{"id":47359,"date":"2014-06-06T14:13:12","date_gmt":"2014-06-06T19:13:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=47359"},"modified":"2014-06-06T15:58:52","modified_gmt":"2014-06-06T20:58:52","slug":"couples-file-challenge-n-d-ban-same-sex-marriage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=47359","title":{"rendered":"Couples File, Challenge N.D. Ban Same-Sex Marriage"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) &#8211; Seven couples have filed a federal lawsuit challenging the ban on same-sex marriage in North Dakota, the last remaining state without a court challenge.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The clerk of the court confirmed that the lawsuit was filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Fargo.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It challenges both North Dakota&#8217;s constitutional ban on gay marriage and its refusal to recognize marriages of same-sex couples who legally wed in other states.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The lawsuit means cases are currently pending in all 31 states with gay marriage bans. Judges have overturned several of those bans since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down part of the federal Defense of Marriage Act last year.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Minneapolis-based attorney Josh Newville, who is representing the North Dakota couples, also filed a lawsuit on behalf of South Dakota couples in May.<\/p>\n<p>The North Dakota Attorney General says he hasn&#8217;t seen the lawsuit challenging the state&#8217;s ban on same-sex marriage yet, but he notes that it&#8217;s his duty to defend the state when it&#8217;s sued.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Wayne Stenehjem (STEHN&#8217;-juhm) says ultimately, only the U.S. Supreme Court can determine whether North Dakota&#8217;s law is constitutional.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) &#8211; Seven couples have filed a federal lawsuit challenging the ban on same-sex marriage in North Dakota, the last remaining state without a court challenge. \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The clerk of the court confirmed that the lawsuit was filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Fargo. \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4340,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47359"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47359\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47368,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47359\/revisions\/47368"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}