DETROIT (AP) — Michigan’s ban on gay marriage, approved
by voters in a landslide in 2004, was scratched from the state
constitution by a federal judge who said the ballot box is no defense to
a law that tramples the rights of same-sex couples.
Clerks who
handle marriage licenses in Michigan’s 83 counties said they would start
granting them to gays and lesbians — three as early as Saturday —
although Attorney General Bill Schuette asked a higher court Friday to
freeze the landmark ruling while an appeal is pursued. It was not known
when a federal appeals court in Cincinnati would respond.
Schuette
noted that the U.S. Supreme Court in January stepped in and suspended a
similar decision that struck down Utah’s gay-marriage ban.
"A
stay would serve the public interest by preserving the status quo …
while preventing irreparable injury to the state and its citizens," he
said.
The decision by U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman was
historic, following a two-week trial that explored attitudes and
research about homosexual marriage and households led by same-sex
couples. The judge rejected the conclusions of experts hired by the
state to defend the rationale behind a constitutional amendment that
recognizes marriage only as between a man and a woman.
The
attorney general’s office emphasized the 59 percent approval by voters
as well as tradition and child-rearing as reasons why the 2004 amendment
should stand. Friedman, however, wasn’t swayed.
He praised April
DeBoer and Jayne Rowse, two Detroit-area nurses who are raising three
children with special needs. They filed a lawsuit in 2012 because
they’re barred from jointly adopting each other’s children. Joint
adoption is reserved for married heterosexual couples in Michigan.
"In
attempting to define this case as a challenge to ‘the will of the
people,’ state defendants lost sight of what this case is truly about:
people," the judge said.
"It is the court’s fervent hope that
these children will grow up ‘to understand the integrity and closeness
of their own family and its concord with other families in their
community and in their daily lives,’" Friedman said, quoting the Supreme
Court. "Today’s decision is a step in that direction, and affirms the
enduring principle that regardless of whoever finds favor in the eyes of
the most recent majority, the guarantee of equal protection must
prevail."
Seventeen states and the District of Columbia issue
licenses for same-sex marriage. Since December, bans on gay marriage
have been overturned in Texas, Utah, Oklahoma and Virginia, but appeals
have put those cases on hold.
DeBoer and Rowse cried as they read
the decision with their lawyer on a laptop at their kitchen table in
Hazel Park. About an hour later, the couple got a standing ovation and
cheers at Affirmations, a community center for gays and lesbians in
Ferndale, north of Detroit. They said they’ll get married when the case
ends, a process that could take years with appeals.
"We don’t want
to speculate what’s to come. … We want to get married. We will be
getting married — when we know that our marriage is forever binding,"
DeBoer said.
The 31-page decision was filed in Detroit’s federal
court shortly after 5 p.m., when most county offices were closed and
couldn’t issue licenses. Washtenaw, Oakland and Muskegon counties said
they would be open Saturday. Others will follow suit Monday.
"We
don’t ask someone’s orientation on a concealed pistol license, birth
certificate, death certificate or voter registration," said Carmella
Sabaugh, the clerk in Macomb County, near Detroit. "Today’s court ruling
means we won’t ask that question for marriage licenses, either."
Dave
Murray, a spokesman for Republican Gov. Rick Snyder, said the state has
an "obligation" to defend what voters chose a decade ago.
If a
"court concludes the provision of the Michigan Constitution cannot be
enforced, he’d respect those decisions and follow the rule of law,"
Murray said of Snyder.
Michigan’s Roman Catholic leaders were
disappointed by the outcome Friday. Seven dioceses contributed more than
$1 million to a campaign committee to help get the 2004 amendment
passed.
Led by Detroit Archbishop Allen Vigneron, the bishops said
gays and lesbians should be "accepted with respect, compassion and
sensitivity." But the judge, they said, is wrongly redefining marriage.
"This
decision …
mistakenly proposes that marriage is an emotional
arrangement that can simply be redefined to accommodate the dictates of
culture and the wants of adults," seven bishops said.
___
AP
reporters Jeff Karoub and Corey Williams in Detroit, Mike Householder
in Ferndale, Mich., David Eggert in Lansing, Mich., and Emma Fidel in
Mason, Mich., contributed to this report.
___
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