Academic

Ouellette on ?Moral Reasoning in Judicial Decisions on Same-Sex Marriage?

By Bridget Crawford

Professor Alicia R. Ouellette (Albany) has posted to ssrn her article, “Moral Reasoning in Judicial Decisions on Same-Sex Marriage.”  Here is a portion of the abstract:

Even judges who claim to bracket morality do not remain morally neutral toward homosexual relationships when they justify the grant of marriage rights. Instead, they make the case that same-sex relationships are normatively valuable for the very reasons that heterosexual marriages are normatively valuable. It is only the judges who take the middle ground - condemning discriminatory laws without granting the affirmative right to marriage itself - who come close to achieving moral neutrality toward homosexuality and same-sex relationships in their opinions.

The full paper is available here.

-Bridget Crawford

Full post as published by Feminist Law Professors on February 02, 2008 (boomark / email).