Word: same-sex
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When Marcia Hams and Susan Shepherd cut into their wedding cake at city hall in Cambridge, Mass., on May 17, 2004, after becoming the first same-sex couple in the U.S. to complete a state-sanctioned marriage application, they probably hoped their union would open the floodgates for gay couples across the country. But instead, it became a high-water mark for same-sex marriage as the acrimonious debate over the issue raged on--a moment equaled only by a California Supreme Court's ruling in mid-May overturning the state's ban on gay marriage...
...Same-sex marriage has a short but heated history in the U.S. It first came to national attention in a 1993 Hawaii case, in which judges found that the state's constitution required a compelling reason not to extend to gays equal marriage rights. The ruling prompted Congress to push through the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which prevented homosexual couples from receiving benefits traditionally conferred by marriage. Since then, states have scrambled to define their own stance on the issue, in some cases recognizing civil unions or domestic partnerships...
Last week, the California Supreme Court voted 4-3 to recognize same-sex marriage. The decision makes the state the second in the country after Massachusetts to allow the practice. The Court justified its ruling by the constitutional right to marry and the right to equal protection...
...marriage, either to forbid or require its recognition. The Court’s rash decision to interpret this silence as a guarantee of gay rights could provoke the populace to remove the ambiguity: November’s state elections could see a referendum on a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. Unfortunately, by opening a new battlefront on the constitution, the court has provoked such drastic kinds of move that could set back progress on the issue by decades...
...McCain's most plausible path to victory is to court these economically anxious, mildly socially conservative voters. He is already standing with them on values: When California's supreme court imposed same-sex marriage on the state, he said that he did not think judges should be deciding the issue. But he needs to explain how he would make it easier for these voters to move up the income ladder and get affordable and dependable health insurance...