esrosedotblog

DEAR SUPREMES, THIS IS ONE TOUGH LETTER

Boies and Olson (left and right wing guys together) have written their final brief to the Supremes for their hearing on March 26th about Proposition 8 in California.

The unmistakable purpose and effect of Proposition 8 is to stigmatize gay men and lesbians—and them alone—and enshrine in California’s Constitution that they are “unequal to everyone else,” Rome v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620, 635 (1996), that their committed relationships are ineligible for the designation “marriage,” and that they are unworthy of that “most important relation in life.” Neither tradition, nor fear of change, nor an “interest in democratic self-governance” (Prop. Br. 55), can absolve society, or this Court, of the obligation to identify and rectify discrimination in all its forms. If a history of discrimination were sufficient to justify its perpetual existence, as Proponents argue, our public schools, drinking fountains, and swimming pools would still be segregated by race, our government workplaces and military institutions would still be largely offlimits to one sex—and to gays and lesbians, and marriage would still be unattainable for interracial couples. Yet the Fourteenth Amendment could not tolerate those discriminatory practices, and it similarly does not tolerate the permanent exclusion of gay men and lesbians from the most important relation in life. “In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law.” Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537, 559 (1896) (Harlan, J., dissenting).

Kos says it qualifies them as "bad-asses".

This is a video made for the Union for Reform Judaism Biennial Plenary. It is very well done.

Labels: gay marriage, gay rights