Gov. Rick Perry
The mainstream media is finally picking up on efforts by the Texas Legislature to bar transgender people from marrying people of the opposite sex.
The Associated Press has a story today about SB 723 by Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, which would remove a court order of sex change from the list of documents that can be used to obtain marriage licenses. As we’ve reported, the bill was on the Senate’s intent calendar last week but has yet to be called up for a vote.
The irony of Williams’ bill, of course, is that if it becomes law, it will indicate that the Texas Legislature thinks it’s perfectly fine for transgender people to marry people of the same sex. And yet, Williams and others are citing their opposition to same-sex marriage as the reason for supporting the bill.
“The Texas Constitution,” Sen. Williams said told the AP, “clearly defines marriage between one man and one woman.”
“The governor has always believed and advocated that marriage is between a man and a woman,” said Mark Miner, a spokesman for Gov. Rick Perry.
As the story notes, most states allow transgender people to marry people of the opposite sex if they have a court order of sex change.
But you can’t have it both ways, which appears to be what conservative lawmakers in Texas want.
I’m confused. How will this bill “indicate that the Texas Legislature thinks it’s perfectly fine for transgender people to marry people of the same sex” if it becomes a law? I think it will prove that the exact opposite.
Austin, let’s look at an example. Let’s say Jesse is born a man, but after gender reassignment surgery is now a woman. As it currently stands, Jesse can marry a man, because Jesse is currently a woman. Woman marries man = not marrying someone of the same sex. If this passes, then (for purposes of marriage) Jesse must use the gender assigned to Jesse at birth – male. And Jesse (a woman) is therefore only eligible to marry other women. Woman marries woman = marrying someone of the same sex.
@Austin: By saying that transgender people cannot marry people of the opposite sex, they are are implicitly saying that transgender people CAN marry someone of the same sex. You cannot take away someone’s right to marry completely.
…admittedly, it’s possible that the legislators INTEND to fully revoke the right of transgendered persons to marry, but it does not appear that this legislation would be sufficient to do so.
I don’t have any kind of “court order for sex change”. But I do have an original (not amended) birth certificate from my home state with my correct (current) name and gender. My TX drivers license is the same. My social security record likewise. So, based on the Littleton -v- Prange TX Court of Appeals case (which this legislation would codify), I can only marry a woman. Yay!! But, I don’t have any official document required by the statute to prove my “gender” in order to get a marriage license to marry a woman. Boo!!!
Now, I could probably get a marriage license to marry a man with my current documentation. Meh not interested, but just saying. However, the Littleton case (and this legislation) would invalidate that marriage, just as Christie Lee Littleton’s marriage was invalidated in the eponymous court decision.
So essentially, I can’t get legally married in Texas to a woman or a man.
As a transgendered person, this just makes me ashamed to be Texan. Really guys?
As an aside, the whole idea that this is an attack on certain hetero marriages is falling on a lot of deaf ears, since the proponents in the TX legislature, the Governor, and I will wager even a large percentage of DV readers truthfully believe that a trans woman is and always will be a “man” who simply lives as a woman (and vice versa for trans men). If one finds this belief prevalent in the lesbian and gay community, how could one expect better understanding from social conservatives?
This is seriously hilarious. If they pass this law, they’ll be legalizing same-sex marriage for transgendered people. Texas idiots/Republicans are going to have to decide what is grosser/weirder to them – a married couple that was born the same gender or a married couple that IS the same gender.
Where are the Jobs Perry? Show me the money? You know, there is more BS things we need to deal with other then this? And if you think Texas is worst, take a look at Fort Worth and Joel Burns: https://www.facebook.com/imwithjoel Fort Worth has the same issues and just like little Perry traveling with his little book and him. Why are the voters in Fort Worth even more stupider then letting him run unopposed?
If you read the House Bill that serves as a companion (HB3098), people would see this is more about the law requiring photo ID at the time one presents to the Clerk. I don’t have an issue with that. The M2F or F2M can STILL use their DL as proof of ID. The legislation simply says that the court order cannot be used as proof of identity (nor can school records or birth certificate or a host of other non-photo ID’s. Chris K above at least seems to get it- the intent may be there but this statute does not accomplish it even if passed in its current form.
I also find it interesting that the case people insist on hanging onto (Littleton) is one that would not have gotten to court in its current iteration if the individual in question had changed their birth certificate PRIOR to the marriage and BEFORE the post-mortem litigation ever got filed. When people do not do paperwork in a timely manner, it tends to come back to bite them. That being said, I have to believe the Legislature has more important things to tend to than a list of documents sufficient to satisfy even the most redneck bigoted County Clerk…
ann, it is clear that the legislative intent of this Bill is to codify the Littleton decision state-wde. Courts place a lot of emohasis on legislative intent when the clear meaning of a statute is not evident from the text itself (which would be the case here). See the following: https://www.legislativequeery.com/2011/04/legislative-intent-and-sb-723.html
“You cannot take away someone’s right to marry completely.” You do realize, of course, that the Texas Fascism Festival (sometimes known as the Texas Legislature) will simply take that as a challenge, right?
What I don’t understand on the Littleton case was that everything I read was that she was married while a pre-op. I am not aware of any states that will recognize a pre-op marriage. She had the SRS in the weeks following the marriage on reports that I have read. No state that I am aware of will change a birth certificate before SRS.
