Kathy Wray Coleman is a community activist, legal and political reporter, and a 22- year investigative journalist who trained for 17 years at the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio.

(www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com

WASHINGTON, D.C.-A deeply divided nine-member U.S.  Supreme Court  heard oral arguments on Tuesday, April 28 in four consolidated cases together titled Obergefel v. Hodges on whether same-sex couples enjoy a constitutional right to marry, with the liberal and conservative justices split, and Justice Anthony Kennedy holding the controlling vote.

Thousands converged on Washington, D.C. and protested in front of the Supreme Court, both advocates and opponents of same sex marriage.

A decision is expected to be handed down in coming months, likely in June.

The  arguments, which went on for more than two hours, centered around gay marriage bans in the states of Kentucky, Michigan , Tennessee and Ohio that were upheld by the United States Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, Ohio , a 2-1 decision of a three-judge panel issued late last year that created a conflict with other appellate rulings. That conflict between federal appeals courts made the case ripe to be heard by the Supreme Court of the land.

The Sixth Circuit, pursuant to its decision issued last year, upheld the trial courts ruling, saying  that the state legislature and voters in Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan and Tennessee, and not the courts, should decide the issue of same sex marriage.

President Barack Obama, a constitutional lawyer and  two-term Black president who advocates same sex marriage, has said that he believes that "the equal protection clause [of the 14th Amendment] guarantees same sex marriage in all 50 states."

Former first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, a former U.S senator representing the state of New York who served as secretary of state during the president's first term, and who announced earlier this month that she will make a second bid for the Democratic nomination for president in 2016, supports gay marriage too.

"I was proud to help launch Hillary's campaign," said same sex marriage advocate Jared Milrad in a press release to Cleveland Urban News.Com, Ohio's leader in Black digital news." She's been an advocate for equality for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and gender Americans."

Milrad , who is featured with his fiancee Nathan Johnson in Clinton's video for her announcement for president, said that he does not have to wait on a decision by the high court because he and Nate are engaged and getting married this summer in Chicago, Illinois where same sex marriage has been legal since June 2014.

Gay marriage is legal in 37 states, and is banned in 13.

About six in 10 of U.S. registered voters support gay marriage, polls show.

John J. Bursch, the lawyer for the opponents argued  before the high court on Tuesday that same sex marriage is not a constitutional right  and that it perpetuates children born out of wedlock ,while attorneys representing proponents of gay marriage told the justices that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marriage under the due process and equal protection clauses of the 14th Amendment, among other arguments. That denial of due process, they argued, creates an undue interference with the fundamental freedom of marriage.

Justice Kennedy asked tough questions on both sides and said  that while he is concerned about changing a conception of marriage ingrained in the American way of life, he is equally uncomfortable with excluding the gay and lesbian communities from what he called "a noble and sacred institution."

The four conservative justices, including Chief Justice John Roberts, and Clarence Thomas, the only Black on the high court, seemed inclined to leave the issue of the right to marry to the states, and questioned whether those wanting gay marriage  are seeking to join the institution, or are  "seeking to change the institution.”

Several of the more liberal justices asked the lawyers of the opponents of gay marriage  how extending marriage to same sex couples would harm anyone, including heterosexual couples that now enjoy the right to marry without discrepancy.

“You are not taking away anything from heterosexual couples if the state allows gay couples to marry," said Ruth Bader Ginsburg, one of the more liberal of the four liberal justices, the other three of whom are  Sonia Sotomayer, Elena Kagan and Stephen Bryer.

Ginsburg was nominated by former president Jimmy Carter, Sotomayer and Kagan were nominated by Obama, and Bryer is a nominee of former president Bill Cinton.

U.S. Supreme Court justices are nominated by the president and must be subsequently confirmed by the U.S. Senate to serve. They are appointed for life.

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