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A future liberal Supreme Court (or maybe this one, depending on Kennedy or O'Connor) could force this on the other states by way of the Full Faith and Credit Clause.

Does a concealed carry permit from Florida will be accepted in Massachusetts?

I doubt it. The Full Faith and Credit clause has plenty of loopholes.

Furthermore, a liberal Supreme Court can find that European law or the UN Charter of Human Rights overrides the US Constitution, amended or not, and gay marriage is an alienable right.

I think that amending our precious documents to fight liberal judges is not adequate. We need a conservative-leaning President and Senate, not a ERA-like amendment that will never be ratified.

The problem you correctly identified is liberal judges. We need to elect a few conservative Senators with a backbone who will be leaders in the US Senate, instead of caving in to Democrats on the Judicial Committee.

In my humble opinion, ten Jesse Helms will do more in the US Senate for conservatives that any amendment to the US Constitution.

On the other hand, perhaps this talk about a constitutional amendment will help reelect Bush, especially if it helps energize the Republican base.

Article IV

Section 1. Full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state. And the Congress may by general laws prescribe the manner in which such acts, records, and proceedings shall be proved, and the effect thereof.

No mention of Sweden or any other Eurosocialists in the US Constitution.

George, I wish I could agree with you on states' rights grounds, but I can't.

Below is a post I made on another thread earlier today regarding why gay marriage can't be confined to one state (such as Massachusetts, but the same would be true for California):

I keep trying to warn people that if gay marriage is allowed to become law in Massachusetts, it will spread like a disease across the rest of the country.

Many of the people who use the "states' rights" argument for opposing a federal marriage amendment don't seem to fathom the dynamics at work here. They act as if the only consequence of gay marriage in Massachusetts will be gay marriage in Massachusetts.

But if gay marriage is allowed to stand in Massachusetts, it's inevitable that certain things will follow.

Other states have leftist state Supreme Courts. No doubt the justices on those courts are watching the Massachusetts case carefully. If gay marriage survives there, look for three or four other state courts to order gay marriage within a year or so, triggering more battles.

Because New England is geographically compact, huge pressure will occur on the other five states to recognize Massachusetts gay marriages. It isn't "fair", it'll be argued, that a gay couple from Boston can't rent a summer cottage in Maine and have their gay status validated there as well. It isn't "fair" that a lesbian who lives in Massachusetts but works in Providence doesn't have Rhode Island spousal legal protections for her "wife".

There will be a constitutional challenge to the Defense of Marriage Act, as already noted many times, under the full faith & credit clause.

It will quickly be argued that married Massachusetts gays are "prisoners" confined to one state because they can't move without losing their marital status. Some gay guy from Boston will claim he has an excellent job offer from a company in Omaha, but can't accept it because his marriage wouldn't be recognized by law in Nebraska.

Big corporations, who seem enraptured by the gay agenda, will jump on the bandwagon, claiming they're losing out on recruiting great employees from Massachusetts because the laws elsewhere don't permit gay marriage. So there's your equal protection 14th amendment argument for voiding all laws against gay marriage.

Sad as it may be to some people, there can be no stopping gay marriage from spreading nationwide once it gets established in even one state. It'll be all or nothing. Either a federal amendment banning gay marriage, or a federal judicial fiat imposing it everywhere.