A federal judge today declined to lift his stay on same-sex marriages in California, ruling that such unions may not occur until Aug. 18, at the earliest. Judge Vaughn Walker's decision gives opponents time to appeal to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Supporters of same-sex marriage were pleased with the decision. Courage Campaign’s Rick Jacobs said: “"Today's ruling means that in less than one week, equality under the law will be restored for millions of loving families across California. Lifting the stay is ultimately consistent with both legal precedent and the findings in this case.”
But opponents expressed outrage and condemned Walker as an "activist. “When a lower judge makes an unprecedented ruling that totally overturns existing Supreme Court precedent, the normal thing for that judge to do is to stay his decision, and let the higher courts decide," the National Organization for Marriage said in a statement. "Judge Walker's ruling is more evidence he is not a neutral referee, he's an activist on this issue." The statement added that the group expects the ruling to be appealed to Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy.
I'm not angry over this. The lgbt community has had to wait for a long time for this moment, so what's a couple of more days.
But in the words of Greek playwright, Euripides, "the world has turned and turned sharp, too."
I'm hopeful that eventually we will win this but I am happier over the fact that this shows the strength of our community.
Just think - in 2004, the religious right were galvanized like never before and we were like innocent lambs awaiting the onslaught of hungry wolves.
And they tore us up. In every state which there was a vote over marriage equality, we lost.
But things are a bit different now because we kept to the grindstone, never stopping to use every opportunity we could to talk about our families and never giving up hope that the momentum would shift our way.
And it has. So while the opposition are assembling themselves in laughably useless "Truth Academies" and embarrassingly empty "marriage tours" peddling the same homophobic lies, the lgbt community is growing and progressing.
Peter O'Toole say it best in The Lion In Winter:
THIS is what winning looks like.
