Prop 8 Case Scheduled

The AP reports that California's Supreme Court

has scheduled a March 5 hearing date for oral arguments in a series of lawsuits seeking to overturn Proposition 8.

Gay couples, several local governments and Attorney General Jerry Brown maintain the ballot initiative, which passed with 52 percent of the vote, is unconstitutional.

If it opts to uphold the measure, the court has said it will also decide whether the 18,000 same-sex marriages performed when gay marriage was legal in California are valid.

After hearing arguments, the court's seven justices will have 90 days in which to issue a ruling.

Going head to head before the Supremes will be Kenneth Starr - Bill Clinton's nemesis - for the pro-Prop 8 side, and California Attorney General Jerry Brown for the opposing side.

Regardless of the legal arguments, regardless of how the court decides, I don't see how this is going to be resolved peacefully anywhere besides the ballot box. I expect this one to be kicked around for years and years, not a quick, easy solution.

But maybe I'm wrong. We'll see.

On a related note, Freedom to Marry has the results of a study that shows

party affiliation, political ideology, frequency of attending worship services and age were the driving forces behind the measure’s passage on Nov. 4. The study finds that after taking into account the effect of religious service attendance, support for Proposition 8 among African Americans and Latinos was not significantly different than other groups. Through a precinct-by-precinct analysis and review of multiple other sources of data, the study also puts African-American support for Proposition 8 at no more than 59 percent, nowhere close to the 70 percent reported the night of the election. Finally, the study shows how support for marriage equality has grown substantially across almost all California demographic groups — except Republicans.

Link to PDF copy of the study (17 pages).