Iowa Supreme Court Legalizes Same Sex Marriage

April 4, 2009

Iowa really is the Heartland.

Yesterday, the Iowa Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in a unanimous decision. This makes Iowa the third state (joining MA and CT) to allow same-sex marriage.

The Iowa Supreme Court wrote, “We are firmly convinced the exclusion of gay and lesbian people from the institution of civil marriage does not substantially further any important governmental objective.”

The Court went on to say that Iowa lawmakers had, “excluded a historically disfavored class of persons from a supremely important civil institution without a constitutionally sufficient justification.”

The justices said that upholding a same-sex marriage ban “would be an abdication of our constitutional duty.”

Is there anybody on the planet who thought that same sex couples would be allowed to marry in Dubuque or Badger, IA before New York City, San Francisco, or Los Angeles? Not me.

As many of you know, the state of California legalized same-sex marriage for approximately six months last year, before outlawing it (Propostion 8) in the November 2008 election.

Now, Ken Starr, best known for investigating the Clinton/Monica Lewinsky scandal, is attempting to nullify the 18,000 same-sex marriages legalized in California in a battle being decided now in the California Supreme Court.

In Florida, where I live, the voters passed Proposition 2 last November, amending the state constitution and defining the institution of marriage as limited to a union between one man and one woman.

This makes me livid.

Prohibiting gay Americans from marrying is depriving them of their civil rights.

It is wrong.

It is just as wrong as depriving women the right to vote. It is just as wrong as depriving African-Americans the right to vote. It is discrimination.

I, for one, am tired of people using their ???family values??? to discriminate against other American families.

The most popular poem read at American weddings is the one we???ve all heard a million times:

???Love is patient, love is kind??????

It doesn???t say one word about love being straight.

Frankly, I don???t care if you think gay people are going to hell. I don???t care if you think it???s a sin. (Okay, fine, actually I do care, but it’s not really germane to our discussion here, so I’ll leave it alone.)

I don???t care if you think that granting civil rights to all will negatively affect our economy. (That, by the way, is the exact same crap argument used by those who were pro-slavery, back in the day.)

Our first amendment very clearly says religious beliefs have no place in our government. According to the Cornell Law School website,

???Two clauses in the First Amendment guarantee freedom of religion. The establishment clause prohibits the government from passing legislation to establish an official religion or preferring one religion over another. It enforces the “separation of church and state.”

It means your religious values don???t trump mine. And vice versa.

And when you take religion out of the equation, all you???re left with is people — And whether some people in our country should get rights that other people don???t.

I think we all know the answer to that one.

If we have any doubts, we don???t need to look any further than our own Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self evident ??? that all men are created equal.

Lisa

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Dating Coach and Relationships Expert Lisa Daily is the bestselling author of two dating books, Stop Getting Dumped!, How to Date Like a Grownup and the totally funny novel Fifteen Minutes of Shame. You???ve seen her everywhere from Entertainment Tonight to the HITCH movie DVD.