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Final ruling in Brown's polygamy case

I don't think the ban will hold against the Supreme Court. Most legal scholars agree that this provision would never hold up under constitutional scrutiny. The real battle has been getting SCOTUS to actually hear the case. Exciting news indeed! :grin:
 
This opinion is being reported in a rather strange way. The ruling severing the cohabitation clause from the bigamy statute and narrowly construing the terms "marry" and "purport to marry" to include only state-licensed marriages is still intact from December. This new opinion dealt with one final issue that the judge had to address: the Browns' §1983 claim against the Utah AG for violation of their Civil Rights. And lucky for Utah, the Browns graciously withdrew their claim for monetary damages, because Judge Waddoups ruled for the Browns, so Utah is on the hook for the Browns' attorneys fees and court costs, but not moving expenses, etc.

The good news for us is that now the state can finally get on with its appeal.

It'll be interesting to see what their appeal looks like. Judge Waddoups wrote a very thoughtful, well-reasoned opinion, based squarely on precedent. Other than "we don't like the outcome and we think you should change it just because", the state doesn't have much of an argument....
 
I think it's just media sensationalism as usual. Check out the second, fourth, and sixth headlines. Wildly over-simplified and exaggerated, but hey, it's the news!

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Meanwhile, though the judge did restate his ruling from December regarding the cohabitation clause, the only thing that changed this time around was that he disposed of the Civil Rights claim. So the real headline should have been "Browns awarded attorneys fees and drop damages claim". How boring is that?
 
Oh, yeah! And as you pointed out, the best news for us is now the appeals process can move forward. Very exciting!
 
The worst news for the state of Utah is that the appeals process can now move forward. They're on the hook to say something intelligent for reversing the decision and they can't. :D
 
The irony of this is that they must certainly know that they will probably lose and waste significant taxpayer resources by the time the smoke clears. But they're both Republicans and have constituencies to appease, so they're not allowed to make a practical decision, they have to take a futile, symbolic stand so the outcome won't be their fault.

Welcome to the wacky world of the "justice" system! :razz:
 
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