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At the same time, after these courts have started legalizing gay marriage, public support for gay marriage has followed. I always suspect it's a chicken-or-egg

At the same time, after these courts have started legalizing gay marriage, public support for gay marriage has followed. I always suspect it's a chicken-or-egg type of situation. Sometimes there is genuine public support for a given issue. Other times, change must occur first, and then people can see that society hasn't collapsed. Once polls began to demonstrate that more people supported gay marriage than were against it (years after the Massachusetts court decision), politicians began tripping over each other to suddenly become champions of gay rights.

jkestner 12y ago
It would be nice to see these charts mapped against public opinion polls, to help show which rights have been led by the government vs the people.
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  Well, here's one pollsters poll series http://www.gallup.com/poll/117328/marriage.aspx http://www.gallup.com/poll/117328/marriage.aspx Note that the first court decision in the US (in Massachussetts) which led to legalized same-sex marriage was in 2003 with marriage becoming legal in 2004 (national public support at about 42%). Note that this was a state court decision, and public support in Massachussetts may have led what it was in national polls. Most of the final (not lower court decisions that were stayed pending appeal to a higher court which issued the final decision) court decisions -- and the acts by state legislatures not mandated by court decisions -- on the issue have happened in the last few years, with national public support at 50% or above.
mitchty 12y ago
In my own state of Minnesota the courts had nothing to do with legalization. Nothing likely would have changed either unless it wasn't for a bunch of anti gay bigots really pissing a lot of people off by trying to pass an amendment to the state constitution banning it. That misfire caused everyone that gave a shit about not being jerks to humans to fix that crap pronto by getting that amendment killed, then 6 months later fly a middle finger to the same people by getting an amendment passed to allow gay marriage. No courts were needed in this case. Though I recognize that is not the norm so far in the US.
- freehunter 12y ago
  Well in quite a few cases, the legalization came via a state passing a bill to allow gay marriage then someone challenging it in federal court.
  - pdabbadabba 12y ago
    The opposite occurred in the vast majority of cases -- people challenged gay marriage bans and won in court. And many states legalized same-sex marriage simply by virtue of being within a federal circuit that had ruled on the issue.
    - freehunter 12y ago
      Right, what I was trying to get at was the Minnesota case isn't that different. They just didn't have the law being challenged in a federal court. In other cases, the law was changed and then it was taken to court. It's not like the courts just decided to make a ruling out of the blue.

jkestner 12y ago

It would be nice to see these charts mapped against public opinion polls, to help show which rights have been led by the government vs the people.

dragonwriter 12y ago
Well, here's one pollsters poll series http://www.gallup.com/poll/117328/marriage.aspx http://www.gallup.com/poll/117328/marriage.aspx Note that the first court decision in the US (in Massachussetts) which led to legalized same-sex marriage was in 2003 with marriage becoming legal in 2004 (national public support at about 42%). Note that this was a state court decision, and public support in Massachussetts may have led what it was in national polls. Most of the final (not lower court decisions that were stayed pending appeal to a higher court which issued the final decision) court decisions -- and the acts by state legislatures not mandated by court decisions -- on the issue have happened in the last few years, with national public support at 50% or above.

mitchty 12y ago

In my own state of Minnesota the courts had nothing to do with legalization. Nothing likely would have changed either unless it wasn't for a bunch of anti gay bigots really pissing a lot of people off by trying to pass an amendment to the state constitution banning it. That misfire caused everyone that gave a shit about not being jerks to humans to fix that crap pronto by getting that amendment killed, then 6 months later fly a middle finger to the same people by getting an amendment passed to allow gay marriage. No courts were needed in this case. Though I recognize that is not the norm so far in the US.

freehunter 12y ago
Well in quite a few cases, the legalization came via a state passing a bill to allow gay marriage then someone challenging it in federal court.
- pdabbadabba 12y ago
  The opposite occurred in the vast majority of cases -- people challenged gay marriage bans and won in court. And many states legalized same-sex marriage simply by virtue of being within a federal circuit that had ruled on the issue.
  - freehunter 12y ago
    Right, what I was trying to get at was the Minnesota case isn't that different. They just didn't have the law being challenged in a federal court. In other cases, the law was changed and then it was taken to court. It's not like the courts just decided to make a ruling out of the blue.