A Decade Since ‘Five Lawyers’ Divorced Marriage from Natural Law, Obergefell is Ripe to be Overturned
By Mat Staver
On June 26, 2015, “five lawyers” on the Supreme Court divorced “marriage” from natural law and fabricated a constitutional “right" through an opinion that invented same-sex “marriage” nationwide.
A decade later, society bears the consequences of this opinion that is ripe to be overturned. Much like Roe v. Wade, which was struck down after nearly 50 years, the 10-year-old Obergefell v. Hodges opinion is on shaky legal footing for the same reason: There is no basis for same-sex “marriage” in the U.S. Constitution.
Every Household at Risk
Not only is this so-called “right” a legal fiction, but same-sex “marriage” puts every household at risk. Same-sex “marriage,” by nature, is incompatible with the family and damns children by permanently depriving them of the right to both their mother and father.
As Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in his dissent,
This universal definition of marriage as the union of a man and a woman is no historical coincidence. Marriage did not come about as a result of a political movement, discovery, disease, war, religious doctrine, or any other moving force of world history—and certainly not as a result of a prehistoric decision to exclude gays and lesbians. It arose in the nature of things to meet a vital need: ensuring that children are conceived by a mother and father committed to raising them in the stable conditions of a lifelong relationship.
Simply put, the union of a man and a woman in marriage — as it has existed for millennia — is for family formation and the raising of children. Thus, same-sex “marriage” puts the family, which is the bedrock of society, at risk.
The Obergefell opinion is a social experiment that has gone horribly wrong. One needs to look no further than the onslaught of “pride” month with obscene displays in the presence of children, the predation toward children by “Drag Queen” and coerced indoctrination in public schools, males invading female sports and private spaces, and the never-ending LGBTQIA+ alphabet of perversions to see how this movement was never just about same-sex “marriage.”
Katy Faust, founder and president of Them Before Us, a global children’s rights nonprofit, writes that “children have paid the highest price” as a result of the same-sex “marriage” ruling that eroded a child’s right to his or her mother and father. She shares how children are most victimized by same-sex “marriage,” which leads to a loss of either maternal or paternal love and decreased emotional well-being compared to children with opposite-sex parents.
Of course, same-sex “marriage” also opens a Pandora’s box of other evils such as elevated rates of abuse and neglect with an unrelated adult in the home and obtaining a baby through unethical practices such as surrogacy, which allows even HIV-positive LGBTQ men to procure a child.
The intentionally motherless or fatherless children in same-sex “marriage” homes are being forced to grow up without the love and protection of one of their parents — a mom or a dad — both of whom offer the complementary and necessary roles essential for a child’s development. There is no question that children do best when raised by both a mother and a father. Same-sex “marriage” not only permanently excludes a mother or a father from the child’s life, but by its very nature, same-sex unions distort the view of the missing gender. This is far different than single parenting, which remains open to the absent gender and does not cast a negative spin on the absent gender.
Same-sex unions are a double whammy for children by eliminating one gender and thereby imposing a negative view of the absent gender on the child.
When it comes to raising children, gender matters. It should come as no surprise that within a marriage between one man and one woman, as God designed it, is the environment in which children and families naturally thrive. Veering from natural law and replacing it with perversion will inevitably result in chaos, disorder, and harm.
Ten years since the White House was first illuminated in rainbow “pride” colors to celebrate Obergefell, it is clear this legal opinion forced on society — and wreaking havoc on our children — should certainly not be a part of our law and policy, masquerading as a constitutional right.
Ripe for Overturn
At this point, it’s not a matter of if but when Obergefell will be overturned to become consistent with the Constitution. In the words of Chief Justice John Roberts in his dissent, “the majority’s decision is an act of will, not legal judgment” and “the right it announces has no basis in the Constitution or this Court’s precedent.”
Rowan County, Kentucky, Clerk Kim Davis was the first victim of the Obergefell “opinion” and went to prison for six days after she refused to give “marriage” licenses to same-sex couples while she waited to receive a religious accommodation from the state. Liberty Counsel has represented Kim Davis since 2015 when she was victimized for acting in accordance with her religious convictions, and she now personally faces hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees because of acting in line with her Christian faith.
Now, Liberty Counsel is petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court to hear Kim Davis’ case, which underscores why the High Court should overturn Obergefell v. Hodges as it threatens the religious liberty of Americans who believe marriage is a sacred union between one man and one woman.
As Chief Justice Roberts noted in his dissent, the “freedom to exercise religion is—unlike the right imagined by the majority— actually spelled out in the Constitution.”
By taking this case, the Supreme Court can do two things: affirm religious freedom for all people and also correct the Obergefell mistake by overruling the 2015 opinion. A decade later, three out of the five Justices who voted to legalize same-sex “marriage,” Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Stephen Breyer, are no longer on the Court.
The current Supreme Court overturned Roe (with nearly 50 years of legal precedent) and now has an opportunity to correct the damage Obergefell did to the Constitution by overruling this disastrous legal opinion.
Obergefell does damage to the Constitution and to society, of which the family is the bedrock. For the benefit of families and culture, as well as for the integrity of the Constitution, the sooner this opinion is overturned, the better.
To paraphrase Chief Justice Roberts, “Just who do we think we are?” to “[order] the transformation of a social institution that has formed the basis of human society for millennia?”
To answer Chief Justice Roberts, it is not our place to “rewrite” God’s definition of marriage. In fact, we should uphold it –– just as humankind has from the beginning.
Originally published in the Standing for Freedom Center.
For more from Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel Mat Staver, click HERE.