Happy 4th!
Mississippi in the Spotlight; HB1523, Standing, and You.
HB1523 is the little engine that could. A three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals determined that the Plaintiffs in the underlying matter did not have standing to pursue their case. The Court basically said those complaining had not been harmed.
A brief reminder, HB1523 was aimed to prevent “government from interfering with people of faith who are exercising their religious beliefs …in matters of marriage.” Phil Bryant. The Governor said it would not allow the discrimination of anyone.
The debate essentially centers around two “competing” interests. Those in favor of the law – contend a small business owner, hardworking, toiling and of strong Christian conviction should not lose their business and livelihood due to getting sued for not baking a cake for a gay wedding. Those opposed to the law – state that this law affords no protections to a class in need of protection.
Interestingly, prior to this law, during its litigation and even to date, there has not been a reported instance of a small business in the State of Mississippi being sued or facing any consequences for refusing service to same-sex persons prior to this law. The Oregon case where a baker had a money judgment entered against him was due to the admitted violation of an Oregon State law and aggravating factors, including that the baker published the Complaintant’s name, home address and personal phone number on FaceBook. The money damages were for violating Oregon State law and the emotional distress that accompanied the intended private complaint being publicly posted.
The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution prohibits the federal government from making a law “respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” This provision applies to state and local governments through the Fourteenth Amendment.
The problem I see is that this law demands the respecting of an establishment of religion. It specifically allows state employees to discriminate against other citizens based upon a “sincerely held religious belief” or “moral conviction.” This means that the State employee whose job is to issue marriage licenses can refuse because they do not approve of you and/or your soon-to-be spouse.
The intent was to prevent same-sex marriage, but it could also prevent persons who were previously divorced from being married, persons pregnant out-of-wedlock who seek to be married, those that have had a child out of wedlock, and those having sex out of wedlock from getting married. These facts, by the way, are not an interpretation. The law provides for protection of these beliefs.
However, the plaintiffs complaining could not show that they had actually been harmed or discriminated against because of the law. Due to this, the 5th Circuit determined that they did not have the right to sue the State as they could show no harm. Case dismissed.
So, what’s next? This ruling will be appealed to the full panel before the 5th Circuit and in the meantime additional suits will be filed with aggrieved plaintiffs, I predict. However, is a law really a law if it doesn’t matter? Maybe all who seek will get their marriage licenses and all who desire a cake will get their cake and eat it too. Maybe Mississippi is better than our politicians deserve.
Matthew Thompson is a Divorce Attorney encouraging you to believe in your beliefs, but follow the law.
She’s Your Ex, not mine.
“The poison ivy of people are ex spouses.” -Matthew Thompson
Exes can irritate, inflame, and annoy regardless of the season. Exes can make life difficult and uncomfortable. Exes can also cause a reaction that is not good.
I was meeting with a divorcee and their new spouse. We were discussing some issues about the ex and the best way to address it. The new spouse made the comment “She’s your ex, not mine.” This was a profound comment. It was not shirking responsibility or even placing blame. It was a statement that you, as the former spouse, need to address issues head-on and in an adult like manner.
Novel thought. Act like an adult. All too often, I see ex spouses acting like everything but adults. Petty arguments, meaningless games of one-upping the other and a general lack of care for the ex spouse can serve to harm the child. These are bad. Don’t do these things.
Act like an adult.
Matthew Thompson is a Child Custody attorney and encourages ex spouses to act like adults.
Happy Father’s Day!
(601) 850-8000
Advice to Parents; Grow up
If you are the parent to a child then act like it.
We have seen the reports and stories of parents going off the deep end. Using illegal drugs, abusing substances, pursuing bad-idea relationships and ultimately putting their own selfish desires above the needs of their children. It’s time to stop.
There are only a handful of people that you, as a parent, are ultimately responsible for; yourself and the people you brought into this world, your children.
Don’t shirk your duties. Don’t neglect your children. Don’t be so consumed with your own desires that you lose sight of what is important. Don’t hate another person so much it clouds your judgment when it comes to your children.
Matthew Thompson is a Child Custody attorney and encourages parents to grow up and act like a parent.
Clarion-Ledger: Protecting families, or prolonging misery?
Matthew Thompson is a Mississippi family law attorney and professor, and having difficult, drawn-out and costly divorces would be good for his pocketbook.
But Thompson supports reform and changes to divorce laws, “even though it’s against my own self interests.”
