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USA Today - California's Prop. 8 ban on same-sex marriage ruled unconstitutional


The Evil Genius

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Now, if they could overturn the idiotic DOMA.

:mad:

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/ondeadline/post/2010/08/calif-ban-on-same-sex-marriage-prop-8-ruled-unconstitutional/1

California's voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional, a federal judge in San Francisco has ruled.

Proposition 8, passed by 52% of voters in November 2008, defined marriage as the union of a man and a woman. But after a non-jury trial earlier this year, Chief District Court Judge Vaughn Walker ruled that the initiative violated the equal-protection and due-process clauses of the 14 Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

After the court announced yesterday that it would issue its ruling today, both sides said they would appeal to the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, also in San Francisco, depending on the outcome. Regardless of how the appeals court rules, the case will reach the U.S. Supreme Court next year or 2012.

Two gay men from Burbank and two lesbians from Berkeley challenged the law, which came in response to a May 2008 state Supreme Court that legalized same-sex marriage. In February 2004, San Francisco's new mayor, Gavin Newsom, approved same- sex marriages, and the city issued about 4,0000 marriage licenses before the state Supreme Court halted the weddings in March. Four months later the court voided all the licenses, prompting lawsuits from gay married couples.

The court set up a special site for the case.

Here's background on the battle over same-sex marriage in California.

Update at 4:58 p.m. ET: In his 136-page opinion, Walker ruled that Proposition 8 "both unconstitutionally burdens the exercise of the fundamental right to marry and creates an irrational classification on the basis of sexual orientation," and that the plaintiffs "seek to have the state recognize their committed relationships, and plaintiffs' relationships are consistent with the core of the history, tradition and practice of marriage in the United States."

Ultimately, Walker concluded, Prop. 8 "fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license. Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite-sex couples are superior to same-sex couples. "

MORE AFTER LINK

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Please tell me why people vote in the state of CA if all these propositions just get nullified by liberal judges. The openly gayness of this judge obviously, without question, affected his thinking and handling of this case. Surprise surprise. Well, it's CA after all.

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Does this not set a precedent to let would-be polygamists to challenge anti-polygamy laws in court? Do they not have a right to marry whoever they want, as well as exercise their religion?

Not really my view on the subject, just playing devils advocate.

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from what i can gather, this case will almost definitely go to the SCOTUS eventually. now that will be interesting. i bet it will all rest on Kennedy's shoulders.

when you see graphs like this,

age1.jpg

the trend over time is so stark. the eventual legalization of gay marriage seems inevitable. soon, those 65+ folks will begin to die off, and each successive generation is more pro-gay-marriage than the last in every single state.

imagine the same graph 15 years from now. erase all the blue dots, and make a new set of dots representing the new 18-29 year olds, just to the right of the red dots. it won't be long before popular support overwhelmingly supports gay marriage.

but my fear is this is going to the SCOTUS too soon. the current court (in my opinion) would be likely to make yet another 5-4 conservative-leaning ruling, potentially setting a terrible precedent that sets back necessary progress for decades (think dred scott or plessy v fergasun).

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Please tell me why people vote in the state of CA if all these propositions just get nullified by liberal judges. The openly gayness of this judge obviously, without question, affected his thinking and handling of this case. Surprise surprise. Well, it's CA after all.
CA and openly gay!

Must be a liberal!

:D

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The trend towards people getting smarter as they age? :D

well, that is certainly one way to interpret the data. either people become more opposed to gay marriage as they age, or each new generation is becoming more accepting than previous generations.

personally, i doubt people in large numbers change their minds on the gay marriage issue as they age. i do not think those over-65s would have, back in 1959 when they were 18-29s, have expressed support for gay marriage in any greater number than they do now. but i grant you that is merely implied by common sense, not the graph itself.

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Libertarians should be all about getting government out of the private lives of people, so I don't see any inconsistency here.

it makes sense. this is the "out" that conservative politicians will eventually use when it is no longer politically beneficial to support homophobia.

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Man here again the 14th amendment rears its ugly head. Thanks Radical Republicans :mad:

And I agree with the outcome of the case, but I don't see how "equal protection of the laws" works here. That phrase was meant to protect people from unequal treatment from officials under existing laws.

The 14th amendment is easily the worst-worded part of the Constitution.

That said, this is (however un-constitutionally grounded) a major victory in the name of liberty.

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greenspandan,

I see it more as bigotry than homophobia. I don't think people are afraid of gay people.

I think they just are okay with being intolerant and prejudiced against them.

Well it's been that way for all of human eternity then. It's part of the human condition to assess differences. You call it bigotry & prejudiced and many many more call it deviant, abnormal and atypical. I'm just saying that's where we're at right now.

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Well it's been that way for all of human eternity then. It's part of the human condition to assess differences. You call it bigotry & prejudiced and many many more call it deviant, abnormal and atypical. I'm just saying that's where we're at right now.
Glad you realize bigotry and prejudice are deviant, abnormal and atypical :)
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