A federal court has upheld a ruling that Proposition 8, the legislation banning gay marriage in California, was unconstitutional. The backers of the legislation have vowed to take it all the way to the Supreme Court.
The court made a two-to-one decision that Proposition 8’s powers to restrict marriage to between one man and one woman was unconstitutional. Judge Stephen Reinhardt, who was part of the three-judge panel, said ‘Proposition 8 served no purpose, and had no effect, other than to lessen the status and human dignity of gays and lesbians in California’.
This decision is the latest in a line of gay marriage successes in the last six months in America, with New York legalising gay marriage in June last year and Washington on the brink of doing the same. If this decision is taken to the Supreme Court and upheld, then there will be no reason for any state in the US not to legalise gay marriage, as effectively it would make it unconstitutional to oppose it.
Feature image by karaface, Flickr
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