Precedent

I love words. All words. I've loved words since I was a very small child, worshipped them even before I could decipher them. Words are instruments of power – everyone knows this. They can create worlds, tear them down, reshape them in reality and in our perception of reality. 

 

Today's word is “precedent.” 

 

Dictionary.com defines precedent as follows:

1. Law. a legal decision or form of proceeding serving as an authoritative rule or pattern in future similar or analogous cases.

2. any act, decision, or case that serves as a guide or justification for subsequent situations. 

 

This piece was originally going to be about the Texas Supreme Court's recent unanimous ruling in Pidgeon v. Houston. I planned to point out that withholding spousal benefits from one group, but not others, violated the precedent set in Loving v. Virginia. We have already visited this issue, I planned to say we have already determined that when it comes to the legal contract of marriage, and all the rights and responsibilities that contract confers, you can deny certain aspects to all -- but if you only deny them to some, based upon specific criteria, you are performing an act of discrimination and are therefore in violation of law. 

 

While I was researching the case in preparation for this piece, I pulled up the original court filings. And it was there that my focus suddenly changed. Because this isn't, was never, about spousal health benefits being extended to a small group of Houston's city employees, and certainly not about denying them to the even smaller group that make up those who are in legally recognized same-sex marriages. 

 

It's about precedent. And it becomes obvious when you read these words:

“On June 27, 2016, the Supreme Court issued its ruling in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, 136 S.Ct. 2292(2016)(App. C), and held that a Texas law that protects the safety of abortion patients must give way to a court-created right to abortion that cannot be found anywhere in the Constitution. See John Hart Ely, The Wages of Crying Wolf: A Comment on Roe v. Wade, 82 Yale L.J. 920 (1973). The Supreme Court also disregarded the rules of res judicata and refused to enforce a severability clause in the state’s abortion law, even though the Court’s precedents had held emphatically that severability was a matter of state law that binds the federal courts. See Dorchy v. Kansas, 264 U.S. 286, 290 (1924)(holding that a state court’s “decision as to the severability of a provision is conclusive upon this Court”); Virginia v. Hicks, 539 U.S. 113, 121 (2003)(“Severab[ility]is of course a matter of state law. See Leavitt v. Jane L.,518 U.S. 137, 139 (1996)9(per curiam)”). It is clear that the current Supreme Court will continue to use its power to advance the ideology of the sexual revolution until there is a change of membership. And that makes it all the more urgent for this Court to narrowly construe the Obergefell ruling and provide clarity for Texans and Texas court to avoid disrespect of the Constitution and the rule of law.”

Let me say it again: this is about precedent. 

 

They want to ensure that they, the state of Texas, have the right to simply ignore any federal law they disagree with, for any reason. They want to be free to impose their morality upon the personal lives of every citizen of their state, in the form of legislation that restricts certain behaviors they find unacceptable. 

 

They want to punish people for the choices they make as concerns their relationships, and the fruits of those relationships, by withholding benefits, funding, medical treatment, state services. 

 

They want to be free to refuse even basic necessities like public toilet facilities. 

 

And they want that right extended to every state in the nation.

Because “precedent”.

If this case goes to the U.S. Supreme Court next, they may get just that. Any state would have the ability to restrict the rights of those they find “immoral” or “undeserving” of basic rights. And far too many states would take full advantage. 

 

It's a small case, affecting a very small number of people. It seems unimportant. But as I said when I started... words have power. Precedent is one of the tools built by words. And with this ruling, they've turned it into a bulldozer that could tear down the entire foundation this country was built upon. 

 

Under pressure from Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, Attorney General Ken Paxton, and other high-ranking Republicans, the Texas Supreme Court are trying to set a precedent that goes against everything we stand for. We cannot let this stand. 

 

We are all equal in the eyes of the Constitution. 

 

Let's keep it that way.