I don't agree with this but here's how some people are trying to link the two. http://www.washblade.com/2004/2-13/news/national/polygamy.cfm Utah polygamy suit cites Lawrence ruling Experts disagree over whether case imperils gay marriage suits By LOU CHIBBARO JR. Friday, February 13, 2004 SALT LAKE CITY — A lawsuit filed here on Jan. 12 cites the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling last year overturning state sodomy laws as grounds for striking down Utah’s ban against polygamy. A heterosexual married couple filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City after clerks in Salt Lake County denied the couple’s request for a license to enter into a three-person “plural” marriage with another woman. It represents the kind of spin-off case from the Supreme Court’s sodomy ruling that conservative Justice Antonin Scalia warned about in his strongly worded dissenting opinion in the sodomy decision, known as Lawrence vs. Texas. Scalia called the majority ruling in the Lawrence — that morality alone cannot justify laws criminalizing relationships between consenting adults — a misinterpretation of the U.S. Constitution. Echoing controversial comments made earlier in the summer by Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.), Scalia predicted the Lawrence ruling would bring about a series of court challenges to state laws that currently ban “bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery, fornication, bestiality, and obscenity.” Two gay rights attorneys said the Lawrence decision would have little or no legal impact on the Utah polygamy lawsuit, and the lawsuit would not be a significant factor in harming efforts to legalize gay marriage. Opposites unite against polygamy Gerald Jensen, Utah’s assistant attorney general, agreed, indicating that gay rights advocates and Utah’s conservative, often anti-gay state government may be on the same side in the polygamy case. But a law professor with Brigham Young University said the U.S. Supreme Court might eventually accept the case on appeal — possibly before a gay marriage case reaches the high court. Such a scenario would likely add fuel to efforts by gay rights opponents to pass a federal constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. . . . The holding premise is on the state constitution,” Wilkins said of the Massachusetts court. “But the analysis is the same analysis that the [U.S. Supreme] Court announced in Lawrence. If that’s true, I think you’ll have polygamy, too. I don’t see how you can say two men or two women can marry but you can’t allow a group of people — two men and three women or five men and one woman. If that’s what they think is marriage, it’s going to be a marriage.” Wilkins acknowledged that he opposes same-sex marriage and shares Scalia’s theories and philosophy on U.S. constitutional law. The Utah polygamy case, called Bronson vs. Swensen, involves a single woman identified only as J. Bronson, who joined fellow plaintiffs G. Lee Cook, a Salt Lake City resident, and his wife, identified as D. Cook. All three applied for a license to incorporate Bronson into the Cooks’ marriage. The three argue in their lawsuit that a “plural” marriage is an integral part of their religious beliefs, citing the 1800s practice of polygamy among “fundamentalist” Mormons. All of the plaintiffs are over the age of 40, according to their attorney, Brian Barnard. The lawsuit calls for overturning the Utah State Constitution, which bans polygamy as a practice, and a separate state law that defines polygamy as a felony. The lawsuit also seeks to overturn an 1871 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that declared that the First Amendment doesn’t protect the practice of polygamy. In addition to citing the Lawrence decision as grounds for challenging the ban on polygamy as a violation of privacy rights, the lawsuit says the Utah anti-polygamy laws violate the plaintiffs’ First Amendment “right and ability to fulfill and practice a major tenet of their religion.”
