May 15 2008
Surprise, Surprise
I have to admit, even though I am in favor of same-sex marriage, I was quite surprised—no, stunned—by the California Supreme Court’s decision upholding same-sex marriage in California. I have only glanced at the decision (the opinions can be downloaded here) but it is important to note that all seven justices concurred in at least part of the majority decision. The majority opinion was written by Chief Justice George, there is a concurring opinion by Justice Kennard, a concurring and dissenting opinion by Justice Baxter (also signed by Justice Chin), and another concurring and dissenting opinion by Justice Corrigan. Thus, even though technically a 4-3 decision, the notion that the state must treat same-sex couples the same as different-sex couples was much stronger. The issue for the partial dissenters seemed to largely rest on whether the term marriage itself could be used to define same-sex marriage, not whether same-sex couples could be discriminated against. One could say this case was more about semantics than civil rights, and that is a significant step forward regardless of whether the voters overturn the decision in November.
Note also that six of the seven justices are Republicans and that Governor Schwarzenegger has come out against the proposed ballot initiative currently being certified for the November ballot. Some pundits have attributed Bush’s 2004 re-election to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom’s directive to issue seme-sex marriage licenses (which is what prompted this litigation in the first place). All of this will make for an interesting time come November, and may once again put California in play for the Republicans, or at the very least make the Democrats spend more money and resources in California protecting what would otherwise be a safely blue state.
