I hate to be a nay-sayer, however...

[legalmoose]

Before anyone gets too excited about the Massachusetts decision, let me point out what's happened:

• The court ruled that marriage licenses could not be denied to same-sex couples.


• The court did not order the state to grant licenses to the couples who sued.


• The court punted the question back to the state legislature for action to amend the marriage statute within 180 days.

What this means is that the Massachusetts state legislature now has the ball. The same legislature that's been kicking around a state constitutional amendment to define marriage as between a man and a woman, in the same was that Alaska and Hawaii did when their courts did similar things.

While this is a victory, it's a mixed one, and one which could very easily, and very quickly, go against us if the state passes the proposed anti-same-sex-marraige amendment to the state constitution.

Comments

[fj.livejournal.com]

jwg pointed out in my entry that it will take longer than 180 days to ammend the constitution -- any ammendment has to be passed by two successive legislatures. I wonder what that means.

naysayer!

[saltbox.livejournal.com]

Yes, yes, things could still go wrong. But things could always still go wrong; even now, conceivably, we could have a constitutional amendment taking away, say, the fourteenth amendment. If we wait for absolute certainty to be excited, we'd never be excited. (To take my pet topic, it would mean that back when the Clean Air Act was passed, I shouldn't get excited, because, hey, it could always get repealed. Well, if I were an adult then, which I wasn't.)

For me, I see this decision as a necessary step towards getting same-sex marriage rights, and now, yay, we're one step closer. This doesn't mean that progress can't be stopped in other ways, like a state constitutional amendment (though I have decent hopes for the state I lived in and loved for nine years). The important thing is not to treat this like an end-point; there are, as you point out, still many more steps to go.

yeah...

[xavier78.livejournal.com]

Definitely a downer...I just hope someone sees the light and pushes for it, even if it's close as long as it passes...I don't want to have to go to Canada to get married...

[raybear.livejournal.com]

this is also exactly what happened in vermont courts which led to the legistlators creating civil unions to get out of the "marriage question".

[michaelnolan.livejournal.com]

Thank you for bringing this up; I was going to ask you for your insight on the matter, actually.