“The current laws make it expensive, and in some instances, impossible to get a divorce,” said Thompson, whose firm focuses on family law statewide and who is a professor teaching domestic relations at Mississippi College’s law school.
Thompson said the Legislature’s recent divorce law reform, removing a corroboration requirement for abused spouses, is a needed change.
“Our law has required cruelty claims be corroborated with evidence beyond that of the victim’s testimony,” Thompson said. “… Even if the court believed you, you had to have a neighbor, family member, police report or picture, or you didn’t have corroboration … Now, if the court finds the victim truthful and credible, the court can accept that. If you take a step back and think, that makes sense. Our judges have always been the lie detector, always the barometer of whether someone was credible.
“There is some form of abuse in a vast number of divorce cases,” Thompson said. “Not every one, but a lot of them. When you drill down and include physical, mental, emotional, verbal abuse — It’s a significant number of cases. We as human beings treat the people we are supposed to love the most the worst.”
Thompson said he supports Mississippi creating a “no-fault” ground for divorce. South Dakota is the only other state without such a ground. He said opposition to this change, from those saying it will weaken the sanctity of marriage and increase divorces, is misguided. In practice, Mississippi’s lack of a no-fault ground allows one spouse to hold up a divorce, sometimes for years.
“The idea behind making it difficult to get a divorce is that Mississippi is promoting marriage,” Thompson said. “But when you go 10 years and it costs tens of thousands of dollars — those aren’t intact families trying to get back together.
“Our law promotes divorce blackmail,” Thompson said. “… You have to pay what I say, or agree to what I want, or I won’t agree to a divorce … You have a fundamental, constitutional right to marriage, according to (a U.S. Supreme Court ruling). Shouldn’t you have a fundamental right to a divorce? I guess the counter to that is that you don’t have to get married.”
Thompson said some of the moral and religious arguments focused on divorce policies should be focused on the front-end, marriage policies.
“Our state has made it phenomenally easy to get into a marriage,” Thompson said. “There used to be a three-day wait, used to be a blood test requirement. But now you just go to the circuit clerk and pay $25.
“Studies show having mom and dad happily married and living together is what’s best for children and families,” Thompson said. “Having mom and dad get along and living separately would be second best. Mom and dad living together and fighting and being miserable, whether it’s violent or just cold war, that’s not the best. If this is really about protecting families, there are ways to do that, but still have an appropriate and reasonable means to get out of a marriage. It shouldn’t take a beating or physical violence to get there.”
Contact Geoff Pender at 601-961-7266 or gpender@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter.
Annulment 101
§ 93-7-3. Causes for annulment of marriages.
Annulment is having your marriage legally revoked.
A marriage may be annulled for any one (1) of the following causes existing at the time of the marriage ceremony:
(a) Incurable impotency.
(b) Adjudicated mental illness or incompetence of either or both parties. Action of a spouse who has been adjudicated mentally ill or incompetent may be brought by guardian, or in the absence of a guardian, by next friend, provided that the suit is brought within six (6) months after marriage.
(c) Failure to comply with the provisions of Sections 93-1-5 through 93-1-9 when any marriage affected by that failure has not been followed by cohabitation.
Or, in the absence of ratification:
(d) When either of the parties to a marriage is incapable, from want of age or understanding, of consenting to any marriage, or is incapable from physical causes of entering into the marriage state, or where the consent of either party has been obtained by force or fraud, the marriage shall be void from the time its nullity is declared by a court of competent jurisdiction.
(e) Pregnancy of the wife by another person, if the husband did not know of the pregnancy.
Suits for annulment under paragraphs (d) and (e) shall be brought within six (6) months after the ground for annulment is or should be discovered, and not thereafter.
The causes for annulment of marriage set forth in this section are intended to be new remedies and shall in no way affect the causes for divorce declared elsewhere to be the law of the State of Mississippi as they presently exist or as they may from time to time be amended. § 93-7-3.
Matthew Thompson is a Divorce and Annulment lawyer in Mississippi.
Remembering Memorial Day.
On Memorial Day, the flag of the United States is raised briskly to the top of the staff and then solemnly lowered to the half-staff position, where it remains only until noon. It is then raised to full-staff for the remainder of the day.
The half-staff position remembers the more than one million men and women who gave their lives in service of our country. At noon, their memory is raised by the living, who resolve not to let their sacrifices be in vain.
Matthew Thompson
(601) 850-8000 - - BowTieLawyer.MS 