US Supreme Court backs same-sex marriage by five votes to four

“Just who do we think we are?” wrote John Roberts, Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court on Friday – one of four judges to issue scathing criticism of their colleagues’ ruling to impose same-sex marriage across America.

A sobering question from the most senior of the nine judges who last week set aside almost 250 years of US law to find by five votes to four that same-sex marriage is now a Constitutional right.

Roberts said that “the Court invalidates the marriage laws of more than half the States and orders the transformation of a social institution that has formed the basis of human society for millennia”.

“The Court today not only overlooks our country’s entire history and tradition but actively repudiates it, preferring to live only in the heady days of the here and now.”

The redefinition of marriage in the US has been court-led throughout. In 26 states – the majority of those that allowed same-sex marriage before Friday’s decision – it was imposed by court decision. Over 30 states have had popular votes on the issue, and all but four supported traditional marriage.

And there are serious concerns that this latest redefinition of marriage will not be the last. Chief Justice Roberts rightly points out that with this ruling there is no longer any rationale for defining marriage as being between only two people.

He highlights that the ruling, “offers no reason at all why the two-person element of the core definition of marriage may be preserved while the man-woman element may not.”

Writing in The Spectator this week, Melanie McDonagh hits the nail on the head when she says that the logic of the ruling means marriage “can be reinvented at will” and could therefore be expanded to include polygamy and marriage between a brother and a sister.

Cambridge University Press have even recently published a book calling for polygamy. In Defense of Plural Marriage puts forward a “semi-contractual marital model” to give legal recognition to a “wide range of intimate relationships”.

Even before this ruling, in the US – as in Britain – people are being punished for expressing their sincere beliefs about marriage.

Bakeries and wedding venues have been forced to close and in Wisconsin a political science professor was suspended for supporting a student’s right to oppose same-sex marriage.

Judge Samuel Alito joined Roberts in raising concerns familiar to C4M supporters: “I assume that those who cling to old beliefs will be able to whisper their thoughts in the recesses of their homes, but if they repeat those views in public, they will risk being labelled as bigots and treated as such by governments, employers, and schools.”

These eminent judges express what C4M has been saying for years – redefining marriage has profound consequences for society and for free speech.

Like those judges, C4M is committed to exposing the falsehoods of those opposed to free speech and highlighting the injustices meted out to those who refuse to give up their freedom to publicly speak the truth that true marriage can only be between one man and one woman.