ADF to 8th Circuit: Allow Mo. to affirm marriage as one man, one woman

ST. LOUIS – Alliance Defending Freedom filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit Tuesday that encourages the court to uphold the freedom of the people of Missouri to affirm marriage as the union of one man and one woman. In November 2014, a district court ruled that the state’s marriage laws are unconstitutional and that marriage licenses must be issued to same-sex couples.

On Nov. 6, the 6th Circuit affirmed the freedom of four other states to affirm marriage as a man-woman union, and the 8th Circuit has already unanimously affirmed the right of Nebraskans to maintain marriage as a the union of a man and a woman. The ADF brief filed with the 8th Circuit in Lawson v. Kelly encourages the same result and highlights compelling stories and new social science evidence confirming the value of children knowing and being raised by both of their biological parents.

“The people of Missouri – like the people of every state – should be free to affirm marriage as the union of a man and a woman in their laws,” said ADF Senior Legal Counsel Jim Campbell. “As the U.S. Supreme Court concluded in its Windsor decision last year, marriage law is the business of the states. Federal courts should not reinterpret the Constitution to prevent the states from affirming marriage as it has existed in their states since the time of their founding.”

“The State best serves children when it adopts laws and policies that promote the biological home,” the ADF brief explains. “Man-woman-marriage laws do just that. The preeminent social purpose of marriage – and the overriding reason why the government recognizes marriage – is to connect children to both of their biological parents.”

“Individuals separated from either their mother or their father…regularly experience deeply rooted frustration, depression, anxiety, and sadness that result from the inability to know or establish a relationship with their biological parents,” the brief explains, with supporting social science evidence and examples. “As one person separated from her biological father tellingly revealed: ‘I think of myself as a puzzle; [but] the only picture I have ever known is half complete….’ In contrast, children reared in intact biological homes benefit from access to all these pieces when building their life story….”

“The most rigorous and reliable studies substantiate the conclusion that children are most likely to achieve favorable outcomes on a number of indicators when they are reared by both of their biological parents in stable family units,” the brief states.

“The Constitution does not demand that one irreversible view of marriage be judicially imposed on all the states,” added ADF Legal Counsel Doug Wardlow. “The court should reaffirm the essential role that marriage has always played in linking children to both of their biological parents. Maintaining this essential link is vital to protect the welfare of future generations of Missourians, particularly in a time of increasing fatherlessness and broken homes.”

Alliance Defending Freedom is an alliance-building, non-profit legal organization that advocates for the right of people to freely live out their faith.