I better understand where you come from now and the point you were trying to make. It was not clear and was very flippant at best.

I have read many of the Jefferson & Madison & Henry papers (really more letters)- a consequence of growing up in Virginia & having an interest in history. It is true that many of them were concerned about a large central government. Henry advocated that Virginia not even join the Union for he feared any central government. Franklin wanted a stronger central government than most, but even he was wary. I am well aware of us being a Republic, hence you notice I made points not to refer to us a Democracy or any of the other often misused terms. We are a representative republic. We are not America, we are THE United STATES of America, a Union of States. I more than understand that distinction and despite your not so subtle put down did not learn my history in a weak public school having failed to read adult books. Though I do not carry a degree in history I can read and I can process logic, and amazingly enough carry on an intelligent conversation.

All that said they gave the people a tool for changing the document. Right or wrong, like it or not, they made it a framework and accepting their fallibility they made it changeable. The supremacy the Federal government, like it or not, has gained over the years has been some what at the hands of courts but more so at the hands of the people and the states- the amendments. The 18th amendment besides outlawing alcohol at the Federal level gave the government vast powers to enforce and take action. As did the 16th, 17th, and some would argue the 19th all moved powers from the states to the Federal level. In fact in nearly every amendment the power of enforcement was given to the Federal government time and again.

So, while you do not like a strong central government (and I think our government is too large and far away often even at the state level) the reality is that the people have through attrition and some would say the Tyranny of Small Decisions moved the power in this nation to the Federal government.

I think the issue is that you argue what you feel things should be at the Federal government and I argue from what I see as the pragmatic position of what they are. No matter what our "Founding Fathers" (which as a quick aside were far from Christian and far more Humanist but I digress) wanted or feared they gave the people the power to make changes, and changes they have made. We have moved from from what they started, and closer in many ways to what they feared. Despite doing so this is still "Of the People by the People" and so it is a reflection of that, be it through action or inaction, and so when I evaluate the Marriage as a Contract of Common Law and see it as a Federal issue I do so not in the light of Jefferson & Madison or Henry, but in the light of the will and acts of the people since.

The law is not history, it something that evolves over time and in this nation it ostensibly does it according to the will of the people or at least through their inaction.

When we start to successfully stand up in less complicated areas I would be the first to support it in the complicated ones. However given humanity's penchant for finding every which way to do do the wrong thing or to screw over the "other".. yeah keep it simple. Just being pragmatic no matter how much the idea sucks.

I would agree to that in a heartbeat. Unfortunately the current US Congress and enough of the US does not that its not a reality. So, I must work within the confines of the world I live.

For the sake of simplicity we draw a ton of arbitrary lines. We would have more courts, more judges, and less life if we made everything be a "it depends" situation. I don't like arbitrary lines any more than you probably do, but I recognize them for the pragmatic solution they often provide in the face of issues of scale.

Your willingness to trade simple clear laws with easy adjudication for complex, complicated, subjective laws surprises me.

It is a compromise, and it does meet the basics and cover the bases in general.

It is not a world I would like to live in though. I find most laws too draconian for their complexity and them being left to being open to interpretation. I also find anything that generates more work for lawyers to be a failure. So, it would work, but I would move and I would never want to open a business. What if Joe across the street used to server KKK members but as of yesterday he stopped and I did not know. I refuse them and now I am in court fighting fines. No thank you!

But it would "work".

Sorry, its late, that should be "Hence why its OF and not FROM."

I have a question. Why is it Freedom of Religion and Freedom of Association but...

You argue Freedom FROM Association. You are conflating the right to be able to associate with the right not associate.

If you want to push the Freedom FROM Association then I get to push the Freedom FROM Religion.

Kinda leaves things in a mess huh? Hence why it OF and FROM.

LOL...
When logic can not be applied your reply is to conflate conflate conflate.

1950's "No Negros Served" is comparable, equal to, and similar to "No Gays Served".

The NSA and spying has no rational relation. So you spout off catch phrases and point to the distance and yell "government!!!"

Its easy for you to say "Just let it go and lets see if it is a problem before we try to solve it". Its not your life. Its not your problem. Its not you who suffers the indignity, the abuse, and its not you who watches kids turned away from homes, families, and jobs contemplate if life is worth it.

Tell you what, lets tax all straight white men 75% of their income. No, don't fight it. Lets test it out and see if its really a problem. Then and only if it become a real problem for lots of people will we evaluate how to deal with it. Dumb ideas huh? Yeah, waiting is not such a good plan when your on the wrong end of the wait.

The writer is making the point that the issue the CRA solved for African-Americans is the very problem this new law creates for gays. S/He is not being dishonest they are making a point that the issue of refusal of service back then is the same one being dealt with now. The best way to show how to solve a current problem, or to avoid it, is to look at how you solve a similar problem in the past- provided it was successful. I think most will agree that the CRA was a success.

Also the CAPS are because on the mobile edition the bold italics etc don't work so sorry. Not shouting just used for emphasis.

Wow...

Did you really just compare Justice Bradley, a US Supreme Court Justice, and his opinion joined by the majority of a court appointed by elected Representatives of the US Senate as nominated by the President of the US as authorized by the US Constitution (which you herald later as the absolute power) to the imagined powers of the neighbor kid!?!?

Ok, rational thought has exited the door. You can disagree with him, you can argue against his ideas, but to attempt to denigrate the position and the man while heralding the document that created it is just... hypocritical to the full extent.

