Prop 8 Upheld in Court; Activists Gear Up for 2010

The California Supreme Court upheld the decision by California voters to enshrine discrimination into the state constitution today.

Equal rights activists around the country are distraught by the news, despite the fact that the Court did uphold the 18,000 existing gay and lesbian marriages.

California voters legally outlawed same-sex marriage when they approved Proposition 8 in November, but the constitutional amendment did not dissolve the unions of 18,000 gay and lesbian couples who wed before the measure took effect, the state Supreme Court ruled today.

The 6-1 decision upholding Prop. 8 was issued by the same court that declared a year ago that a state law defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman violated the right to choose one's spouse and discriminated on the basis of sexual orientation.

Even though I often criticize the online environment for being less than friendly to social activism stories, it was encouraging to see that Reddit.com expressed emotion over this decision through a logo change on the site:

It gives me hope that mainstream support for same-sex marriage will ensure that Prop 8 is overturned in the 2010 ballot race. The Courage Campaign just released a 60-second TV ad version of "Fidelity" and a pledge drive to repeal Prop 8 by 2010 with a marriage equality army one million strong:

Hope is not completely lost yet. As Gay Rights blogger Michael Jones said in his earlier post, Prop 8 Wins the Battle, but Certainly not the War.