Should Prop 8 stand?

The California Supreme Court will rule today on the validity of the CA proposition banning gay marriage. The key question is whether or not the proposition amounts to a revision of the CA Constitution. A revision is defined as the altering of the underlying principles of the Constitution. Obviously I support gay marriage, but I am not sure Prop 8 constitutes a fundamental change of this nature (if it did then the CA Legistlature would have had to have approved the change prior to the public voting upon it).

Its a tough question to answer. I think the inquiry has to be if this is a revision then what isn't a revision? Unforunately, as much as I would like to have some great line to draw, I don't. Prop 8 didn't remove sexual orientation as a suspect class entitled to protections in line with race and religion under CA law. It also didn't strip gay couples of any of the rights of marriage, it only said that they couldn't call it marriage (I use "only" in the limitation of scope sense not to diminish the significance of the right being taken away). What the prop basically said was, everything remains the same but it doesn't apply to calling a same sex union marriage. I really cannot imagine that it is a fundamental principle of the CA Constitution that same-sex unions be called marriages.

This is an alteration, or exception, to the application of the principles of the CA Constitution in one discrete instance. As much as I would love to be able to say that the CA Supreme Court should overturn prop 8, if the alteration of/exception to the application of a principle is a "revision" then everything has to be a revision and the CA Constitution clearly did not intend that result. If a proposition didn't even so much as change the application of a constitutional principle then it wouldn't change anything at all would it? I hate to say it, but I think gay marriage is on the losing side of this battle. Best bet is to overturn prop 8 in the 2010 election cycle.

Madison