Quick question, was the neighbor kid vetted by an elected legislative body of those he rules? Does he have a written basis for his rule that rule...Just wondering how organized your neighbor kids are.

Ok, first of all his point was to sex acts. On that point, I hear people of religion being "afraid" of being forced to have gays in their lives and I call bullshit. But even if this was true, why is it ok to force me to live under your religious rules but not vice verse? See "In God we Trust", Sodomy laws, swearing oaths, etc. If you are willing to forgo all of those things then we can have an honest open debate on their place in law & life. Otherwise... not so much.

Also, find me a case of where a church was required to host a gay wedding and I will help fund their defense. Churches are places of worship and are protected. The only cases of things like that are cases where they did not limit access except to gay couples and I have never seen it with a church. Only with the auxiliary services they offer- Adoption, Housing, etc. In most of those cases they took Federal money. The issue was not that they could not limit it, it was that they could not limit it while using MY MONEY. If YOUR money cannot pay or abortions or condoms then MY MONEY can not pay for things I can not use.

Having gotten married as a gay man I can speak on this in a way you probably can not- first person. My friend and his husband were turned away (well my husband and I on their behalf since we were doing the planning), and in one instance we were ok with it in another we were not. Our first choice for caterer turned us away by saying they would rather not do it and why but that they would. They then kindly offered us a referral and helped us get started with them. The second was for the venue, they just said no, rudely and then began to tell us why we were horrible people. Them I referred to the state to deal with the consequences. The first realized their obligation and if no one else would have done the wedding they would have- because they realized that they would never want to be in the same place we were.

At the end of the day if you want to serve the public, then serve the public. If you want to serve only your church, then start a membership, charge a membership fee, and serve only members.

As for traditional... Christianity is only ~2014 years old and marriage predated that in the time of the Greeks, the Romans, and in places with no mon-theistic gods so to claim it as a religious ceremony of tradition with limits can only be done if you ignore history. Many cultures allowed for plural marriages, and others allowed for extra marital relationships, and multigender marriages. Heck some are even described in the Bible. So for those that argue tradition I ask.

Who's tradition? From what time frame? In what culture? As interpreted by whom?

Homosexuality was ok with the Greeks... Can we go back to that time?

I do not think that word means what you think it does...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrimination
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/discrimination

Unless people without shirts has become a "class of people" and I was not made aware :)

The term has a specific legal meaning. It does not mean to just turn away or say no. It is based on the hows and the whys of turning them away. I made the error of using it and now I must correct that. I should have said "Refusing to server someone based on what they wear..."

That is a failure to correct earlier in the argument on my part.

I would agree with you on the mutable but difficulty of changing poverty. But then you are ascribing discrimination in another place to the restaurant. You can no more hold the restaurant guilty for the ills of society than you can a son for the crimes of a father.

That said, I would have to agree that the lack of mobility in our current US economy is an issue and may even be discriminatory if not at least wrong on principal.

Yes things can be "fairly" legislated but unfairly applied- this law does just that in fact. That does not however ever make everything unfair by its nature so I do not see where you are going with this point other than sharing history. Which is a favorite topic of mine so always happy to discuss!

I did not bring up the Pharmacy closing, you did. You brought up the extreme (hypothetical) not me so that question is best asked of you. I simply answered your question about that being discriminatory or not.

As to the second point it makes no point. Where are you going with this? No one has said you have to purchase from everyone. If you wish to conflate refusing to sell to the public as a public business with being forced to buy from everyone then you are going to first have to make an argument of how they are similar in nature, function, and law. Otherwise I am arguing against false facts and we will both be going nowhere.

Ok...

You made the broad claim, not I. I followed your broad claim, that you now seek to narrow. True mostly about interstate trade, but that excludes Bankruptcy and Criminal law, which both acknowledge and involve marriage and rights and privileges for each. You can not simply call two major parts of the judiciary "irrelevant".

Point 1: The SCOTUS on a regular basis reviews and adjudicates contract disputes- do a simple Google search. The limitation on interstate is only a limitation of the courts preview, not of the fact that they can not adjudicate Common Law Contracts - a claim you made. Second, where a contract conflicts with a Federal law or right (see EEOC, NLRB, FCC, etc) then a NON-Interstate contract can be adjudicated by the Federal courts. So, point in fact, the US Federal courts do handle and work with Common Law contracts. Finally, no one has authority over "Contract Law" they have the power in the executive/legislative branch to codify things in law that were previous Common Law and they have a right in the Judiciary to adjudicate it. Not sure where you get this notion of "authority" over. Either way at the end of the day your first statement that the US Federal government has nothing to do with Common Law was on its face a false statement.

Point 2: And you just ignore and pass by the Elastic Clause. The US Federal powers have expanded, like it or not (I am not all that happy about it often), and with the elastic clause they can and do pass into non-interstate issues where they feel they have a "necessary and proper" justification.

Point 3: Foreign marriages are validated by the Federal government, and not a state. Also the SCOTUS has already rules on non-interstate private contracts RE; Energy Reserves Group v. Kansas Power & Light and many since. And the Federal government has not always relied on a states definition of a marriage - see Loving v Virginia when the Federal government validated the marriage, but the state of Virginia did not. Pile on Federal rights and privileges and you have a compelling interest for the Federal government to review and adjudicate the nature of Marriage contract law. Even if all of that did not count the Full faith and Credit Clause would make all marriage issues a Federal one when one state does not acknowledge another states acts.

You have attempted to narrow your arguments again. But the fact remains you made a broad statement, argued it, and now to defend it you keep narrowing it down.