Same-Sex Marriage Deja Vu

Within the past couple of years, love has been more accepted as many states legalize same-sex marriage. Utah was a recent convert after a surprise ruling by a US District Judge which said that the state's ban on same sex marriage violated those couples' constitutional rights. After this ruling, over 1,000 same sex couples were married in Utah.  But just a few days ago the US Supreme Court granted Utah a "stay" on the ruling which allowed the republican Utah Governor Herbert to stop all officials from marrying same sex couples. This puts those 1,000 couples in limbo as their fate is decided. There is a devastating possibility their marriages will be dissolved.

It is bad enough when gay couples are not allowed to get married, but it is worse when their right to get married is taken away from them. They have had a taste of freedom and now it's gone. The citizens of Utah have been left dazed and confused.  One Utah resident who was planning to get married to his partner, but didn't do it in time said "It feels like we are second-class citizens during the stay." Many predict that this will go to the US Supreme Court.

I think that allowing gay couples in Utah to get married then taking that privilege away from them was a bad decision and will only make same-sex marriage more desirable. In the past when this happened in California (2008), same-sex marriage was legalized within the constitution but then banned again by an amendment called "Prop 8". Many people got together and made peaceful speeches and demonstrations in favor of same-sex marriage. Demonstrations were now more passionate than they had been before because the people of California had already experienced the freedom of being able to marry whomever they wanted. This ended up being taken to the US Supreme Court in 2013 and they overruled Prop 8 with a vote of 5 to 4, legalizing gay marriage in California.

Based on what has happened in the past, taking away a privilege from people who have already known what it's like to have that privilege has not worked out well. If the Utah case goes to the US Supreme Court, I think they will legalize same-sex marriage just like they did for California. The Court's decision to grant a "stay" indicates their interest in the case, and the same nine judges sit on the US Supreme Court as did for the decision in Prop 8, so they are likely to vote the same way.

Although the gay community of Utah has lost hope for marriage equality, when we look at the past, we see promising outcomes. Utah is a hopeful case and if we keep our fingers crossed same-sex couples all over the nation will reap the benefits.