It's been 365 days since the Supreme Court of the United States voted 5-4 that there is a constitutional right to Same-Sex Marriage in this country. Somehow, God has not unleashed locusts and plagues upon us to show his wrath and somehow, marriage between one man and one woman is still allowed for those who wish to get in on one of those.
A number of websites are today recalling the dissenting opinion authored then by Chief Justice John Roberts. Writing with obviously gritted teeth, he said…
…however heartened the proponents of same-sex marriage might be on this day, it is worth acknowledging what they have lost, and lost forever: the opportunity to win the true acceptance that comes from persuading their fellow citizens of the justice of their cause.
That struck me then as it does now as a kind of sour grapes statement. Yeah, maybe they lost the chance of winning true acceptance without a court decision but they got two things in exchange, one being that they settled the issue everywhere at once instead of having to fight it out in every state and city and little community where holdouts could still muster enough votes to keep in place laws that ruined so many lives.
There are still legislatures in this country that think they can pass laws overruling the Supreme Overrulers. Think how long the LGBT community would have had to wait until the kind of "true acceptance" Roberts described trickled down to the Kim Davis level. Heck, there are still places in this country where they don't like the whole idea of racial integration.
And also, they won this: A real world test of whether there was any truth in all those dire screeches that Gay Marriage would destroy America and lead to every conceivable sin and destruction of religion and decency and everything we hold dear. Men married men, women married women and as noted, none of the horrendous promised consequences occurred. Life on Earth did not cease just as it didn't when it was decreed that black people were equals and women got the right to vote. The black folks and the women might in fact save us all when their vote keeps Donald Trump out of the White House.
Roberts is right that it might have been nice if Gay Marriage had resulted wholly from persuading citizens of the rightness of the cause. But a lot of them have since been persuaded because they've seen how Gay Marriage has not done irreparable harm…and some are probably thinking, "Gee, it's nice to not have that debate going on so loudly in our lives." I'd say that's a pretty good trade-off.