It annoys me that its proponents describe same-sex marriage as a basic human or civil right. Even assuming the California Supreme Court invalidates Proposition Eight, how can it be recognized as such when it is only legal in two state of the union, but not in forty-eight others? How can it be recognized as such, but only until you hit the Connecticut border or the Colorado River? How can it be recognized as such when few if any other nations allow it? Sure, you are free to argue that it ought to be recognized as such, but until if and when the Supreme Court of the US declares it to be so, which it may or may not ever do, all you are doing is pushing a questionable and unsubstantiated legal theory. Personally, I voted for Proposition Eight because I don't happen to buy into this theory, and I think that trying to spin the idea that the gay agenda constitutes a legitimate civil rights movement only cheapens and demeans the real civil rights struggle for racial equality.

By the way, for the benefit of all the folks who are about to flame me, I'd like to point out two things. First, saying something is so, no matter how strong your feelings happen to be, doesn't make it so. Second, the point at which I stopped being a child and started becoming a man was when it eventually dawned on me that pitching temper tantrums never would get me that pony.

First, saying something is so, no matter how strong your feelings happen to be, doesn't make it so.

So no matter how strongly you feel that it is not a constitutional right for two people to get married, that doesn't makes it so, right?

I think you need to get off your pony before you lose your temper.

Magnificent point-missing, sir, and I see I was right in predicting that guys like you would start coming out of the woodwork. It's not what I FEEL about same-sex marriage that matters. It's what I THINK about the dangerous absurdity of the legislatures or court systems of individual states taking the bit in their teeth and endorsing the idea that s. s. m. is a "constitutional right." I voted for Proposition Eight because I found obnoxious the idea of the US being turned into a crazy-quilt in which constitutional rights are enumerated differently in different jurisdictions. As I've already said, how can you have a "constitutional right," let alone a "fundamental human right" on the west bank of the Colorado River but not not on the east bank? That's what we have a US Supreme Court for. If the California Supreme Court had endorsed s. s. m. on other grounds than the "constitutional right" argument I would not have found that objectionable, and if the US Supreme Court endorses it, I'll of course accept it as the law of the land. But I think it's lousy jurisprudence for a state court to get involved in this particular subject. (If I'm wrong in my opinion, I'll gladly take instruction from somebody with a law degree, but not from you--you folks had plenty of opportunity to convince the California voters of the rightness of your cause, and once again you failed to make your case. ).

Dear DFS,

They do not care about law or what is right or wrong. They only care about forcing their social agenda on the rest of us.

They have been doing this for a long time, and the Republicans have done many things like faith based funding of charities, that have made it worst.

They have taken God out of our society, they have taken Him out of our schools, now they want to take him out of our Churches.

If they had their way, we would all work for the state, and we would have a religion like Japan before WWII, where the state was the beginning and end of our reason for living.

The issues of gays to marry is not an issue in our courts, it is something that destroys our basic way of life, and the leftist understand that they are never going to be able to achieve what they want without this.

The changes that Mr Obama will cause to our economy are the same, the wants to have a single system for control of all aspects of our lives. The liberal elite has been fascist from the beginning and will not rest until they achieve these aims.

The reason they placed the second amendment into the constitution, is the founding fathers felt this was going to happen, where the state would try to take more power than allow, and the people would have to fight against them.

God Bless You

DFS, The California courts, along with the federal courts, have long recognized the right to marriage as a fundamental civil right.

The question in the court case was whether an essential part of the definition of the word "marriage" can validly be "male-female only". In California, the answer found in the constitution was "No." While history might suggest that this is a valid restriction of the scope of that right, the equal protection jurisprudence in the state overrides such historical considerations, invalidating any such scope limitation. The definition of marriage can include many things, but not the presumption of heterosexuality - that is what the California courts found, and it ought to be what other courts find, as well.

However, at the moment, most people and courts are content to think of it this way: Marriage is a fundamental civil right, yes, of course it is - heterosexual marriage, that is.

But go ahead and say I'm throwing a tantrum. I'll take you very seriously, I promise.

