Obergefell V. Hodges: Case Study

In my brief I will explore the effect of the Loving V. Virginia (1967) on the case of Obergefell V. Hodges (2015) and how it led to legalization of same sex marriage. I will prove that the 9th amendment which addresses the right to marriage did not specify that marriage should be between a man and a woman. I will also prove that the precedents set by prior cases reflected on the decision of the supreme justice. I will first explain the prior cases and discuss their rulings and reflect on the reason judges chose this. I will then discuss the Obergefell v. Hodges case and its similarity to prior cases . I will then discuss the Constitution and the right to marriage under the 9th amendment. It is important that we acknowledge the cases that

Virginia, Mildred Jeter who is African American and Richard Loving who is caucasian married in Washington, D.C and were arrested on their return to their home state of Virginia for violating their state's “miscegenation” laws which prohibited interracial marriage. The couple was arrested and sentenced to a year in jail but the judge who tried the case agreed to suspend their sentence if they left the state for 25 years. They agreed and left the state but were arrested during a visit with family members five years later. Mildred Loving wrote to attorney Robert F. Kennedy for help. He referred her to the American Civil Liberties Union (UCLA) and they represented she and her husband in the supreme court case. The Supreme Court Justices decided, unanimously, that bans on interracial marriages were

Nelson(1972) two male students from the University of Minnesota filed a lawsuit against Gerald Nelson, a clerk in Hennepin County district court, for denying the couple a marriage license based on the state’s to the restriction of marriage to the opposite sex even though the state didn’t officially commented on the gender of marriage neither did they officially ban same-sex marriage. The couple argued that their right to Equal Protection under the 14th amendment was violated as well as their right to marriage under the 9th Amendment. When tried in the Minnesota Supreme Court, their appeal was denied. The case reached the Supreme court and was dismissed for “ want of a substantial federal question.” This case brought light to the issue of same-sex marriage. A country that fights for equality in every corner of the world was oppressing its own citizens and denying them marriage equality, a right that was promised to them under the law of the