Constitutional scholar Michael C. Dorf visited the law school on Sept. 16 to present a faculty workshop, 鈥淪ame-Sex Marriage, Second-Class Citizenship and Law鈥檚 Social Meaning.鈥
The Robert S. Stevens Professor of Law at Cornell Law School, Dorf is one of the leading constitutional scholars in the nation, the co-author (with Laurence Tribe) of 鈥淥n Reading the Constitution,鈥 and the founder of the influential blog, Dorf on Law.
During a faculty workshop, Dorf聽offered a framework for upholding the rights of same-sex couples to marry based on constitutional prohibitions against government treatment of any class of individuals as second-class citizens.
While the government is permitted to express disapproval of behaviors like teen smoking, Dorf said, stigmatizing same-sex couples conveys a social message that could be vulnerable to constitutional challenge.
鈥淭he Constitution forbids government from speaking in ways that have a social meaning of treating some persons as second-class citizens,鈥 he said.