Subtle rumors that the Sixth Circuit Court had purposefully ruled to uphold same-sex marriage bans in order to force the hand of the Supreme Court quickly surfaced. This was fueled in part by Judge Martha C. Daughtrey, the sole dissent in the 2-1 vote of the Sixth Circuit Court decision, who wrote that this may have in fact been the majority’s ulterior motive because the “correct result” of the court’s ruling should be sufficiently “obvious.” 

Black Catholics confront a moral dilemma in the upcoming presidential election: vote with their church or vote with the party that they have long preferred to keep the first African-American president in office four more years. While African-American Catholics are relatively few in number, they may represent enough of the black vote to make a difference in the outcome if they choose to bestow or withhold their support.