Wide appeal to SCOTUS on marriage equality

In preparation for the hearings this month on marriage equality, Thursday was the deadline for friends of the court to file their supporting briefs in the cases concerning marriage equality.

How much difference these amicus curia briefs matter is an open debate.   It's my contention that justices are human beings who live in the real world and that they cannot help but be influenced to some degree by social changes (except perhaps contrarians Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas).   It's generally accepted, I believe, that the court does not want to get too far ahead of public opinion, or lag too far behind, when making decisions that will change social institutions.

Good examples include the decisions that removed the ban on inter-racial marriage, that decriminalized sodomy, and that made it legal to sell/purchase contraceptives.   Those changes did not come from any change in the constitution, but from interpreting it differently, in part because society had changed.

So these briefs probably do make some difference -- in addition often to supplying research data or legal reasoning that the justices find useful. 

Two briefs filed this week on the California Proposition 8 case show the wide support for overturning that.   One was from the U. S. Justice Department, which closely follows the strong support for marriage equality in President Obama's State of the Union address.

The other is an affidavit signed by more than 100 prominent Republicans, including the former George W. Bush campaign manager, who was later chairman of the Republican National Committee, Ken Mehlman.    And there was the full page ad in the NYTimes last week with pictures of Republican celebrities who support gay marriage:   Dick Cheney, Laura Bush, and Colin Powell.  There has also been a supportive document filed from 13 states, including the nine who have legal gay marriage and four that do not.

My prediction hasn't changed:   SCOTUS will completely overturn DOMA and will decide Prop8 narrowly so that it restores same-sex marriage in California but does not [yet] impose it on other states.

Ralph