Overview

• Justice Samuel Alito said his comments do not urge overruling Obergefell v. Hodges, the 2015 decision guaranteeing a national right to same-sex marriage.
• He reiterated that nothing in his 2022 Dobbs opinion was intended to disturb Obergefell.
• Alito used Obergefell to argue judges should avoid reading broad abstract principles into constitutional text.
• He described himself as a "working judicial originalist" who sometimes derives principles from the Constitution’s structure beyond explicit text.
• The remarks come as the Court is expected to consider this fall whether to hear Kim Davis’s long-shot petition seeking to revisit Obergefell, which court watchers view as unlikely to be granted.