Between a constitutional amendment restricting marriage to a man
and a woman and the collapse of the traditional concept of marriage
lie gay civil unions.
Between a constitutional amendment restricting marriage to a man and a woman and the collapse of the traditional concept of marriage lie gay civil unions. That status should be offered, as marriage has been, by individual states, conferring on those unions the legal rights granted to married heterosexual couples.
Under the federal Defense of Marriage Act, passed with bipartisan majorities in the House and Senate in 1996, states would retain their right to define what marriages or unions are lawful, and what marriages or unions made in other states they wish to recognize.
Moving this way toward gay civil unions nationally remains our preferred outcome. But the debate is moving too fast and too far in polarized, and polarizing, directions at both state and federal levels. …
Court decisions that conflict with a solid national majority that disapproves of gay marriage, or an amendment to the U.S. Constitution on an issue that was heretofore left and should be left to individual states: Neither approach fully corresponds to national sentiment now. … A 2-to-1 majority in the nation disapproves of gay marriage, with a slim majority approving a federal constitutional amendment to prohibit it.
State and federal courts, however, can move more quickly to impose their interpretation of the law and how they move will greatly influence the public perception of the need for a constitutional amendment, at the federal or the state level, or both.
At the moment, then, restraint is best in every venue. Compelling reasons exist to reserve marriage for a union between a man and a woman. Compelling reasons exist as well to allow gay civil unions. And not just in California is a consensus favorable to affording gays and lesbians legal rights equal to marriage evolving. Peremptory court rulings requiring gay marriage could not only stall it but reverse it into a backlash of support for an ill-advised constitutional amendment. The will of the people cannot be ignored, or coerced. It can be persuaded, and the states are the place to begin that process.
