State lawmakers typically don’t take too kindly to outsiders coming to Texas and telling them what to do. Except, of course, if we’re talking about keeping equal rights away from LGBT individuals. Then some lawmakers these days are all ears.
Dozens of elected officials stood outside the Capitol earlier today to welcome Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore for what organizers billed as a rally in defense of Texas’ discriminatory same-sex marriage ban, a prohibition that seems destined to be overturned and ruled unconstitutional by the federal courts.
A brief history on Moore. He first rose to national prominence in the early 2000s when, under the cover of night, he unilaterally ordered the installation of a Ten Commandments monument in the Alabama state judicial building. Talk about an activist judge. Anyway, church-state separation groups sued and won, but Moore ignored a federal order to remove the monument. The monument was eventually removed, along with Moore, who was booted from the bench.
In 2012, Moore returned to the bench when Alabama voters again elected him as the state’s top judge. In recent weeks Moore has once again earned notoriety for ordering state judges in Alabama to ignore another federal court order, this one bringing marriage equality to his state state.
At today’s rally he basically told Texas officials to do the same thing here, should a federal court rule for marriage equality.
After the rally, Moore told reporters same-sex marriage is not about civil rights and had a simple explanation for why marriage equality has made large gains across the country: the hippies did it.
Watch the video:
