Tenn. judge refuses to grant straight couple a divorce because … gay marriage

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Tenn. judge refuses to grant straight couple a divorce ... - 9/4/2015 7:10:35 AM

dcnovice

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Last week, a Tenn. judge refused to grant a straight couple a divorce because the U.S. Supreme Court allowed gay marriage.

* * *

[W]hen Thomas and Pamela Bumgardner walked into [Jeffrey M.] Atherton’s court in late July hoping for a quick and easy divorce, the judge apparently had other ideas.

The sexagenarian couple had married in November of 2002, according to the Times Free Press. But after 13 years together, they wanted to split, claiming straying allegiances and irreconcilable differences.

After four days of testimony including seven witnesses and 77 exhibits, however, Atherton unexpectedly ruled that he would not be granting the Bumgardners a divorce.

* * *

“The Tennessee Court of Appeals has noted that Obergefell v. Hodges … affected what is, and must be recognized as, a lawful marriage in the State of Tennessee,” Atherton began. “This leaves a mere trial level Tennessee state court judge in a bit of a quandary. With the U.S. Supreme Court having defined what must be recognized as a marriage, it would appear that Tennessee’ s judiciary must now await the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court as to what is not a marriage, or better stated, when a marriage is no longer a marriage.”

* * *

The Supreme Court’s decision was “troubling” because it amounted to a “judicial fiat,” Atherton argued. “… What actually appears to be the intent and (more importantly) the effect of the Supreme Court ruling is to preempt state courts from addressing marriage/divorce litigation altogether.”

* * *

But it is Atherton’s next paragraph that is the real doozy, in which he calls the Supreme Court’s decision “judi-idiocracy.”

“Although this Court has some vague familiarity with the governmental theories of democracy, republicanism, socialism, communism, fascism, theocracy, and even despotism,” he begins sarcastically, “implementation of this apparently new ‘super-federal-judicial’ form of benign and benevolent government, termed ‘krytocracy’ by some and ‘judi-idiocracy’ by others, with its iron fist and limp wrist, represents quite a challenge for a state level trial court.”

Faced with this “challenge,” Atherton’s decision is simply to throw his hands up in the air and claim that the Supreme Court’s decision had “divested subject matter jurisdiction from this court when a divorce is contested.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/09/04/tenn-judge-refuses-to-grant-straight-couple-a-divorce-because-of-gay-marriage/

Honestly, I can understand disagreeing with the Supreme Court on Obergefell and/or preferring that same-sex marriage had been tackled legislatively rather than judicially. But Atherton strikes me as simply throwing a tantrum, at the expense of innocent citizens who shouldn't have been misused as pawns. It seems a bit, well, unhinged even. (Anyone else catch the "limp wrist" dig?) Then again, marriage equality does have that effect sometimes.

Thoughts, anyone?

_____________________________

No matter how cynical you become,
it's never enough to keep up.

JANE WAGNER, THE SEARCH FOR SIGNS OF
INTELLIGENT LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE