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Title: Polygamist who appeared on Sister Wives applies for a license to marry his second wife in wake of Supreme Court ruling on gay marriage
Source:
Daily Mail UK
URL Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art ... o-applies-wedding-license.html
Published: Jul 6, 2015
Author: AP and Daily Mail reporters
Post Date: 2015-07-06 15:48:02 by redleghunter
Keywords: None
Views: 3823
Comments: 59
A Montana man said Wednesday that he was inspired by last week's U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage to apply for a marriage license so that he can legally wed his second wife. Nathan Collier and his wives Victoria and Christine applied at the Yellowstone County Courthouse in Billings on Tuesday in an attempt to legitimize their polygamous marriage. Montana, like all 50 states, outlaws bigamy - holding multiple marriage licenses - but Collier said he plans to sue if the application is denied. 'It's about marriage equality,' Collier said Wednesday. 'You can't have this without polygamy.' Collier and his second wife were met with confusion when they went to the Yellowstone County court house on Tuesday to fill out the application. 'So, are you legally married, you didn't get divorced?' one clerk asked, when he saw that Collier marked 'not applicable' on a question asking the dissolution date of his previous marriage. Collier responded that he was indeed still married and trying to marry for a second time. 'We'll have to deny that, let me go grab the other supervisor real quick so I can get confirmation but as far as I'm aware you can't be married to two people at the same time,' another clerk said. County clerk officials initially denied Collier's application, then said they would consult with the county attorney's office before giving him a final answer, Collier said. Yellowstone County chief civil litigator Kevin Gillen said he is reviewing Montana's bigamy laws and expected to send a formal response to Collier by next week. 'I think he deserves an answer,' Gillen said, but added his review is finding that 'the law simply doesn't provide for that yet.' 'All we want is legal legitimacy. We aren't asking anybody for anything else. We just want to give our marriage and our family the legitimacy that it deserves,' Nathan Collier said. In a Facebook post on Wednesday, Nathan Collier said he had yet to hear an answer from the county attorney on their decision to grant or deny the marriage license. However, he says that he has told through 'other sources' that the attorney general's office is considering charging him for bigamy. 'I knew the risks I faced when I asked the State to grant legal legitimacy to my family, and I accepted those risks. 'I only ask that if their intent is to lock me in a cage (and we wonder why they keep asking for more money to expand the jails?!?!?) over my family dynamic, contact me privately and I will walk in your front door. 'I have no reason to run or hide. Please, don't kick my door in and shoot my dogs,' Collier wrote. Collier goes on to say that he is 'saddened' that his family faces such challenges in the 'land of the free'. 'You can believe that the entire nation is and will be watching your choices and actions. There is no honor in destroying functional families,' Collier added. The Supreme Court's ruling on Friday made gay marriages legal nationwide. Chief Justice John Roberts said in his dissent that people in polygamous relationships could make the same legal argument that not having the opportunity to marry disrespects and subordinates them. Poster Comment: Seems to look like a "happy, loving, healthy" family...I mean who are we to judge if they all really love each other....The wise Latina wants to know...
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 40.
#3. To: redleghunter, Nolu Chan (#0)
(Edited)
The supreme court case centered around equal treatment under the law. The logic is that since a hetero couple can get married a homo couple should also because they are denied rights a married hetero couple would get. This does not apply to polygamists because that is not allowed for anyone. Whoever brings up this polygamy should now be legal argument just shows they are ignorant over the judicial arguments involved. I don't agree with gay marriage at all as a Christian but the arguments for it are based on the equal protection clause. If I am wrong, I will let our resident lawyer tell us otherwise.
