Why is no one in the media or blogosphere discussing an equally momentous and more imminent ballot initiative in California in a few weeks--one that would remove the winner take all electoral vote system and rather hand a large number of California's electoral votes to the Republicans for carrying Congressional districts?!

There is no way the rights of individuals should be subject to a vote. If that were the case, the south would still be engaging in slavery today.

At some point, the courts need to do the right thing and hold up the Constitution's promise of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all it's citizens - not just some of them.

This is a moot point and the courts decision needs to be final.

Enough of this crap.

Concerned Women of America (actually a bunch of hate mongering fundies who can't admit that they have adulterous relationships in their own lives, can’t acknowlege a ~50% divorce rate, haven’t seen the end of priest/pastor child molestation and can't keep a lid on a nasty little problem wherein their husbands keep getting busted blowing other men in public bathrooms) can kiss my ass with and live with their inherent hypocrisy for a change! Just my $0.02 for the "concerned" ladies.

Don't forget the worst part of the iniative process: Having to deal with the mouth-breathers who get paid to collect those signatures, harrassing you outside of the grocery store.

Seriously, what the hell are we paying the legislature for if we have to vote on every goddam issue?

In Michigan, we had a vote on amending the state constitution to deny gay marriage. And it passed, so that gay marriage and gay unions and everything else supposedly are illegal here.

However! The state universities and many cities have defined things differently. Despite our "absolute" prohibition, gay partners can get employer health benefits. In Michigan, we now allow people who live with other people to get health coverage. So, your gay partner could get it, or even your mom or your disabled cousin, if those people live with you.

Hooray!

The christianists hate this, but there's nothing they can do. Right now, they are trying to raise a ruckuss, but they are in a weak position when they try to deny benefits to aged moms and retarded cousins. They have to go back home and live in their own stink. Hallelujah!

Thanks for helping me out. If you can help further...

If the question is "right to marry" and the judges answered "yes, same sex can marry, according to our interpretation of the CA constitution," then why does John Q Public have a vote?

As someone who lives in CA, I have been given many reasons over the years to loath our ballot Initiatives. I can't believe that my state actional allows the State Constitution to be ammended by a simple majority on a ballot vote which only needs to get signature from an amount of people equal to 8% of the people who voted in the last gubernatorial election. Unfreaking believable. Considering the last attempt to ban same-sex marriage passed in a landside, I think this one will have no trouble at all. Oh,and the Republicans still have no hope putting this state in play. A Republican dominated Supreme Court made the ruling and the Republican govenor approves.

Hmm, I am wondering if you are conflating two different constitutions. The CA Supreme Court interprets CA's constitution, not the U.S. Constitution. For clarification (unless I am misreading your post, in which case I apologize) I suggest Glenn Greenwald's post. He is a constitutional lawyer, btw. Here's a relevant quote: "The ruling had nothing to do with the U.S. Constitution, but instead was based on the California State Constitution's guarantee of the "right to marry" and its guarantee of "equal protection" under the law."

Regarding the "right" using this as an issue to bring out conservative voters. I suspect it won't work this time. They've used it over and over and had six years of Republican dominance at the national level during which they Reps never made any real attempt to accomplish the stomping out of gay marriage. Dobson et al, have been increasingly sidelined by more open-minded, fair-minded Evangelicals such as Jim Wallace. Evangelical churches are starting to lose their younger members in many areas precisely because of their combination of conservative ideology, unyieldingly conservative theology, and politics which focused on gay marriage and abortion while their political allies raped the planet and America's lower and middle classes. The conservative pundits can (and probably will) scream all they want, but they'll be screaming into empty places where the only response will be the echo of their own voices.

Laws do not create rights; they legally recognize them.

That is why, if something is "unconstitutional," all you have to do is change the constitution in order to make it constitutional.

Here's an example: The Declaration of Independence (not a legal document) alluded to "certain inalienable rights" for "men," which we can probably assume meant "humans." But the constitution didn't recognize those rights. It did not enfranchise women or Africans. It was unconstitutional for these humans to vote until the constitution was amended. That doesn't mean these humans did not have an inalienable right to vote until the early 1900s. It just means that in order for it to happen, the constitution had to recognize that right. Laws do not bestow or take away rights.

FranZooey hit on something I was wondering about: today's decision is not a statement about gay marriage per se, but is really an application of the "separate is not equal" principle that was forged decades ago. That is, it's a question of basic human rights.

So if a California constitutional amendment is passed to enforce the separation, wouldn't it be contradicting other parts of the consitution that deal with bsic rights? How can we have a constitution in which some parts of it contradict other parts?

Or would such an amendment essentially be repealing basic rights, opening the door to all sorts of other abuses?