DEEP IN THE HEART

Lawsuit Challenges Texas Ban On Marriage Equality

The full court press (in every sense) for marriage equality continues, with Texas being the latest state to see a lawsuit challenging its marriage ban. Two couples, Mark Pharris and Vic Holmes and Cleopatra De Leon and Nicole Dimetman, have filed a suit arguing that the state’s ban on same-sex marriages violates the U.S. Constitution.

“In Texas, Plaintiffs cannot legally marry their partner before family, friends, and society — a right enjoyed by citizens who wish to marry a person of the opposite sex. And should they become married in a state that has established marriage equality, Texas explicitly voids their marriage,” said the suit. “There is no rational basis, much less a compelling government purpose, for Texas to deny plaintiffs the same right to marry enjoyed by the majority of society.” Of course, “rational basis” and “Texas politics” aren’t phrases often used in the same sentence.  Needless to say, Gov. Rick Perry, whose disastrous presidential campaign was marked by antipathy toward anything gay, staunchly opposes any change to the Texas ban.“The governor agrees with the majority of Texans, who voted to define marriage in the Texas Constitution as between one man and one woman,” spokeswoman Lucy Nashed told the San Antonio Express-News. Among those that the governor is agreeing with: the Ku Klux Klan, which held a rally for  in support of the 2005 ballot measure that Perry holds so dear.

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