California AG Jerry Brown promised to uphold the will of the people…
So, now he’s changed his mind…
The California attorney general has changed his position on the state’s new same-sex marriage ban and is now urging the state Supreme Court to void Proposition 8.
Jerry Brown filed a brief Friday saying the measure that amended the California Constitution to limit marriage to a man and a woman is unconstitutional. He says it deprives gay couples of a fundamental right.
After California voters passed Proposition 8 on Nov. 4, Brown said he would fight to uphold the initiative in his role as attorney general, even though he personally voted against it.
He submitted his brief in one of the three legal challenges to Proposition 8 brought by same-sex marriage supporters.
More on his brief from LAT:
It is the attorney general’s duty to defend the state’s laws, and after gay rights activists filed legal challenges to Proposition 8, which amended the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage, Brown said he planned to defend the proposition as enacted by the people of California.
But after studying the matter, Brown concluded that “Proposition 8 must be invalidated because the amendment process cannot be used to extinguish fundamental constitutional rights without compelling justification.”
Backers of Proposition 8 expressed anger at Brown’s decision not to honor the will of voters, who approved the measure in November. “It’s outrageous,”said Frank Schubert, campaign manager for Proposition 8.
Proposition 8 foes, however, were elated. “Atty. Gen. Brown’s position that Proposition 8 should be invalidated demonstrates that he is a leader of courage and conviction,” said Geoff Kors, executive director of Equality California.
In his brief to the high court, Brown noted that the California Constitution says that “all people are by nature free and independent and have inalienable rights,” which include a right to “privacy.”
How many millions of dollars, both for and against, were poured into this ballot initiative? How many man hours were spent on the Proposition 8 campaign? People have spent their fortunes, had their lives ruined, and seen their businesses attacked, all in the name support of Proposition 8.
Now, Jerry Brown thinks he will just “invalidate” their hard earned success.
Thus, the voice and opinion of a California jurist will overturn the will of the majority of the citizens of California. Brown expresses concern over Prop 8 establishing a “tyranny of the majority.” Yet by his actions, he will further establish California’s tyranny of the minority.
Allahpundit, Gateway Pundit, and Don Surber also blogging on this.
5 Comments
December 20, 2008 at 4:18 pm
Yes and how dare The Supreme Court/Eisenhower invalidate the hard earned success of Southern Whites by forcing integration!
December 20, 2008 at 7:33 pm
I am gay and have every right you have, plain and simple. This will not ever be taken away from me.
I don’t have to ask for equal rights, I simply have them. I will not be discriminated against.
December 20, 2008 at 7:42 pm
Boyce, there’s only one problem with your analysis. By definition, a constitutional amendment changes a constitution. To argue that a constitutional amendment is ineffective because it goes against what was written there before is a logical absurdity, for it essentially negates the ability of the people to amend that document.
The difference, of course, between the situation with Prop 8 and your absurd analogy is that the latter does not involve an amendment to the relevant document. If, however, an amendment had been passed to the US Constitution that repealed the 14th Amendment or specifically allowed for racial segregation, Eisenhower and the Supreme Court would have been bound by the document to uphold racial segregation, regardless of how repugnant they found the practice. The same is true of Brown and the California Supreme Court with Prop 8, which is a constitutional amendment to that state’s constitution to invalidate a previous ruling by the California Supreme Court.
December 20, 2008 at 7:44 pm
Alex — you are right. You have every right I do. And I cannot marry a person of the same sex either. There is therefore not an equal protection question — and regardless, Prop 8 changes the state’s constitution to explicitly state that no one has the right to marry a person of the same sex. Given that the US Constitution has never been interpreted differently, the subject is settled.
January 5, 2009 at 10:02 am
[...] Jerry Brown and California’s Tyranny of the Minority [...]