Posted on 10/31/2008 6:18:33 PM PDT by SmithL
SAN FRANCISCO- When Californians vote on Proposition 8, they'll decide whether same-sex partners' right to marry will still exist as of 12:01 a.m. Wednesday. What's less clear is the impact on as many as 16,000 gay and lesbian couples who have wed since June.
Some legal commentators say Prop. 8, if passed Tuesday, would retroactively invalidate all same-sex marriages performed in the state since a state Supreme Court ruling legalizing such weddings took effect. Others say the court established rights that can't be taken away, even if the law changes.
The answer could come from the same court that overturned California's previous law defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Or it could come from a higher-ranking tribunal in Washington, D.C.
Craig Wetherbee and John Melena of Modesto weren't thinking that far ahead when they arrived at San Francisco City Hall last week for a wedding they had originally planned for next March, the seventh anniversary of their relationship.
"We'd rather do it now, when we can," Melena, 26, said as other like-minded couples lined up at the city clerk's office for marriage licenses.
Domestic partners for five years, they considered themselves married long before the state made it legal, said Wetherbee, 31. Even if Prop. 8 passes, he said, "I'll have my piece of paper on the wall."
If California voters approve Prop. 8, the legal weight of that piece of paper, and of thousands of others, will be up to the courts to decide.
About 16,000 same-sex couples will have married since mid-June, according to the UCLA law school's Williams Institute for Sexual Orientation
...The initiative that could undo those weddings is a proposed state constitutional amendment declaring that "only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized...
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
They’re not concerned. I think the first of the four is not up for retention until 2012.
The AG disagrees with your assessment on ex post facto grounds. The status of those marriages will definitely be battled in the courts.
“Jerry Brown is a heterosexually married man since 2005. He married Anne Gust who he’d dated since 1990.”
That’s all show, he’s queerer than a $3 bill.
It applies to laws not just criminal ones. While they would still be married the question is with the wording of the constitutional change how would the state have to treat them since by law the state no longer can recognize their marriage.
Can support for Prop 8 help McPalin in CA? I saw one thread that had M-P down by 2 points in CA - quite a shocker if true.
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