{"id":6608,"date":"2004-08-12T14:53:57","date_gmt":"2004-08-12T21:53:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2004\/08\/12\/rule-of-law.html"},"modified":"2014-11-05T15:20:38","modified_gmt":"2014-11-05T22:20:38","slug":"rule_of_law","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/08\/12\/rule_of_law.html","title":{"rendered":"Rule of Law"},"content":{"rendered":"

The California Supreme Court has ruled that Mayor Gavin Newsom of San Francisco had overstepped his Constitutional bounds in issuing marriage licenses to gay couples, and, 5-2, voided the 4,000-odd gay marriages that had occured<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“The justices have restored the rule of law in California,” said the Alliance Defense Fund’s senior counsel, Jordan Lorence, who argued the case before the court in May. “The decision shows that same-sex `marriage’ is not inevitable. Same-sex `marriage’ loses whenever a state puts it before voters.”<\/p>\n

Actually, the ruling shows nothing of the sort. It shows that the court isn’t going to let executive<\/em> branch members decide on the constitutionality of laws — which, I have to say, is probably a good <\/em>thing. After all, if one mayor declared that a law prohibiting gay marriage was unconstitutional and could thus be ignored, nothing would stop a mayor in some future year from declaring a law allowing gay marrage to be unconstitutional and thus ignoring it.<\/p>\n

Gay rights groups had expected the ruling against Mr. Newsom, but had hoped that the court would not throw out the 4,000 marriages until the broader constitutional issue had been decided.
\n“It is a sad day for all the wonderful couples in San Francisco, but we know this is not the end,” said Alice Leeds of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, a gay rights group in Washington. “The future lies in fairness for gay and lesbian families.”<\/p>\n

I believe so, too. That said, the court could not well have let the marriages sit in limbo while a parallel case progresses through Superior Court. While I hope (and perhaps even expect) that California courts will ultimately agree with Massachusetts on the matter, it’s necessary that they do so in a proper fashion that won’t come back to bite people of any political stripe back on the butt. (Whether the courts making such a determination is, in fact, “proper,” is a political discussion for another day; I think it is, though I also recognize certain risks pertaining to that view.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The California Supreme Court has ruled that Mayor Gavin Newsom of San Francisco had overstepped his Constitutional bounds in issuing marriage licenses to gay couples, and, 5-2, voided the 4,000-odd…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[25,718,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gay-stuff","category-marriage-equality","category-politics-law"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":12388,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/05\/15\/equal_protection_under_th.html","url_meta":{"origin":6608,"position":0},"title":"Equal Protection Under the Law in California","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 15-May-08 3:56pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Bravo. California's top court has ruled that a state law banning marriage between same-sex couples is unconstitutional.The state's Supreme Court said the \"right to form a family relationship\" applied to...","rel":"","context":"In "LGBTQ &c"","block_context":{"text":"LGBTQ &c","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/gay-stuff"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":18059,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2010\/08\/04\/a-little-rationality-creeps-into-california.html","url_meta":{"origin":6608,"position":1},"title":"A little rationality creeps into California","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 4-Aug-10 5:15pm","format":false,"excerpt":"As you can tell by the high-pitched screams from certain quarters, Federal Judge Vaughn Walker has overturned California's Proposition 8 (decision here).\u00a0 The nitty-gritty: Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license. Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "LGBTQ &c"","block_context":{"text":"LGBTQ &c","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/gay-stuff"},"img":{"alt_text":"Themis, Blind Justice","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/blind-justice-themis-219x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":37892,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/06\/26\/scotus-and-doma-and-prop-8-oh-my.html","url_meta":{"origin":6608,"position":2},"title":"SCOTUS and DoMA and Prop 8 (Oh, My!)","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 26-Jun-13 2:05pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I have a lot to say about this (beyond the lengthy rewtweeting), and will say it anon ... but for the moment, let me just say that I am overall pleased with both rulings, and gobsmacked \/ wildly amused by the IT'S THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12385,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/05\/16\/more_on_the_california_ga.html","url_meta":{"origin":6608,"position":3},"title":"More on the California gay marriage ruling","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 16-May-08 8:50am","format":false,"excerpt":"Couple of good articles in the LA Times about the state supreme court decision yesterday that overturned the legal ban on gay marriage. It's an instant presidential campaign issue, for...","rel":"","context":"In "LGBTQ &c"","block_context":{"text":"LGBTQ &c","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/gay-stuff"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13595,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/11\/06\/fighting_proposition_8.html","url_meta":{"origin":6608,"position":4},"title":"Fighting Proposition 8","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 6-Nov-08 3:41pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The battle against Prop. 8, which amended the California Constitution to ban gay marriage, is not over. From Gloria Allred (emphasis mine): On May 15, 2008, after we waged a...","rel":"","context":"In "Elections 2008"","block_context":{"text":"Elections 2008","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/elections-2008"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13534,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/11\/19\/will_of_the_people.html","url_meta":{"origin":6608,"position":5},"title":"Will of the People","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 19-Nov-08 6:55pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The California Supreme Court has agreed to take up three lawsuits against the just-passed Proposition 8, which overturned a Supreme Court ruling finding that equal protection under the law required...","rel":"","context":"In "LGBTQ &c"","block_context":{"text":"LGBTQ &c","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/gay-stuff"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6608"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6608\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46723,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6608\/revisions\/46723"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}