A brief history of gay marriage legislation in Texas

From TM Daily Post.

RedEquality

Gay marriage supporters have made massive strides in a very short amount of time. Less than ten years ago, gay couples couldn’t get married anywhere in the United States. While the progress they did achieve shortly thereafter involved victories, they were handed down by judges—rather than their fellow voters—and the term “marriage” still didn’t apply—they could only have separate-but-equal “civil unions.”

Now, though, nearly a third of the states (containing nearly forty percent of the population) have legalized gay marriage, and in most cases, that’s been through the actions of elected legislatures or voters at the ballot box.

In Texas, meanwhile, if the status of gay marriage is going to change—at least in the short term—it’ll likely have to be in the courts. And there are four lawsuits pending that are challenging the various restrictions in the state that outlaw gay marriage. As we take a look at them, let’s also take a moment to trace the history of gay marriage bans in Texas.

Most of what’s in there will be familiar to you, though I at least didn’t realize that the first shot in this branch of the culture war was fired in 1997. The most recent developments in the state are the lawsuits, one about divorce and the other about marriage, that are likely to have a profound effect on the status quo going forward. Assuming that the federal lawsuit doesn’t make it all moot in the wake of the Utah decision, of course. In an ideal world, the existing laws would be repealed by the Legislature, but we may never get to a point where there’s a sufficient majority to repeal that awful constitutional amendment; a one-third minority in either chamber would be enough to block any such attempt. So I’m happy for the courts to do what needs to be done, but as I’ve been saying I just wonder how big and insane the freakout will be when it happens. We may get a good idea of that soon.

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