we’ve got DOMA.” Famous last words.

[longtermmemmory]

remeber John McCain attached the poison pill “flag burning amendment” in order to kill the FMA.

[RKBA Democrat]

Now, now. We all know that the constitution explicitly says that marriage is between 2 men, one woman, an oak tree, and a donkey named Bob. (/s)

[fwdude]

A court can’t “legalize” anything. That is constitutionally the work of the legislature.

[StonyBurk]

marriage is the union of one man and one woman period— NO State has ever documented any compelling State interest to advocate SODOMY and Fornication.If marriage means NOTHING to theState— I expect the Marriage rate to drop -as it has in Europe where such sin is encouraged.

[CedarDave]

The outcome was preordained - all the judges on the court are liberal Dems. Link to the opinion (don't read if you believe in traditional marriage - you will seethe with anger):

Read the New Mexico Supreme Court's opinion

From the New Mexican:

News of the ruling, which comes after a number of county clerks in the state already started issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples earlier this year, spread quickly on social media and touched off celebrations among marriage-equality advocates, who plan a 6 p.m. rally tonight outside the Supreme Court building in Santa Fe.

[CedarDave]

NM list PING!

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[Jewbacca]

Sadly, NM has been taken over by fleeing Californians who brought their absurd voting habits.

[CedarDave]

From the opinion:

We conclude that although none of New Mexico’s marriage statutes specifically prohibit same-gender marriages, when read as a whole, the statutes have the effect of precluding same-gender couples from marrying and benefitting from the rights, protections, and responsibilities that flow from a civil marriage. Same-gender couples who wish to enter into a civil marriage with another person of their choice and to the exclusion of all others are similarly situated to opposite-gender couples who want to do the same, yet they are treated differently. Because same-gender couples (whether lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender, hereinafter “LGBT”) are a discrete group which has been subjected to a history of discrimination and violence, and which has inadequate political power to protect itself from such treatment, the classification at issue must withstand intermediate scrutiny to be constitutional. Accordingly, New Mexico may neither constitutionally deny same-gender couples the right to marry nor deprive them of the rights, protections, and responsibilities of marriage laws, unless the proponents of the legislation—the opponents of same-gender marriage—prove that the discrimination caused by the legislation is “substantially related to an important government interest.” Breen v. Carlsbad Mun. Sch., 2005-NMSC-028, ¶ 13, 138 N.M. 331, 120 P.3d 413 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).

BOLD = B.S. -- it is proponents of traditional marriage whose rights are being trampled!

[CedarDave]

The vote of the five Justices was unanimous.