From Truth Dig: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/why_the_supreme_court_will_uphold_gay_marriage_20130314/
By Bill Blum
Mar 14, 2013
Unless and until Nate Silver gets in the business of handicapping the work of judges, predicting the outcome of Supreme Court cases will remain a risky proposition. That said, there’s good reason to be optimistic that the Roberts court will bow to the growing public acceptance of same-sex marriage and find a way to sustain gay unions in the two landmark lawsuits (Hollingsworth v. Perry and Windsor v. United States) set to be argued before it March 26 and 27.
But there’s also good reason to temper the optimism and keep the champagne on ice, because the court isn’t likely to declare a nationwide constitutional right to same-sex marriage, and the rulings it issues likely will not be unanimous. Instead, the court will hand down narrow and sharply divided opinions that will boost the cause of marriage equality but leave the ultimate goal of an unfettered right of all consenting adults to wed unrealized.
Of the two cases, the best opportunity for a broad constitutional advance rests with Hollingsworth, involving the validity of California’s Proposition 8, the November 2008 ballot initiative passed by the state’s voters that amended the California Constitution to restrict marriage to heterosexual relationships, and in effect annulled a state Supreme Court ruling that had declared such restrictions unlawful.
In February 2012, in a 2-1 decision authored by Stephen Reinhardt—perhaps the nation’s most liberal federal appellate judge—the 9th Circuit found Proposition 8 unconstitutional. The case has made its way to the Roberts court on a petition filed by the proposition’s proponents, headed by Dennis Hollingsworth, a former California State Senate Republican minority leader, and the umbrella group ProtectMarriage.com, a coalition of well-funded right-wing political and religious organizations united in a sacred mission to save traditional marriage and whose ranks run the gamut from nominally secular outfits like the Family Research Council to the Catholic and Mormon churches.
Standing against that imposing coalition as the “respondents” in the case are the city and county of San Francisco and two otherwise unassuming gay couples—Kristin Perry and Sandy Stier from the Bay Area, and Paul Katami and Jeffrey Zarrillo of Burbank.
Continue reading at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/why_the_supreme_court_will_uphold_gay_marriage_20130314/
