A "Cut To The Chase" Summary Of The
Iowa Supreme Court's Ruling Mandating
The Legalization Of "Civil Same-Sex Marriage"

Also, in light of the ruling, please see our page of General Authority and Gospel Scholar quotes regarding protecting and respecting the civil rights and equality of all people and "liken them unto" this ruling.

Here's the summary -

"A statute inconsistent with the...Constitution must be declared void, even though it may be supported by strong and deep-seated traditional beliefs and popular opinion."

"Regarding 'Equal Protection', the Court quoted a statement claiming that it,"is essentially a direction that all persons similarly situated should be treated alike."

"(W)ith respect to the government's purpose of 'providing an institutional basis for defining the fundamental relational rights and responsibilities of persons,' same-sex couples are similarly situated to opposite-sex couples."

"The more fundamental of a right the government seeks to infringe, the closer scrutiny the government's actions receive from the courts."

"(The) courts apply a heightened level of scrutiny under Equal Protection analysis when reasons exist to suspect 'prejudice against discrete and insular minorities . . . which tends seriously to curtail the operation of those political processes ordinarily to be relied upon to protect minorities.'" (The three main levels of legal scrutiny - Rational Basis, Intermediate/Heightened Scrutiny, and Strict Scrutiny are discussed in detail in this essay on our site dealing with other courts' rulings regarding scrutiny and equal protection.)

"To survive intermediate scrutiny, the law must not only further an important governmental interest and be substantially related to that interest, but the justification for the classification must be genuine and must not depend on broad generalizations."

"The first step in scrutinizing a statutory classification can be to determine whether the objectives purportedly advanced by the classification are important. "The burden of justification is demanding and it rests entirely on the State." Id. at 533, 116 S. Ct. at 2275, 135 L. Ed. 2d at 751. Where we find, or can assume, the proffered governmental interests are sufficiently weighty to be called 'important,' the critical inquiry is whether these governmental objectives can fairly be said to be advanced by the legislative classification."

Here are the reasons the County offered as justification for the statute -

a. Maintaining traditional marriage. - "Because the County offers no particular governmental reason underlying the tradition of limiting civil marriage to heterosexual couples, we press forward to consider other plausible reasons for the legislative classification."

b. Promotion of optimal environment to raise children. - "Plaintiffs presented an abundance of evidence and research, confirmed by our independent research, supporting the proposition that the interests of children are served equally by same-sex parents and opposite-sex parents. On the other hand, we acknowledge the existence of reasoned opinions that dual-gender parenting is the optimal environment for children. These opinions, while thoughtful and sincere, were largely unsupported by reliable scientific studies."
"Under intermediate scrutiny, the relationship between the government's goal and the classification employed to further that goal must be 'substantial.'"
"In pursuit of this objective, the statutory exclusion of gay and lesbian people is both under-inclusive and over-inclusive. The civil marriage statute is under-inclusive because it does not exclude from marriage other groups of parents-such as child abusers, sexual predators, parents neglecting to provide child support, and violent felons-that are undeniably less than optimal parents. Such under-inclusion tends to demonstrate that the sexual-orientation-based classification is grounded in prejudice or 'overbroad generalizations about the different talents, capacities, or preferences' of gay and lesbian people, rather than having a substantial relationship to some important objective. See Virginia, 518 U.S. at 533, 116 S. Ct. at 2275, 135 L. Ed. 2d at 751 (rejecting use of overbroad generalizations to classify). If the marriage statute was truly focused on optimal parenting, many classifications of people would be excluded, not merely gay and lesbian people."
"The ban on same-sex marriage is substantially over-inclusive because not all same-sex couples choose to raise children. The statute does not prohibit same-sex couples from raising children. A law so simultaneously over-inclusive and under- inclusive is not substantially related to the government's objective."

c. Promotion of procreation.- "If procreation is the true objective, then the proffered classification must work to achieve that objective....
"While heterosexual marriage does lead to procreation, the argument by the County fails to address the real issue in our required analysis of the objective: whether exclusion of gay and lesbian individuals from the institution of civil marriage will result in more procreation. If procreation is the true objective, then the proffered classification must work to achieve that objective..."
"Thus, the sole conceivable avenue by which exclusion of gay and lesbian people from civil marriage could promote more procreation is if the unavailability of civil marriage for same-sex partners caused homosexual individuals to 'become' heterosexual in order to procreate within the present traditional institution of civil marriage. The briefs, the record, our research, and common sense do not suggest such an outcome. Even if possibly true, the link between exclusion of gay and lesbian people from marriage and increased procreation is far too tenuous to withstand heightened scrutiny. Specifically, the statute is significantly under-inclusive with respect to the objective of increasing procreation because it does not include a variety of groups that do not procreate for reasons such as age, physical disability, or choice. In other words, the classification is not substantially related to the asserted legislative purpose."

d. Promoting stability in opposite-sex relationships.- "While the institution of civil marriage likely encourages stability in opposite-sex relationships, we must evaluate whether excluding gay and lesbian people from civil marriage encourages stability in opposite- sex relationships.... The County offers no reasons that it does, and we can find none."

e. Conservation of resources. - "Excluding any group from civil marriage-African-Americans, illegitimates, aliens, even red-haired individuals-would conserve state resources in an equally 'rational' way. Yet, such classifications so obviously offend our society's collective sense of equality that courts have not hesitated to provide added protections against such inequalities."
"The sexual orientation-based classification does not substantially further the suggested governmental interest, as required by intermediate scrutiny."

Conclusion. "Having examined each proffered governmental objective through the appropriate lens of intermediate scrutiny, we conclude the sexual-orientation-based classification under the marriage statute does not substantially further any of the objectives. While the objectives asserted may be important (and many undoubtedly are important), none are furthered in a substantial way by the exclusion of same-sex couples from civil marriage. Our Equal Protection clause requires more than has been offered to justify the continued existence of the same-sex marriage ban under the statute."

"Constitutional Infirmity. We are firmly convinced the exclusion of gay and lesbian people from the institution of civil marriage does not substantially further any important governmental objective. The legislature has excluded a historically disfavored class of persons from a supremely important civil institution without a constitutionally sufficient justification. There is no material fact, genuinely in dispute, that can affect this determination.
We have a constitutional duty to ensure Equal Protection of the law. Faithfulness to that duty requires us to hold Iowa's marriage statute, Iowa Code section 595.2, violates the Iowa Constitution. To decide otherwise would be an abdication of our constitutional duty. If gay and lesbian people must submit to different treatment without an exceedingly persuasive justification, they are deprived of the benefits of the principle of Equal Protection, upon which the rule of law is founded."

"AFFIRMED. All justices concur."

As anyone can plainly see, there is no "constitutionally sufficient" nor "exceedingly persuasive justification" to deny same-sex couples their Equal Protection rights under the Constitution to have "Civil Same-Sex Marriage".

Based on the clear logic of the Varnum v. Brien ruling, we LDS need to abandon our opposition to Civil Same-Sex Marriage. Please consider this page of General Authority quotes dealing with civil rights and the scriptural prohibition against infringing upon the civil rights of others.