The Fountain Street Fishwrap described the decision thusly:

The statute that empowers Family Court to “hear and determine all petitions for divorce from the bond of marriage” was enacted in 1961. But what did its authors mean by “marriage”?

Trying to determine the intended meaning of the word, the justices did what most people would do, they consulted a dictionary—albeit one 45 years old—to figure out what the authors of the law were trying to say.

Actually, according to the ruling [PDF] they consulted several dictionaries published around 1961. Unsurprisingly, they all described “marriage” as a relationship involving one man and one woman.

Arthur S. Leonard, of the New York Law School, agrees with the dissenting opinion: the majority, he says, “violated one of the basic rules of statutory interpretation—that no provision is to be construed in isolation, but only as a part of the whole statute in order to accomplish the legislative purpose.” In other words, they should have considered that, to a court responsible for granting divorces and annulments, “marriage” means “a relationship for which a marriage license exists.” Leonard continues:

The majority seems to think that because a particular marriage—in this case, a same-sex marriage—is not the kind of marriage approved or accepted or envisioned by R.I. legislators in 1961 (or today, for that matter), then their decision to give the Family Court jurisdiction to receive petitions for divorces from “marriage” must be limited to the kinds of marriages they were then thinking about. But, as dissenting Justice Suttell points out, R.I. courts have jurisdiction to grant divorces regardless whether R.I. law would consider the marriage in question to be valid. For example, an incestuous marriage contracted in another state would be considered void and illegal in R.I., but that would not deprive a R.I. Family Court judge from granting a divorce to a R.I. resident who was party to such a marriage. Similarly, a marriage that might be void because a party was underage or was incapable of giving valid consent to marry, or a polygamous marriage… in any of these cases, a party finding themselves in such a marriage would be entitled to petition for a divorce. That an incidental part of the case would be a decision by the Family Court that the marriage was void from its inception would not serve to deprive the Family Court of jurisdiction to “declare the status of the parties.”

Aside from Leonard and the ProJo’s treatments, the best resources on this case are provided by GLAD, which, quoting the dissenting opinion in the case, points out that the Orniston and Chambers “are left in a virtual legal limbo,” and JURIST, which chronicles some of the history of this case, as do the comments in Leonard’s article.

Field Reports:

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