Same-sex marriage ban backers look to High Court
Supporters of Proposition 8 hold signs during a demonstration outside of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Dec. 6, 2010, in San Francisco. / Getty Images
Updated 3:51 PM ET
(AP) SAN FRANCISCO - Backers of California's ban on same-sex marriages asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday to overrule a federal appeals court that struck down the measure as unconstitutional, a move that means the bitter, four-year court fight over Proposition 8 could soon be resolved.
Lawyers for the coalition of religious conservative groups that sponsored the voter-approved ban petitioned the Supreme Court to review the lower court's finding that the 2008 amendment to the state constitution violated the civil rights of gay and lesbian Californians. The request had been expected since a panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued its 2-1 decision earlier this year.
Calif. Prop 8 fight heading for Supreme Court
If the high court declines to take the case, it would clear the way for same-sex marriages to resume in California. Gay couples could get married in the state for several months before Proposition 8 passed, a right the measure was designed to take away. Same-sex couples still have the rights and benefits of marriage controlled by state law if they register as domestic partners.
The divided appeals court panel cited those conditions, which were unique to California at the time, as grounds for striking down the ban as a violation of the U.S. Constitution's promise of equal protection. But it also went out of its way to state it was not saying similar bans in six other states it oversees were inherently unconstitutional.
In their petition to the Supreme Court, lawyers for Proposition 8's supporters nonetheless predicted that "the 9th Circuit's error, if left uncorrected, will have widespread and immediate negative consequences."
The decision "will force states to make an all-or-nothing choice: either to retain the traditional definition of marriage without any recognition of same-sex relationships or to radically redefine — with no possibility of reconsideration — an age-old institution that continues to play a vital role in our society today," they said. "The 9th Circuit's sweeping dismissal of the important societal interests served by the traditional definition of marriage is tantamount to a judicial death sentence for traditional marriage laws throughout the Circuit."
Lawyers for two same-sex couples who first challenged Proposition 8 in 2009 said they would urge the Supreme Court to reject the case. The high court is expected to act on the petition this fall.
Justices also have been asked to review a series of challenges to the federal Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits the federal government from recognizing same-sex unions and thereby prevents gay couples who are legally married from filing joint income tax, receiving Social Security survivor benefits or securing other national benefits of marriage.
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Hey "Former?" YOU are the one with the "mental illness." Get a CLUE and get a GRASP on the facts. Like it or NOT, gay people are here and a part of the world. Be a bigot all you want, it won't change truth, reality, or equal rights. You should know that. If you can't accept it, get over it old man.
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Gays are here and part of the world? So are pedophiles, white collar swindlers and millionaire CEOs that do nothing. Are we bigots if we think they should be changed, not given access to our children or our money? The conformist position you propose has victimized countless more than it ever protected. Should I not object when my kindergarten child is given a book about two gay men living together under the pretext of teaching tolerance? That is also a reality and has happened in this nation.
And what are these "equal rights" you mention? Gays cannot vote, study, travel, work? They are denied housing and have to eat in gay restaurants? They must enter by back doors? What are these illusionary "equal rights?" Is it only the right to marry? Cannot the legal benefits of matrimony be given without the actual ceremony? Property rights, insurance, inheritance, all can be granted by legislative means without intruding upon the estate shared by a man and a woman. We must ask to what extremes gays want to go with their current publicity crusade. If married, will they then want for the "bride" to go to the ladies room in restaurants? Does the public need to pay for the re-writing of existing laws such as alimony that distinctly refer to the rights of women? Do we permit the mass adoption of children who will never be able to use the word, "Mother" or to learn the special splendor that it represents?
You just don't! Past time to strike down ALL of these laws and give these bigots the wake up call with a kick in the nuts that they deserve.
Homosexuality is a mental illness. You can't base a marriage on mental ilness.
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Educate yourself.
www.psyche.org
It belongs to the American Psychiatric Assn.
People who actually KNOW something about mental illness, unlike yourself, obviously.
But you'd rather remain the way you are, surely......
If their unconstitutional law is found to be so by the court, it's "judicial tyranny".
Bigots always want to see discrimination encoded into law.
Courts place a higher importance on constitutionality than it does bigot's preferences. And there's nothing "tyrannical" about that.
Period.
Bigots like these will pervert anything to fit thier agenda - 'judicial tyranny' exists only when the courts turn down the bigotry of Prop 8.
And doobiedotoo - you might have had one doobie too many. You completely misread FormerUSMCSergeant's comment (he is calling the anti-gay rights folks bigots)
Clean your own house before you attack others.