The U.S. Supreme Court will be meeting in conference Monday to consider whether to take up the issue of same-sex marriage, writes U.S. News and World Report's Tierney Sneed: "The petitions come from four separate decisions out of three different U.S. Courts of Appeal on cases emanating from five different states."
Garrett Epps, a constitutional law professor, said the Supreme Court isn't likely to take up the issue until a circuit court of appeals upholds a ban on same-sex marriage, leading to a split among intermediate federal appellate courts.
Also at issue is whether bans should be rejected on equal protection or due process grounds: "Bans in Utah and Oklahoma, both overturned in separate decisions by the 10th Circuit, were decided on the basis of due process, meaning that denying gay couples the ability to wed deprives them of their fundamental right to marry. The 7th Circuit decision finding Indiana’s and Wisconsin’s same-sex marriage bans unconstitutional did so on the grounds of the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, with the unanimous panel arguing that same-sex marriage bans discriminate against one’s sexual orientation. If the Supreme Court decides on a case that invokes the equal protection clause, how it interprets the 14th Amendment could affect judicial rulings on other questions of LGBT rights and discrimination."
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