It's not that marriage is now unconstitutional in Texas...

[demiurgent]

...though that is funny.

It's that the inevitable test case that challenges heterosexual marriage in Texas neither needs to be nor should be launched by homosexuals. In fact, homosexuality doesn't need to go anywhere near it.

Right now -- right now Anna Nicole Smith is going to the United States Supreme Court to challenge marital rights to a significantly higher portion of her late husband's estate. Her children are fighting her getting any.

This kind of thing happens all the time. A marriage breaks up. A man or woman remarries. Said man or woman dies before changing his/her will. His new spouse is not named in the will, but as an actual spouse is entitled to certain considerations by virtue of the marriage, absent a specific prenuptial agreement to the contrary.

Under the Texas Constitution, as of today, those spouses are not entitled to anything.

You think there won't be a son or daughter of a multimillionaire who despises their stepparent enough to put one of these challenges through?

You think they won't necessarily win their challenge, on appeal if necessary? This is directly constitutional.

And once that challenge goes through and the rights are struck down, it ripples from there. Joint tax filing? Unconstitutional. Spousal consent for a sick husband or wife who can't act on their own behalf without an explicit power of attorney? Unconstitutional. Visitation of a sick husband or wife without explicit legal codification in advance? Unconstitutional. Property inheritance without explicit alterations of wills? Unconstitutional.

Divorce settlements in circumstances where a prenup doesn't exist? No longer have to apply. There's no legal requirement or protection that states that both parties of a divorce need to be able to maintain the lifestyle they've been accustomed to any longer. (Just think what the first ultrarich Texas Oilman who realizes he can dump his wife and challenge any divorce settlement proceedings on the theory that marriage itself is unconstitutional will do.)

Gays and Lesbians want, in the end, to be treated the same as everyone else. They want to be treated with the same rights, courtesy and respect as heterosexuals.

Texas, in an astoundingly bigoted move, has rejected that. But the way they did this... they've opened the door to causing heterosexual husbands and wives... to be treated with the same rights, courtesy and respect as gays and lesbians.

Serves them right, seems to me.

Comments

[shiffer.livejournal.com]

I don't know why you call this move "astounding". It sounds like a perfectly Texan thing to do.

[flemco.livejournal.com]

Fuck you.

The Texas state government has been corrupt and has pandered to the religious MINORITY since the 1980's. I realize all too well that this vote helps bolster the bullshit stereotype about our state - that it's full of god-wankers who hate fags and watch Deliverance as erotic film.

In reality, our metropolitan areas are Blue as fuck. The problem is that we're outnumbered by the fucking retards on the farms, who get easily found polling stations, while we get to scramble to find out that 3 of the 4 polling places near our houses in the cities have been closed for reasons unknown.

This was a corrupt vote, and we got a corrupt result.

The first state to throw off these bullshit shackles the current American way of govt. has slapped us with will be the Lone Star State. Mark my words.

[ardaniel]

Florida will follow, definitely. South Florida has a bunch of blue counties, and gets the same bullshit stereotype applied to it thanks to corrupt government.

(Former damnyankee living in Southern California, dating a Floridian transplant who's *pissed off* at the rep his state gets.)

[demiurgent.livejournal.com]

Preach it.

[mephron]

we get to scramble to find out that 3 of the 4 polling places near our houses in the cities have been closed for reasons unknown.

Oh, the reasons are perfectly obvious. Some inbred cocksucker who hears Rush Limbaugh say that city dwellers want to rape his daughter, his cow and his dog gets his neighbors/cousins/brothers (all the same five people) to get him voted into the State House. Then he sees the Horrible Unbiblical Moral Decay around the State House (these are the kinds of people who get queasy around indoor plumbing, after all) and feels that the people in the cities shouldn't vote, because after all, they might do something horrible. After all, they're LIBRULS, and the President and Tom DeLay said that LIBRULS were against the war against the towelheads who flew a plane into a field in Pennsylvania. So he and Cousin Clem (R-Asswart) ask Tom DeLay what to do, and he says, "Well, you need to make sure they can't vote against what's Good and Right and Godly!" And he gives the webbed-finger brigade plans to stop funding the polling stations, and in Jesus' name they will DO THIS THING HALLELUIA!

The worst part is that I'm only half sarcastic here, and that sarcasm is all the jokes about inbreeding.

[jinwicked.livejournal.com]

You mean like how foreigners are more likely to be assholes, and stereotype an entire US state that's bigger than most European countries, as being one homogenous mass of groupthinking idiots?

News flash, dickweed: There are a lot of people here within the state who have been fighting long and hard against this shit, and I don't appreciate you belittling their efforts.

[book-worm817.livejournal.com]

(applaud) Well said.

I'm not suprised by the vote though. I did my part in voting against it. I even talked it up as best I could around campus and the office. In the end though, the twits won this one. We can only hope that it'll be challeneged in court and it will get stricken.

What a junky constitution we have in this state...

[jinwicked.livejournal.com]

I knew Prop 2 would pass, but anyone who actually knew a thing about Texas would realize that this is one HUGE place with a lot of variety within its population. I'm in Houston and everyone I know thinks this was horseshit. I don't appreciate being lumped in with the people that voted for this crap because it's a "very Texan thing to do". Not everyone here is like that.

