ADF attorneys: Judge erroneously dismissed expert testimony in Iowa marriage case
ADF attorneys file friend-of-the-court brief with Iowa Supreme Court on behalf of five state legislators seeking to defend marriageDES MOINES, Iowa — Attorneys for the Alliance Defense Fund filed a friend-of-the-court brief Monday with the Iowa Supreme Court on behalf of five state legislators seeking to defend marriage. ADF attorneys are questioning a trial judge’s decision to reject the state’s expert testimony in the case last August.
“The government should promote and encourage strong families. The expert testimony excluded by the court was crucial to establishing why Iowa’s Defense of Marriage Act does that and why the act is completely constitutional,” said ADF Litigation Counsel Jim Campbell. “The people of Iowa, through their elected legislators, took their stand on marriage as the union of one woman and one man when they passed this act in 1998.”
In April, ADF filed a different friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of state legislators. But the court incorrectly found that the Defense of Marriage Act was unconstitutional on Aug. 30. The case is now before the Iowa Supreme Court.
The state passed the act in order to block any future attempts to redefine marriage. In December 2005, Lambda Legal filed suit against Polk County Clerk Timothy Brien on behalf of six same-sex couples, demanding marriage licenses for same-sex couples as a constitutional “right” (www.telladf.org/news/story.aspx?cid=4068).
The friend-of-the-court brief filed by ADF attorneys in Varnum v. Brien in the Iowa Supreme Court is available at www.telladf.org/UserDocs/VarnumAmicusBrief.pdf.
ADF is a legal alliance defending the right to hear and speak the Truth through strategy, training, funding, and litigation.
