Get Gay-Married in Pennsylvania, If You Must

Today a federal judge struck
down Pennsylvania’s ban on same-sex marriage recognition (passed
via a statute, not a constitutional amendment). Presuming the ban
stands, Pennsylvania will become the 19th state to legalize
same-sex marriage recognition. Chris Geidner at BuzzFeed
posted the
text of the ruling and noted that the judge did not provide a
stay. So just like Oregon yesterday, the judge’s decision goes into
effect immediately. The state does, however, have a three-day
waiting period for marriage licenses. Gov. Tom Corbett is going to
defend the state’s ban, but he will do this without the assistance
of the state’s attorney general, who believes it to be
unconstitutional.

In his ruling, Judge John E. Jones III separated his analysis of
the ways same-sex couples are treated differently from their
heterosexual counterparts into subheads matching lines from
traditional wedding vows—the “in sickness and in health” section,
for example, talks about how same-sex partners get denied
information or participation in dealing with loved ones’ medical
emergencies. Jones must have really wanted his ruling to stand out
from all the other decisions striking down marriage bans across the
country. He concludes, “We are a better people than what these laws
represent, and it is time to discard them into the ash heap of
history.”

Jones was a George W. Bush appointee. At Slate, David
Weigel
observes that a noted hater of gay marriage, Rick Santorum,
encouraged the Senate to confirm Jones for U.S. District Court for
the Middle District of Pennsylvania. That’s got to sting.

In other news from the rainbow side of things, scroll down a few
inches for a
ReasonTV video today by Amanda Winkler about the debate over
gay issues within the Methodist church and how organizations with
private and voluntary memberships deal with pressure for
change.