After Idaho Resolution, More GOP Lawmakers Are Coming for Marriage Equality

Red state lawmakers are coming after the right of queer people to marry the person they love. Resolutions attacking family freedoms have been introduced in Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Michigan, coming hot on the heels of a call from Idaho state GOP lawmakers for the Supreme Court to strike down its own Obergefell ruling from 2015.

"Michigan State Representative Josh Schriver, a Republican who was elected in 2022 and has previously spoken out against same-sex marriage, introduced a resolution on Tuesday [Feb. 25] that condemns the Supreme Court's decision in Obergefell," Newsweek reported.

Schriver resolution is only the latest salvo in the hard right's crusade to destroy same-sex families.

"Similar measures explicitly seeking to reverse the Obergefell decision have been introduced in Idaho, Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota," NBC News reported.

"The Idaho House passed its resolution last month by a vote of 46-24, and the North Dakota House passed its measure Monday [Feb. 24], 52-40."

The North Dakota resolution calls on the Supreme Court to "restore the definition of marriage to a union between one man and one woman," Newsweek noted, recalling that Schriver had taken to X (formerly Twitter) late last year with a demand to "Make gay marriage illegal again."

"This is not remotely controversial, nor extreme," Schriver claimed in the post.

In a rhetorical twist with an unclear meaning, lawmakers in four other red states – "Missouri, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas," Newseek specified – "introduced bills that don't refer to Obergefell but that would, if they are signed into law, create a category for marriage called 'covenant marriage' that would be only for one man and one woman."

The current understanding of a "covenant marriage" is simply a marriage with a prenuptial agreement in place that serves as a roadblock to subsequent divorce.

Such marriages, The New York Times explained in a 2023 article, "are legally binding contracts or agreements between two people who have the intent to live together for the rest of their lives."

"Unlike traditional marriages, covenant marriages come with additional requirements, and ending one through divorce is more challenging," the Times article detailed. "Currently, three states allow these types of marriages: Arizona, Arkansas and Louisiana."

It was unclear from reports whether Missouri, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Texas had a similar definition of a "covenant marriage" or if their proposals differed from the current understanding of the term.

In Michigan, which is more of a purple state than a red one, Democratic lawmakers gave voice to their opposition to Schriver's proposal. Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, offered a succinct answer to Schriver's divisive proposal: "Hell, no."

"In Michigan, everyone has the freedom to marry who they love," Gov. Whitmer stated, according to Newsweek. "It's not only the law of the land, it's a non-negotiable."

Going on to say that "some extreme members of the Michigan Legislature are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn marriage equality," Gov. Whitmer declared, "We've fought a long, hard fight to win marriage equality and we will always protect our family, our friends and neighbors from hateful attacks."

Idaho's resolution was passed by the state's House of Representatives last month, but the measure did not have unanimous support, with 15 GOP state lawmakers voting against the resolution along with the chamber's nine Democratic members. That state's resolution was backed by a Massachusetts-based group that has opposed marriage equality since the 1990s and is regarded as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The Supreme Court's 2015 ruling legalizing marriage equality in all 50 states was closely divided, with four of the Court's nine justices dissenting. Two of those justices, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, have continued to invite a revisitation of the issue by the Court, and with three Trump appointees having shifted the balance of the bench toward the hard right, any such reconsideration might well result in the Court snatching marriage rights away from millions of Americans in committed same-sex relationships.

That has been the scenario envisioned by watchdogs since the Court disregarded settled law and undid a half-century of American law by rescinding reproductive freedoms in 2021 and striking down Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Court ruling that found a Constitutional right for a woman to end her pregnancy.

A direct result of that repeal of reproductive freedoms was the passage of the Respect for Marriage Act, which would act as a backstop on a Supreme Court curtailment of marriage equality. Still, the Respect for Marriage Act will not completely protect the nation's same-sex families.

But any such reconsideration still has a long road before it, and resolutions are not sufficient to bring the Court back to the issue. A legal challenge to a state law would be required, Newsweek noted.

"If a state sought to go further – to pass or enforce a law that limited marriage to opposite-sex couples, in clear violation of Obergefell – a challenge to that law could quickly make its way to the Supreme Court," Kate Shaw, an expert in Constitutional law, pointed out in comments to Newsweek.