California Gay Marriage Put on Hold

As the nytimes.com the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has ruled today that same sex marriage is put in hold in California, until the appeals court has decided the case.

There is no time limit on when the court decides. In the week on December 6 the appeals court will progress. Many think that this case will finally be decided by the United States Supreme Court. Possibly no same sex marriages will be possible in California until that time.

Same sex marriage was decided to be not allowed California by majority vote of the population. Then this vote had been fought and was considered against the constitution. The action of putting gay marriage on hold is supported by the majority in California, as the majority opposes gay marriage.

The group that stands behind stands for conventional marriage is Protectmarriage.com.

The is one interesting sentence in the Court's order motion for a stay:

"In addition to any issues appellants wish to raise on appeal, appellants are directed to include in their opening brief a discussion of why this appeal should not be dismissed for lack of Article III standing."

While I am not a lawyer, this looks like the court tries to just drop the case based on lack of Article III standing. Which means they would say that the parties involved were not allowed to file an appeal because nobody was hurt. Or at least both parties are asked to prove this, which can be difficult and tricky in this case.