Humans Merely Breeding Stock? \u00a0Say it isn’t so!<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n National and local media are reporting on the Commonwealth of Kentucky’s appeal of the February decision<\/a> of District Court Judge John G Heyburn, II requiring the Commonwealth to recognize legal same-sex marriages performed in other states. The commentary available to me so far highlights a Commonwealth position that Kentucky has a legitimate interest in encouraging procreation to support long-term economic stability through stable birth rates. While that may be true of hog-breeding, I find the concept that the licensing of marriage for\u00a0people of any sex be leashed to economic development to be outrageously offensive. I hope that a full reading of the brief will show that a misunderstanding of the text of the Appeal has occurred. After all, the appeal has our Governor\u2019s name on it.<\/p>\n I have not yet read\u00a0the brief in detail. The Courier-Journal gives a link to a site where the document can be read on-line, but I found a careful\u00a0reading from the site to be difficult\u00a0and it required me to give personal information to download the document. For my benefit and yours, I downloaded the 39 page brief<\/a> from the Federal Court\u2019s own website, along with the first of what is likely to be many Amicus briefs for or against. When I get an chance, I will comment more fully. Please feel free to do the same in the reply\u00a0section below.<\/p>\n In the meantime, gay and lesbian healthcare workers in Kentucky are still being discriminated against at University Hospital at the same time we expect such employees not to discriminate against their patients!<\/p>\n [Addendum:<\/strong> \u00a0I had a chance to read through the appeal in its entirety. \u00a0Alas, a misunderstanding is not possible. The concept of humans as breeding stock is offered as the “legitimate state interest” that allows Kentucky to treat one group of citizens differently than another and therefore not to be in violation of\u00a0the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution. There is more, but “natural procreation”\u00a0is the core of it. \u00a0If I can muster\u00a0the stomach for it, I will outline the arguments later.]<\/p>\n What I fail to grasp, and what\u00a0is not addressed in Kentucky\u2019s appeal, is how refusing to recognize legal out-of-state marriages is going to increase the number of child worker-bees\u00a0and improve the economy as argued. When our Kentucky legislators wrote these laws, did they actually believe that if denied the privileges of marriage, that same-sex\u00a0Kentucky partners would otherwise dutifully engage in \u201cnatural procreation\u201d with members of the opposite sex? Many children arise from\u00a0same-sex marriages.\u00a0Are we\u00a0meant to assume that because “unnatural” artificial or surrogate methods are also often used in support of conception by same-sex partners, that their non-adopted\u00a0children don’t count? \u00a0After a lot of blather about state’s rights and judicial activism, the appeal claims that the State’s action is “rationally based and free from\u00a0invidious discrimination.” We’ve heard that argument before. \u00a0I don’t buy it for a moment. We know it for what it is. I am ashamed for Kentucky.<\/p>\n Peter Hasselbacher, MD Case 14-5291 Document #21<\/a>: Appeal of Judge Heyburn\u2019s decision.<\/p>\n
\nPresident, KHPI
\nEmeritus Professor of Medicine, UofL
\nMay 9, 2014<\/p>\n