Court rejects appeal on same-sex marriage
THE Supreme Court has stood by its ruling rejecting a plea to allow same-sex marriage in the country.
In a two-page notice dated Dec. 10 and released to media yesterday, the tribunal said the petitioners had failed to give substantial arguments. “No further pleadings or motions will be entertained,” it said.
The court in September dismissed a petition led by lawyer Jesus Nicardo M. Falcis III for his lack of legal standing, violating the hierarchy of courts and failing to raise an actual controversy.
The plaintiff in 2015 questioned the validity of the Family Code, which states that marriage is only between a man and a woman.
The court said the issue of same-sex marriage should be raised to Congress.
It added that Mr. Falcis and his co-counsels were liable for indirect contempt for forgetting the “bare rudiments of court procedure and decorum.
“Or worse, to purport them, but really only to exploit them by way of propaganda and then, to jump headlong into the taxing endeavor of constitutional litigation is a contemptuous betrayal of the high standards of the legal profession,” the court said. — Vann Marlo M. Villegas
