John Fund in today’s Wall Street Journal Political Diary E-mail…
One More Time, Liberals Overplay Their Hand on Gay Marriage
Activist judges and how far they go to position themselves above the legislature or electorate has suddenly become an issue in the presidential race with the narrow 4 to 3 decision by California’s Supreme Court to legalize gay marriage.
Barack Obama is unlikely to be pleased by the court’s decision. He will recall how the issue of judicial interference with the political process bedeviled John Kerry’s 2004 campaign after the high court in Mr. Kerry’s home state of Massachusetts legalized gay marriage. Anti-gay marriage initiatives eventually passed that year in nearly a dozen states.
In California, the issue is guaranteed to be a hot political topic this fall. More than 1.1 million signatures have already been collected to put a measure on the November ballot that would change California’s ban on gay marriage from a statutory provision to a Constitutional clause. Putting their preferences into the state Constitution is the last recourse of the state’s citizens against being dictated to by the state’s Supreme Court.
Public opinion seems fairly clear. In 2000, 61% of California voters approved a statutory ban on gay marriage while also leaving open a chance for other legal protections to be extended to gays. The measure, Proposition 22, passed in all but four Bay Area counties and even won a third of the vote in San Francisco.
Supporters of gay marriage assert that public attitudes have shifted since 2000, but they seem unwilling to test that belief through the democratic process. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a very friendly governor to gays, has twice vetoed bills to legalize gay marriage. All gay marriage supporters have to do is elect an even more gay-friendly governor, but instead they insist on court action. Once again, an overreliance on the courts to achieve social change may prompt a public reaction that rebounds to the benefit of conservative candidates.
— John Fund