The Volokh Conspiracy

It's a shame that California will be the only place gay marriage will happen, and that the democratic process will reverse the court decision so soon.

There could have been a lot to learn about genetic and behavioral differences through studying ongoing gay marriages. Marriage rates, divorce rates, child rearing behaviors, etc.

They had to go through the courts, though, and hence, we'll never know.

It's a shame that California will be the only place gay marriage will happen, and that the democratic process will reverse the court decision so soon.

I wouldn't risk a lot of money on that theory...

They had to go through the courts, though, and hence, we'll never know.

I know. Darn them. Darn them to Heck.

"They" of course meaning the Republicans under their governor Arnold, right?

The legislature twice passed a gender-neutral marriage law which was twice vetoed by Arnold. The governor (AKA "They") said it was a matter for the courts. And so it became.

It's a shame that California will be the only place gay marriage will happen ..."

So I guess Massachusetts, Canada, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, South Africa, and I think now Norway, have all just fallen off the map? I know the equal marriage opponents have been predicting a catacylism, but I didn't think it would happen so fast.

Ow! My brain hurts!

Has anyone married his dog in California?

It has been made adamantly clear from numerous sources that a tru West Coast man never marries any of his b*tches.

What AngelSong said. I am hearing a lot of out-of-state conservatives who are just convinced that California is living under judicial tyranny and that the voters are going to overturn the judgment of the state Supreme Court. I suspect the reason we are hearing so much of this is because they would rather talk about this issue in terms of judicial activism, a neutral principle, than on its merits, given the homophobic origin of many of the arguments against gay marriage.

But the truth is, the initiative to overturn this probably has less than a 50-50 chance of passage, which will mean the anti-gay marriage groups are going to have to switch to new talking points if this comes about.

Didn't it come pretty close to passing the Hawaiian legislature last decade, or is that something I've imagined remembering?

Of course, here in the South Californians are regularly characterized as uniformly godless liberals so a pro-gay ballot result wont matter much anyway.

I'm sure that's true, but at least opponents of gay marriage would no longer be able to complain about California judges.

But the truth is, the initiative to overturn this probably has less than a 50-50 chance of passage

You think? I've lived in California for 13 years and I think you're nuts. Or you live in the Bay Area, maybe. If you think folks in OC, much of San Diego, or any of the Imperial and Central Valleys are going to vote against the amendment, you may need to get out more.

Anyway, here is a poll suggesting the amendment is running 54-35 in favor right now. The wildly left-wing LAT, which commissioned the poll, optimistically comments that this edge "may not last," for reasons they modestly decline to state ("because we hope so").

Personally, I'd say the chances of 1 in every 20 California voters changing his mind about this issue over the next few months is a lot smaller than 50%. It's not like it's a complex issue, or one about which most people haven't heard, or about which they haven't thought and have no strong feelings, so that there's some big chunk of "gee I dunno" voters out there who could be persuaded to change their votes.

"It's not like it's a complex issue, or one about which most people haven't heard, or about which they haven't thought and have no strong feelings, so that there's some big chunk of "gee I dunno" voters out there who could be persuaded to change their votes."

Perhaps. But that wasn't the case in Massachusetts. When their supreme court mandated gay marriage, the percentages were roughly the same against it as the number you quote. However, within a few years, they flipped, and no a majority of citizens support gay marriage. In fact, when opponents tried to get a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, they couldn't even muster the 25% support of the legislature to get it on the ballot.

In Vermont, a majority of their citizens were against civil unions when their Supreme Court mandated it, but now there is virtually no support to eliminating it.

so if history is any guide, Californians will realize that the arguments made by the anti-SSM crowd, that marriage will be destroyed, that people will stop having children, that polygamy and incest will be next, are ridiculous and overblown.

Some may even find that they their own marriage hasn't changed a bit.

Has anyone married his dog in California?

If that had happened, I think former Senator Rick Santorum would be I-told-you-so'ing every cable news show...

Eh, we'll be marrying robots (or at least co-habituating with them) before too long. You'll be able to simulate realistic sex with whatever sort of person or beast you so desire.

DiverDan,

It's an interesting question. A piece in the New York Times, Gay Unions Shed Light on Gender in Marriage noted:

Notably, same-sex relationships, whether between men or women, were far more egalitarian than heterosexual ones. In heterosexual couples, women did far more of the housework; men were more likely to have the financial responsibility; and men were more likely to initiate sex, while women were more likely to refuse it or to start a conversation about problems in the relationship. With same-sex couples, of course, none of these dichotomies were possible, and the partners tended to share the burdens far more equally.

While the gay and lesbian couples had about the same rate of conflict as the heterosexual ones, they appeared to have more relationship satisfaction, suggesting that the inequality of opposite-sex relationships can take a toll.

One well-known study used mathematical modeling to decipher the interactions between committed gay couples. The results, published in two 2003 articles in The Journal of Homosexuality, showed that when same-sex couples argued, they tended to fight more fairly than heterosexual couples, making fewer verbal attacks and more of an effort to defuse the confrontation.

Controlling and hostile emotional tactics, like belligerence and domineering, were less common among gay couples.

It seems entirely possible that, on the average, divorces of same-sex couples will be less frequent and less bitter than those of opposite-sex couples. You can still expect a lot of attention to be paid to early same-sex divorces with a hue and cry of "see, we told you," from the opponents of same-sex marriage.

This sounds funny but they did have to check whether opposite-sex couples appeared to be half men and half women, to test their methods for assigning genders based on first names.

-dk

Has anyone married his dog in California?

There's a Barbara Streisand joke in there somewhere.

Now there's a shocker: more women than men desire marriage. Indeed, it must be overwhelmingly so, because all estimates have placed the percentage of gay men higher than the percentage of gay women.

The amendment that qualified for the ballot places no restriction on domestic partnerships, which is interesting. Which gives opponents of marriage equality a weapon they lacked in AZ and SD in 2006.

From a purely political perspective, the amendment would have had a better chance in an off year or midterm election. An '08 amendment, four years after Newsom, the first MA marriages, the amendments, Bush's second term and the defeat of the AZ amendment and near misses in CO and SD, the result in CA is not at all clear.

I make no predictions, but I live in the central valley and I passed about three "just married" cars on the way back from downtown today. The vote will be close, but even if gay rights supporters lose this year, the CA initiative system, and demographic trends, virtually assure victory down the road. An amendment would be a relatively mild obstacle in CA.

DiverDan wrote at 6.20.2008 5:04pm:

Will a Lesbian divorce generally be messier than a straight marriage - will male family court judges be able to handle the first real cat fight?

In California, I'd expect one or the other party would 170.6 the judge.

California Code of Civil Procedure, Section 170.6, as a practical matter gives either party in any case essentially one near-peremptory disqualification of the judge assigned the case. After the first motion by a party and subsequent recusal of the first judge, scrutiny of subsequent recusal motions by that party tends to be greater, but the first 170.6 motion is usually a gimme.

So, as a practical matter, the first two such judges assigned the case would likely readily recuse themselves upon motion of either party. But after that, all bets are off.