Ted Cruz says states should IGNORE same-sex Supreme Court ruling, Twitterati debates

Ted Cruz added more fuel to the fire surrounding the recent Supreme Court rulings by calling on states to ignore the ruling by saying that they aren’t legally bound to follow them.

Cruz explained his position in an interview with NPR:

INSKEEP: Which is a great story. But did I just understand you to suggest that state officials should feel no particular obligation to follow the court ruling if they feel it’s illegitimate?

CRUZ: They should feel no obligation to agree that the court ruling is right or is consistent with the Constitution.

This ruling…

INSKEEP: But does that mean they can ignore?

CRUZ: They cannot ignore a direct judicial order. The parties to a case cannot ignore a direct judicial order. But it does not mean that those who are not parties to case are bound by a judicial order.

And that’s what Justice Scalia was saying in his dissent, which is that the court depends upon the remainder of government trusting that it is faithfully applying the law and — and these judges and justices are disregarding their oaths.

This is — the entire premise of the decision on marriage was that in 1868, when the people of the United States ratified the 14th Amendment, that we were somehow silently and unawares striking down every marriage law across the country.

That’s a preposterous notion. That is not law. That is not even dressed up as law.

Now listen, reasonable minds can disagree as a policy matter. Should gay marriage be allowed. I suspect you and I would disagree on that policy matter.

Part of the genius of our framers is they set up a system to resolve the policy matters, and that system is we can engage in the democratic process, you can make arguments in support of whatever forms of marriage you embrace and others can make other arguments and our elected officials decide.

What this decision is, and both of these decisions are, are decisions from the Washington elites that they know better than the American people, that it doesn’t matter whether the American people agree with them or not, they’re going to force their radical views on them, and that’s — that’s really unfortunate.

And more:

CRUZ: Article III of the Constitution gives the court the authority to resolve cases and controversies. Those cases and controversies, when they’re resolved, when you’re facing a judicial order, the parties to that suit are bound it. Those who are not parties to the suit are not bound by it.

Now, in subsequent litigation, other courts will follow the precedence of the court, but a judicial order only binds those to whom it is directed, those who are parties to the suit. That’s the way our litigation system works.

Now, this is what Justice Scalia was talking about in his dissent, which is that it has been the case that on a great many issues, others have largely acquiesced, even if they were not parties to the case.

But there’s no legal obligation to acquiesce to anything other than a court judgment. And I would note that the next major battlefield that is going to occur following this marriage decision is religious liberty.

And there are a number of pastors who are publicly saying that if the courts attempt to order them to violate their faith, that they will defy the orders of the court and go to prison for it. That shows just how far we’ve gotten from the Bill of Rights and our Constitution.

I mean you have to admit that he has a point – did they intend for the 14th Amendment to redefine marriage back when it was instituted? Even Politico had to admit that he was “technically correct” about the law. But that doesn’t necessarily mean the strategy is a wise one.

This inspired a very interesting debate from the cool kids of conservatism on Twitter:

There is only one answer: we’re escrewed.


Comment Policy: Please read our comment policy before making a comment. In short, please be respectful of others and do not engage in personal attacks. Otherwise we will revoke your comment privileges.