02/21/2014 // West Palm Beach, Florida, US // JusticeNewsFlash // Justice News Flash // (press release)

Oregon – Oregon has decided not to defend a state ban on gay marriage in a federal lawsuit. As reported by the Associated Press (AP), the Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum made the declaration on Thursday, a decade after 57 percent of voters approved the ban.

Rosenblum is quoted by the AP as stating in documents filed in federal court this week, “State Defendants will not defend the Oregon ban on same-sex marriage in this litigation… Rather, they will take the position … that the ban cannot withstand a federal constitutional challenge under any standard of review.”

Conservatives accused Rosenblum and several other attorneys general of relinquishing their duty in making the decision. Brian Brown, president of the National Organization of Marriage, is quoted as stating of the matter, “(Rosenblum) is shamefully abandoning her constitutional duty to defend the marriage amendment overwhelmingly enacted by the people of Oregon.”

Rosenblum has stated that her personal views on gay marriage did not affect her decision, saying during a news conference, “Because we cannot identify a valid reason for the state to prevent the couples who have filed these lawsuits from marrying in Oregon, we find ourselves unable to stand before (the federal judge) to defend the state’s prohibition against marriages between two men or two women.”

This report is provided by Justice News Flash – Oregon Legal News

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