Sound The Trumpet : Obama Administration Asks U.S. High Court to Overturn California Gay Marriage Ban

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“Obama Administration Asks U.S. High Court to Overturn California Gay Marriage Ban”
by CTV News - AP
March 1st, 2013

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration is asking the Supreme Court to overturn California's ban on gay marriage and take a skeptical view of similar bans elsewhere, wading into a case that could have broad implications for the right of same-sex couples to wed.

The administration said unequivocally in a friend-of-the-court brief filed late Thursday that gay marriage should be allowed to resume in California, where citizens voted to bar it in a 2008 referendum known as Proposition 8.

It does not explicitly call for marriage equality across the United States but points the court in that direction.

More immediately, the administration's position, if adopted by the court, probably would result in gay marriage becoming legal in seven other states that, like California, give gay couples all the benefits of marriage, but don't allow them to wed.

They are: Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Nevada, New Jersey, Oregon and Rhode Island.

The brief marks President Barack Obama's most expansive view of the legal rights of gays and lesbians to marry. He announced his personal support for gay marriage last year but has said the issue should be governed by states.

Obama, a former constitutional law professor, raised expectations that he would back a broad brief during his inauguration address on Jan. 21. He said the nation's journey "is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law."

"For if we are truly created equal, than surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well," Obama said.

Obama has a complicated history on gay marriage. As a presidential candidate in 2008, he opposed the California ban but didn't endorse gay marriage. He later said his personal views on gay marriage were "evolving."

When he ran for re-election last year, Obama announced his personal support for same-sex marriage, but said marriage was an issue that states, not the federal government, should decide.

American public opinion has shifted in support of gay marriage in recent years.

In May 2008, Gallup found that 56 per cent of Americans felt same-sex marriages should not be recognized by the law as valid. By last November, 53 per cent felt they should be legally recognized.

The Justice Department planned to submit its brief later Thursday, the deadline for filing in the California case. The justices will hear oral arguments in the case on March 26.

The Proposition 8 ballot initiative was approved by California voters in 2008 in response to a state Supreme Court decision that had allowed gay marriage. Twenty-nine other states have constitutional amendments banning gay marriage; nine states and the Washington federal district recognize same-sex marriage.

In recent days, many states, organizations and individuals have filed briefs in the case.

Thirteen states, including four that do not now permit gay couples to wed, urged the court on Thursday to declare the ban unconstitutional. They said marriage enhances economic security and emotional well-being for the partners, and is better for children.

"All of these interests are furthered by ending the exclusion of same-sex couples from the institution," said the brief signed by Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley.

It was joined by Connecticut, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, New Hampshire, New York, Vermont, Washington, Delaware, Illinois, New Mexico, Oregon and the District of Columbia.

More than 100 prominent Republicans have signed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of gay marriage. Among them are former presidential candidate Jon Huntsman and Florida Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.

One day after the Supreme Court hears the Proposition 8 case, the justices will hear arguments on another gay marriage case, this one involving provisions of the federal Defence of Marriage Act.

That act defines marriage as between a man and a woman for the purpose of deciding who can receive a range of federal benefits.

The administration abandoned its defence of the act in 2011, but the measure will continue to be federal law unless it is struck down or repealed.

In a brief filed last week, the government said Section 3 of the act "violates the fundamental constitutional guarantee of equal protection" because it denies legally married same-sex couples many federal benefits that are available only to legally married heterosexual couples.

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