Keith Ellison Quotes
Just as states should not make laws based on race of who should be able to marry, they should not make laws based on sex about who can marry.
Kieth Ellison, U. S. Congressman (Democrat, MN), PBS News Hour, November 17, 2006
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Earlier, he had opposed same sex marriage, but as the population as a whole had a change of mind on this issue, so did he. By 2013, 16 States had modified their laws to allow gay marriage.
This quotation illustrates the brilliance of Scalia. He was in the minority of the Justices when he opposed gay marriage. However, instead of just writing a caustic dissent—which he did—he posed this question to one of the most brilliant attorneys in the country who was arguing the case for gay marriage. Clearly, gay marriage was not considered unconstitutional when the Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution. It is almost certain that no one in those times even considered such a prospect. However, by 2013 a number of states had allowed gay marriage, and the majority of Americans favored it. The best Olsen could answer was “There us no specific data in time. This is an evolutionary cycle”. Despite his oratory tour de force, Scalia was again in the minority and his view did not prevail. Public opinion had clearly changed, and most judges believed that the interpretation of the Constitution most also change and there is no more a specific time to say exactly when that change took place than there is to say exactly when America concluded that the nation should have Prohibition or any other social norm.
Two days earlier, New York Voted to legalize gay marriage and Alesi became the first Republican to vote for gay marriage. New York was the first state to legalize gay marriage by an act of their legislature and not by the judiciary on Constitutional grounds. Generally, most of the Republican politicians were opposed to marriage equality as they had the religious right wing of the party for whom gay marriage was anathema.
His view was that since gay marriage did not affect anyone else but the gay couple, it should not be illegal. This is an early Thomas Jefferson idea (see {604940} ) where Jefferson argues that since it does not effect him or anyone else if a person worships 20 gods or none, he and society has no business legislating against it. Those on the opposite side argued that if someone was an atheist or a pagan, it damaged the culture as a whole and offended their sense of morality. Therefore there must be a state religion. In modern times we are debating the same principle only gay marriage is the subject. Should the majority moral view control all or only those things that directly and negatively affect other people and not their moral sensibilities.
This was an incredibly accurate prediction as 2 years thereafter, it was not only the major civil rights issue of the time, but it became a major general political and legal issue regarding the rights of states. Within year, 16 states allowed same sex marriage.
Keith Maurice Ellison is an American politician and lawyer serving as the 30th Attorney General of Minnesota. A member of the Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party (DFL), Ellison was the U.S. Representative for Minnesota's 5th congressional district from 2007 to 2019. He also served as the titular Deputy Chair of the Democratic National Committee from 2017 to 2018. In Congress, Ellison was a vice-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and a Chief Deputy Whip. He also sat on the House Committee on Financial Services. Ellison was the first Muslim to be elected to Congress and the first African American representative from Minnesota.