What makes the Littleton marriage valid?
From the Littleton decision:
“Between November of 1979 and February of 1980, Christie underwent three surgical procedures, which culminated in a complete sex reassignment.”
and
“Christie married a man by the name of Jonathon Mark Littleton in Kentucky in 1989, and she lived with him until his death in 1996.”
and finally
“We hold, as a matter of law, that Christie Littleton is a male. As a male, Christie cannot be married to another male. Her marriage to Jonathon was invalid, and she cannot bring a cause of action as his surviving spouse.”
She did not attempt to alter her original birth certificate until the suit began, but the holding in Littleton makes it clear that her attempt to change her birth certificate should not have succeeded.
Chris, the most significant passage from [i]Littleton[/i] that even allowed the situation to have arisen is as follows:
“Christie was created and born a male. Her original birth certificate, an official document of Texas, clearly so states. During the pendency of this suit, Christie amended the original birth certificate to change the sex and name.”
The reality was that if the birth certificate had been altered years earlier, there likely would not have been the former record to have been available to be procured as a request for the certified copy would have resulted in the production of the corrected document.
That reason alone gave the Court all the reason they needed to have concluded that, as a matter of law, the law had not been satisfied at the time of the marriage. I’m of the opinion that counsel at the original trial level could have handled the case differently but they still could not overcome the presumption that existed that, at the precise moment of the marriage, the birth certificates corroborated that this was a marriage of two persons identified on a government document as having been male at birth.
Ironically enough, the birth certificate is one of the documents that would no longer be permitted as identification upon presentment to the Clerk if HB3098 were passed.
I’m quite sure that the governor and his cronies will never be able to wrap their minds around the complexities of this issue. Diagrams will need to be drawn for them.
We must be reading different decisions, ann. The one I’m looking at explicitly states that she should not be allowed to alter her birth certificate, because it was not in error.
Chris, we are not reading different Opinions at all. By not having changed the birth certificate prior to the marriage, it became the red herring that the Court was able to focus on. Had the certificate been changed prior to the marriage, argument, even at the trial court level, goes in a completely different direction and the 4th CoA likely never gets to discuss the issue. Hell, done properly, the original birth certificate would never have been available for the other family member to have obtained for the purposes of the litigation.
“gender assigned to Jesse at birth”
How ignorant are you people. Your gender is NEVER assigned, it’s determined by your chromosomes in your body’s cells. If you’re born a male, then you are a MALE forever, that can never be changed. You can have your ding dong cut off and do whatever you would like to LOOK like a woman, but you are still a MAN. Why is this even an issue, there’s no such thing as a “gender reassignment”. You can’t change your chromosomes, so you therefore can’t change your gender. Where did you people fall through the cracks in school?
BG then I guess your genetics put you in the neandertal category. Please club you female victim over the head so she can be your wife.
BG – You are factually wrong in several ways. “Gender is assigned by Chromosomes” – You mean XX=Female, XY=male? Well.. *usually*… like men are usually taller than women.
“PATIENTS: A 46,XY mother who developed as a normal woman underwent spontaneous puberty, reached menarche, menstruated regularly, experienced two unassisted pregnancies, and gave birth to a 46,XY daughter with complete gonadal dysgenesis.” — J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2008 Jan;93(1):182-9.
There are XX men too, and it’s so common that 1 in 300 men don’t have XY chromosomes. 1 in 450 have XXY, halfway between XX and XY.
There’s a variety of medical conditions that can cause chromosomes to change. This is most obvious in bone marrow transplant recipients.
See
Bone marrow-derived cells from male donors can compose endometrial glands in female transplant recipients by Ikoma et al in Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2009 Dec;201(6):608.e1-8
Meaning her body, including her ovaries, gradually took on the XY chromosomes of the donor. She’s till a woman, chromosomes don’t determine sex any more than height does
Oh yes, and 5ARD, 17BHDD and 3BHDD syndromes cause sex to change sometimes.
Even Senator Williams acknowledges that.
“Williams said he understands that some people’s gender cannot easily be determined when they are born and they later have an operation that could change the originally assigned gender.
“It is an emotional issue,” Williams said. “I can appreciate that.”
He knows – he just doesn’t care. It’s more than an “emotional issue”, it’s about prejudice and bigotry. His.
You, like most of his supporters, didn’t know. Now you do. What are you going to do about this guy who’s made you look like a fool just to support his malice ? You know there’s a court case on right now about this very issue, and the Senator and his friends stand to get a sizeable cut of the $300,000 that’s at stake should the law be changed? That’s the reason for this, to swindle a widow out of the insurance on her deceased husband.
Under current Texas law, for the purposes of marriage a person’s gender is based on chromosomes or original birth certificate. If the doctor at the time of birth said “it’s a boy” you can marry someone who’s doctor said “it’s a girl”. Surgery, reissued birth certificates, legal orders of gender marker change, driver’s licenses etc don’t matter. I’m sure it galls the conserviative right, but that law got me my Texas marriage license to my wonderful wife. A transgender person can apply for and receive a marriage license by showing their new driver’s license and not mentioning the transition, but if it is ever challenged in court it will get thrown out.
This new law, based on reading the actual bill on the state’s website, will not change who can get married, only what documents they can present to apply for the license. It also specifically states that it will not affect licenses applied for before it goes into effect.