If I were a real flamer and we actually came out of the woodwork instead of just one guy that thought your post was mildly lame? Then you could get all condescending towards us and make yourself felt in the grand picture. Quite a pony you got there.

As far as the right to marry goes - forget about the human rights aspect, that will come later - I believe that is indeed a state by state proposition, since the Constitution defers the rules of Matrimony to the states - that is why Louisiana Crooner Bill Halley could marry his teenage cousin, and I could not. To change marital laws, you must first get a state or serveral states to change their laws before they can be heard by the Supereme Court that would then decide if such exceptions to the law require constitutional considerations. Trust me, the lawyers in this case are painting by the numbers.

Also, apparently, being from Illinois (originally), I have greater liberties with my livestock than Halley did, which explains why I found the pony comment of yours curious.

You're not the flamer DFS wanted to show up.

And you didn't bring a pony - boy is he going to be pissed!

It isn't reasonable to suggest that it is a right. It is reasonable to suggest that the law treat all similar arrangements equally (equal protection under the law). Either everyone who wants it should be accorded the relevant rights or noone should. It would be perfectly fair to declare that no law can refer to marriage at all as to indicate that all couples should be able to marry. This really seems to be in accord with the religious groups perspectives as well. It keeps marriage as a sacrament and lets the grubby old legal arrangements go by another name. Everyone gets treated the same way and marriage is defined by any given church in any way they see fit without any legal entaglements.

that would be more than happy ot marry same sex couples and call it marriage.

Hopefully, Obama will use some such arrangement to finally make this whole bad mistake go away.

kaiso:

DFS, The California courts, along with the federal courts, have long recognized the right to marriage as a fundamental civil right.

The question in the court case was whether an essential part of the definition of the word "marriage" can validly be "male-female only". In California, the answer found in the constitution was "No."

In case you haven't been keeping up on current events, the California Constitution DOES only recognize male-female marriages. That's what passing Prop. 8 was all about.

And this should interact with the equal protection clause of the federal constitution to make the word 'marriage' problematic in any law or legal filing. If marriage can't be applied equitably then you'll need to stop referring to marriage in the law.

Bondsman,

I'm aware that the California electorate decided to revise their constitution in such a way as to make it self-contradictory. They did that in response to a court decision, in which it was found that the answer to that question was "No, such a scope limitation is not valid because it falls afoul of equal protection and it's obvious that we need to start viewing sexual orientation as a suspect class."

So they basically said, 'Oh, the Constitution doesn't allow us to discriminate this way? We've got the perfect solution...' and they put language in that says "We discriminate this way", without taking anything out that was the basis of the decision that no, they can't.

"If marriage can't be applied equitably"

It can be. Civil marriage is a civil union, nothing more, nothing less. Some religionists' hangups about legally calling my marriage the same thing as their marriage are not my problem. Or rather, they shouldn't be my problem.

Basically, this whole issue is that a large group of Americans are unable to grasp the semantic difference between "legal marriage" and their particular religious sacrament of marriage. Frustrating? Yes. Surprising? No.

kaiso:

Bondsman,

I'm aware that the California electorate decided to revise their constitution in such a way as to make it self-contradictory. They did that in response to a court decision, in which it was found that the answer to that question was "No, such a scope limitation is not valid because it falls afoul of equal protection and it's obvious that we need to start viewing sexual orientation as a suspect class."

So they basically said, 'Oh, the Constitution doesn't allow us to discriminate this way? We've got the perfect solution...' and they put language in that says "We discriminate this way", without taking anything out that was the basis of the decision that no, they can't.

Kaiso, you're presenting a distorted picture of the sequence of events, perhaps unintentionally.

What REALLY happened was that in 2000 Californians voted for prop. 22 defining marriage as :

“Only marriage between a man and a woman
is valid or recognized in California.”

This then was appealed by activist groups, and was overturned by the California Supreme court.

In response to the court's overruling the will of the people, the people represented the issue as a change to the constitution thus bypassing the tyranny of the biased, left-wing, California court.

So the PEOPLE of California did NOT do this in response to a court decision, rather the court overruled the will of the people, mandating that the people had to restate their will as a change to the California constitution.