[(Anonymous)]

I agree. While most of my friends on campus disagreed with it, and even most of my work friends, I knew it would pass in the DFW area.

The religious minority does a good job of getting out the votes. (shakes head) I have badgered all my friends to get out and vote, but voter apathy is what kills us the most.

'A Texan thing to do,' alas, is something we will have to live down for a long time. Too many people (I use that term loosely in this case) in the goverment that are twits have come from this state. :( We have a lot to live down now...

[book-worm817.livejournal.com]

that was me. stupid thing wasn't logged in.. sorry

[tbutler.livejournal.com]

...believe me, I understand very much what you're feeling right now. I live in Kansas. :(

[no-relation.livejournal.com]

Can't challenge it in the court, it's a constitutional amendment. You can't argue that part of the Texas Constitution is unconstitutional. The only way to overturn it is with another amendment.

[(Anonymous)]

The only way to overturn it is with another amendment.

According to my wife the J.D. studying for the bar, if a state constitution amendment is found to be too vague it can be thrown out.

Paul Gadzikowski, paul@arthurkingoftimeandspace.com

[point5b.livejournal.com]

Preach it. And to top it off, we get to hear people from other parts of the US wax smug, even the ones from states that will follow suit. Feh.

[chadu.livejournal.com]

Hy-sterical. My in-laws live in Texas. I refuse to speculate on which way they voted here.

CU

[archangelbeth]

You know, this means the state no longer has to pay widows (or widowers) of post office employees, doesn't it? That's all based on surviving spouse stuff, right?

I suppose, if they were still doing that, it's one way to cut the budget.

Man, I hope that they get the lawyers called out...

[demiurgent.livejournal.com]

Post office employees are Federal, not State.

[archangelbeth]

Ahhh. Okay, that's good.

I've been reading various news things on Google news -- how can "not create or recognize... identical... to marriage" not threaten existing marriages?

HOW???

[etzhadaat.livejournal.com]

Because the marriages need to be challenged.

[etzhadaat.livejournal.com]

I don't think that matters if all Texan marriages were annulled. But at the same time, I doubt anyone would challenge for that.

[ocarina.livejournal.com]

I think I just hate voters now. San Fran narrowly wins the right for a small majority of voters to take away guns from all of the population and in Texas a small majority of voters impose their will on every darn married person. People are so selfish.

[dvandom.livejournal.com]

Huh? What's the wording in question that makes all this shit hit all those fans?

[drderanged.livejournal.com]

Well, you may already know that I live in Texas and since you've been a Friend of my journal for quite some time, you'll know just how unimpressed I am with our political system.

The results of this vote don't surprise me in the least. I could have told you this outcome weeks ago. Just like Iraq as a society isn't ready for Democracy, a majority element in society isn't ready to actually embrace equality or a level playing field for all.

Frankly, like any major social change -- these people campaigning for gay rights (not just with this vote here but in general) are pioneers. I believe that one day these people will be the majority. Their time will come. But change isn't quick or easy. These are the growing pains.

It's cold comfort but life is a shit storm and it rains on everyone. But without this foundation, it would never happen at all.

[no-relation.livejournal.com]

Eric, I read the ballot, and I read the proposition itself. Where are you getting all that about dispensing with marriage rights?

[demiurgent.livejournal.com]

SECTION 1. Article I, Texas Constitution, is amended by adding Section 32 to read as follows:

Sec. 32. (a) Marriage in this state shall consist only of the union of one man and one woman.
(b) This state or a political subdivision of this state may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage.

Subsection b does not make any provision for granting legal status to marriage. Legally speaking, marriage is in fact both identical to and similar to marriage. They have neither a provision nor a condition separating it out.

Seem ridiculous and nuts? I promise you, it's not. Many, many lawyers will make huge amounts of money arguing interpretations of the subsection. And from the stuff I've read today, it's more likely they're interpret that it denies legal status to anything like marriage including marriage than not.

What's insane is it would have been simple to avoid this, with a slight alteration of language. And, if the State Supreme Court's justices actively dislike the new amendment, it's almost certain that they'll be biased towards this interpretation, since it will force a new amendment or a repeal.

(And even if said SSC is more homophobic than not, they're not likely to like this amendment, because it's poorly rendered and fails to specify conditions.)

[no-relation.livejournal.com]

...because it's poorly rendered and fails to specify conditions.

Never stopped them before.

Austin, TX

[jennyfofenny.livejournal.com]

Of course Travis County, the county in which most of Austin is contained, was the only county in the entire state with a majority vote against Proposition 2. Ya gotta love Austin, at least. :)

[larksilver.livejournal.com]

Grrrrrrrrr. Oh, man, if I didn't hate the cold, and didn't have a soft spot for men in scruffy blue jeans, I'd totally move out of Texas.

[weemumlessmngrl.livejournal.com]

I'm confused. As far as I understand it, we haven't had alimony in Texas in years. Last I heard, after several failed attempts in previous legislative sessions a bill to intro alimony, they finally got it passed, and it's now waiting for Senate approval.

Where is your source on this 'as of today, alimony blah blah blah'?