Another Loss for Gay Marriage Opponents

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) – California’s high court refused Monday to stop same-sex marriages at the behest of a group the Supreme Court recently found lacked standing.     ProtectMarriage.com, a group that sponsored the gay marriage ban initiative Proposition 8 in California, had petitioned the high court Friday for an immediate stay that would forbid the state from issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples.     Gay and lesbian couples have been marrying in California since June 28 after the U.S. Supreme Court threw out ProtectMarriage’s appeal over the unconstitutional initiative that defined marriage as between man and a woman.     The justices found that ProtectMarriage lacked standing to defend Prop. 8 when the state declined to defend the law after a federal judge struck it down in 2010.     ProtectMarriage argued that Gov. Jerry Brown did not have the authority to order clerks in all 58 of California’s counties to start performing same-sex marriages.     The California Supreme Court has yet to rule on whether the 2010 ruling should apply across the state.

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