by Rex Wockner
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger told CNN on Nov. 9 that the state Supreme Court may well "undo" Proposition 8, the voter initiative that re-banned same-sex marriage Nov. 4 by amending the state constitution.
And the governor suggested he thinks that would be a good move.
"They had a very, very strong campaign, the pro-Proposition 8 people, and I think that the people that tried to defeat it did not have, maybe, as good a campaign or had as much money behind it, whatever," Schwarzenegger said. "I think it is unfortunate, obviously, but it's not the end because I think this will go back into the courts, this will go back to the Supreme Court because the Supreme Court very clearly in California has declared this unconstitutional. It's the same as in the 1948 case when blacks and whites were not allowed to marry. This falls into the same category. So, I think that we will again, you know, maybe undo that, if the court is willing to do that, and then move forward from there and again lead in that area."
In addition to the anti-gay side's having aired much more effective ads than the pro-gay side did in the huge TV-advertising war, Schwarzenegger said there were other factors that aided Prop 8's passage.
"Because of the big turnout amongst African-Americans and Latinos, that had an effect also, which they did not expect, so there's all kinds of other things there," he said. "And I think the religious groups have done a really big campaign, a lot of them, to support Proposition 8, and so on, and so it's a very, very difficult thing."
Before the TV ad war started, Prop. 8 had been losing in the polls by as much as 17 points.
The governor also offered some advice to California's gay population.
"(Y)ou should never ever give up," he said. "They should never give up. They should be on it and on it until they get it done."
Lawyers for the gay side filed suit in the state Supreme Court on Nov. 5 seeking to annul Prop. 8. They said it is not merely an amendment to the constitution but rather a "revision" that fundamentally alters the guarantee of equal protection.
Constitutional revisions require a two-thirds vote of the Legislature to reach the ballot. Prop. 8 got there by activists' collecting signatures on petitions.
"Proposition 8 is invalid because the initiative process was improperly used in an attempt to undo the constitution's core commitment to equality for everyone by eliminating a fundamental right from just one group – lesbian and gay Californians," said the American Civil Liberties Union, Lambda Legal and the National Center for Lesbian Rights.
"Proposition 8 also improperly attempts to prevent the courts from exercising their essential constitutional role of protecting the equal protection rights of minorities," the groups said.
