Quote:
Originally Posted by Jimmy Coonan
I'm in favor of gay marriage, but using the courts to do it is a dangerous way to go about it--it'll just make the homophobes push for a constitutional amendment banning it, if not in the federal constitution then state by state where they can (and I'm sure a lot of states would pass it). Besides, it'll keep the issue alive. Abortion is still a hot topic 35 years after Roe v. Wade, because the courts forced abortion on us with shaky legal reasoning instead of leaving it to the legislatures like they should've.
More and more people support gay marriage every day, we should wait until enough of them do for legislatures to legalize it rather than using the legal system as an undemocratic shortcut and having judges twist the law to read things into them that we know weren't supposed to be there in the first place.
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Agreed. No matter what you think about the underlying issue (gay marriage, abortion, etc) the courts overextend their authority when they do stuff like this. And they undermine democracy. Frankly, I'm shocked that an anti-gay marriage law passed a public vote in California to begin with. I wonder if it would survive a revote. But you shouldn't be happy just because the courts got you something you wanted. Next time it could just as easily be something you hate. And it's not the right way to do things.