Civil rights for gay Americans took an important step forward this past week with a federal court decision declaring California’s gay marriage ban unconstitutional.
Prohibitions against gay people entering into the state-sanctioned institution of marriage have intolerably relegated them to the status of second-class citizens. The time has come to end such bans.
The opinion by U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker appears to be marked by a sound reading of law and a clear-eyed view of the motivations of those seeking to ban gay marriage. We hope the decision withstands the legal challenges ahead and that same-sex couples everywhere in this country will someday have the same rights to marry as heterosexual couples.
It’s true that the judge’s decision, which overturned the voter-approved Proposition 8, applies only to California and does not affect the dozens of other states that have prohibitions against same-sex marriage, including Colorado.
But if this decision goes as far as the U.S. Supreme Court, it could provide important legal precedent.
As it stands, the Supreme Court never has taken on the issue of same-sex marriage. Many legal observers believe this case is heading for that venue, after it goes through the federal appeals court.
The judge’s decision, which weighed in at 136 pages, relied heavily on the evidence produced at trial and was unequivocal in its conclusion. “The evidence shows conclusively that Proposition 8 enacts, without reason, a private moral view that same-sex couples are inferior to opposite-sex couples,” Walker wrote.
The judge found that excluding same-sex couples from marriage is “not rationally related to a legitimate state interest.”
Some argue that overturning Proposition 8, which was approved by 52 percent of California voters in 2008, usurps the will of the majority of voters. But we don’t think you can vote away the constitutional rights of a class of people.
The judge ruled, and rightly so, that the measure was a violation of the equal protection and due process clauses of the 14th amendment to the Constitution.
It’s also instructive to remember that laws against interracial marriage existed in this country until 1967, when the Supreme Court voted unanimously to end all race-based restrictions on marriage.
We understand that allowing gay and lesbian couples to legally marry will, unquestionably, remain a contentious issue in the coming years, but the day will come, and should come, when there no longer are restrictions on marriage based on the gender of those who want to get married. Contrary to views expressed by opponents, we don’t see gay marriage as a threat to heterosexual marriage, a detriment to children or an assertion of new special rights.
Same-sex marriage is a civil rights issue, and the time has come to allow gay people the legal and social recognition afforded by the institution of marriage.