No, it centered on the due process clause. The recent decision in Obergefell is based upon the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause is cited only for ancillary support to the main argument that same-sex marriage is a fundamental right. Equal protection of a right does not arise until the right is established as existing. The claim of a fundamental right is not just the use of a surplus adjective. Black's Law Dictionary, 6th Ed. Challenged legislation that significantly burdens a "fundamental right" (examples include First Amendment rights, (privacy, and the right to travel interstate)) will be reviewed under a stricter standard of review. A law will be held violative of the due process clause if it is not closely tailored to promote a compelling or overriding interest of government. A similar principle applies under Equal Protection law. Is the right to same-sex marriage either explicitly or implicitly guaranteed by the Constitution? As you may observe, finding a fundamental right at argument, whether explicit or emanating from a penumbra, affects the applicable standard of review under the due process clause. The underpinning of the majority opinion defining marriage is due process, not equal protection. See also, Roberts in dissent at 23-24: "Rights implicit in liberty and rights secured by equal protection may rest on different precepts and are not always co-extensive, yet in some instances each may be instructive as to the meaning and reach of the other. In any particular case one Clause may be thought to capture the essence of the right in a more accurate and comprehensive way, even as the two Clauses may converge in the identification and definition of the right." Ante, at 19. The majority goes on to assert in conclusory fashion that the Equal Protection Clause provides an alternative basis for its holding. Ante, at 22. Yet the majority fails to provide even a single sentence explaining how the Equal [24] Protection Clause supplies independent weight for its position, nor does it attempt to justify its gratuitous violation of the canon against unnecessarily resolving constitutional questions. See Northwest Austin Municipal Util. Dist. No. One v. Holder, 557 U. S. 193, 197 (2009). In any event, the marriage laws at issue here do not violate the Equal Protection Clause, because distinguishing between opposite-sex and same-sex couples is rationally related to the States' "legitimate state interest" in "preserving the traditional institution of marriage." Lawrence, 539 U. S., at 585 (O'Connor, J., concurring in judgment). It is important to note with precision which laws petitioners have challenged. Although they discuss some of the ancillary legal benefits that accompany marriage, such as hospital visitation rights and recognition of spousal status on official documents, petitioners' lawsuits target the laws defining marriage generally rather than those allocating benefits specifically. The equal protection analysis might be different, in my view, if we were confronted with a more focused challenge to the denial of certain tangible benefits. Of course, those more selective claims will not arise now that the Court has taken the drastic step of requiring every State to license and recognize marriages between same-sex couples.
The recent decision in Obergefell is based upon the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause is cited only for ancillary support to the main argument that same-sex marriage is a fundamental right. Thanks for the clarification of the legalese. I don't think the due process clause can apply to polygamists but what do you think Nolu? Again, taking into account on what the ruling actually said rather than what anti-gay marriage activists like myself wish it said.
I believe that this will ultimately be looked upon as an exercise of due process of contractual law. Since the marriage license is generally viewed as a consensual contract between mutual parties to join together, the number if parties involved may cease to not matter. Yes, the quoted paragraph was talking about trade, but that is what all contracts are, a trade of something each party finds value in. Since marriage is a trade of value, the courts will continue to find that anything truly goes, as long as everything is "mutually consensual". As far as gay marriage being a fundamental right, I saw many times that being the question, but not the clear answer. Those justices dance around the term like dancers on hot coal, never once lingering long enough for the words to really burn them.
I disagree. A contract binds the parties who sign the contract and no one else. A marriage license is recognized by society.
There are no replies to Comment # 40. End Trace Mode for Comment # 40.
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#12. To: Pericles (#3)
The supreme court case centered around equal treatment under the law.
Fundamental rights. Those rights which have their source, and are explicitly or implicitly guaranteed, in the federal Constitution, Price v. Cohen, C.A.Pa., 715 F.2d 87, 93, and state constitutions, Sidle v. Majors, 264 Ind. 206, 341 N.E.2d 763. See e.g., Bill of rights.
In addition to their due process argument, petitioners contend that the Equal Protection Clause requires their States to license and recognize same-sex marriages. The majority does not seriously engage with this claim. Its discussion is, quite frankly, difficult to follow. The central point seems to be that there is a "synergy between" the Equal Protection Clause and the Due Process Clause, and that some precedents relying on one Clause have also relied on the other. Ante, at 20. Absent from this portion of the opinion, however, is anything resembling our usual framework for deciding equal protection cases. It is casebook doctrine that the "modern Supreme Court's treatment of equal protection claims has used a means-ends methodology in which judges ask whether the classification the government is using is sufficiently related to the goals it is pursuing." G. Stone, L. Seidman, C. Sunstein, M. Tushnet, & P. Karlan, Constitutional Law 453 (7th ed. 2013). The majority's approach today is different:
#14. To: nolu chan, SOSO, misterwhite (#12)
The supreme court case centered around equal treatment under the law. No, it centered on the due process clause.
#28. To: Pericles, nolo chan (#14)
I don't think the due process clause can apply to polygamists but what do you think Nolu?
Justice Rufus Peckham (1809–1873), writing for the Court in Allgeyer , favorably cited Bradley’s dissent in Slaughter-house. He also quoted Justice John Marshall Harlan’s majority opinion in Powell . Though Powell upheld restrictions on the sale of margarine, Harlan recognized a Fourteenth Amendment right to “enjoyment upon terms of equality with all others in similar circumstances of the privilege of pursuing [an ordinary calling or trade, and of acquiring, holding and selling property], as an essential part of [the] rights of liberty and property.” Neither of these previous opinions had suggested that the Constitution protects a general right to liberty of contract, but Peckham’s opinion in Allgeyer firmly established liberty of contract as a right protected by the F ourteenth Amendment’s due process clause.
(Emphasis mine) www.law.gmu.edu/assets/fi...eedom%20of%20Contract.pdf
#40. To: TheFireBert (#28)
"I believe that this will ultimately be looked upon as an exercise of due process of contractual law."
Replies to Comment # 40.
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