Court Strikes Down Ban on Gay Marriage in California

A federal appeals court panel ruled on Tuesday that a voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage in California violated the Constitution, all but ensuring that the case will proceed to the United States Supreme Court.

The three-judge panel issued its ruling Tuesday morning in San Francisco, upholding a decision by Judge Vaughn R. Walker, who had been the chief judge of the Federal District Court of the Northern District of California but has since retired. Like Judge Walker, the panel found that Proposition 8 – passed by California voters in November 2008 by a margin of 52 percent to 48 percent -- violated the equal protection rights of two same-sex couples that brought he suit. The proposition placed a specific prohibition in the State Constitution against marriage between two people of the same sex.

The court ruled 2 to 1 that Proposition 8 violated the 14th Amendment of the Constitution by discriminating against a group of people, gay men and lesbians.

“Although the Constitution permits communities to enact most laws they believe to be desirable, it requires that there be at least a legitimate reason for the passage of a law that treats different people differently,” Judge Stephen Reinhardt wrote in the decision. “There was no such reason that Proposition 8 could have been enacted.”

“All that Proposition 8 accomplished was to take away from same sex-couples the right to be granted marriage licenses and thus legally to use the designation ‘marriage,” the judge wrote, adding: “Proposition 8 serves no purpose, and has no effect, other than to lessen the status and human dignity of gay men and lesbians in California."

I have 3 major concerns when it comes to SCOTUS:

1. They won’t take the case (unlikely but fairly possible);

2. They will rule on procedural grounds and not get to the Constitutional issue. (highly likely). and whether that upholds or overrules the 9th Circuit, it does NOT settle the issue and time works against us on this one.

3. SCOTUS upholds it on Constitutional grounds. (Possible) This may be a Conservative leaning Court but it is NOT a state’s rights Court. Needless to say, we will know MUCH more about this once they rule on the ACA.

In short, in no way is this a slam dunk for our side and if either Obama or Romney get to appoint a SCOTUS Justice ... all bets are off.

Not out of the woods yet.

Really a weird legal rationale:

Once a state allows people the right to do something, it can NEVER deny that same right to others, regardless of the constitutional process by which the right was withdrawn.

For example, the sovereign state of Illinois once allowed its citizens unrestricted access to firearms. So now, any restriction on guns in Illinois is once and for all time disallowed. Try that one on for size!

The court ruled 2 to 1 that Proposition 8 violated the 14th Amendment of the Constitution by discriminating against a group of people, gay men and lesbians.

Nobody was being discriminated against because every person already had marriage equality. No man, regardless of his sexual orientation, can marry another man. Any man, regardless of his sexual orientation, can marry a woman. No woman, regardless of her sexual orientation, can marry another woman. Any woman, regardless of her sexual orientation, can marry a man. These guidelines apply to EVERYBODY. Sounds pretty equal to me.

The judge says that that California the word 'marriage' has no purpose and has no legal effect. Ok, if marriage is fundamentally a religious act with no government purpose then government needs to get out of the marriage business and leave it to the churches. If Alan wants to marry Bob, fine. Go to the Church of Freddie Mercury (or whatever) get married, then sign the civil papers and mail them in. Ditto for all marriages.

The push for having the State recognize the word 'marriage' (as opposed to civil unions) is a stalking horse to attack people with religious convictions and to marginalize them in society.

Remember stems cells, and how we all had to immediately allow aborted fetuses to be used for tax-payer funded science because it could save so many lives? Remember how Michael J Fox and Christopher Reeves got on TV to plead for it? (Yeah I know Reeves was dead.. creepy.) Yet when scientists found out that adult stem cells worked just as well or better than stem cells from aborted babies, the urgent lobbying to have the State fund stem cell research all but evaporated almost overnight.

Having the state recognize only civil unions would remove 'gay marriage' as a similar attack-weapon against people with religious convictions. This is why the gay lobby opposes civil unions so fiercely, demanding the State recognize marriage even though legally a civil union is exactly the same for all government purposes.

Once the full force of the State is behind gay marriage the next step will be to force it to be normative in all public discourse. For example, next the State will force wedding cake makers and photographers to work at gay weddings regardless of their religious convictions (this has already happened). Later, any church pastor who condemns gay marriage from the pulpit will be persecuted for hate crimes (already happening in Canada and Europe).

The whole thing is an attack by the left on those with religious convictions, nothing more.

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