IS GAY MARRIAGE BAN CONSTITUTIONAL?
Analysts, citing various state high court rulings, disagree on how the issue is likely to be resolved. By Maura Dolan, Times Staff Writer March 28, 2004 – Los Angeles Times, Sunday Home Edition (Metro) Twenty-five years ago, in one of the first such rulings in the nation, the California Supreme Court decided that the state Constitution protects homosexuals from job discrimination by a public agency. Eighteen years passed before the U.S. Supreme Court reached a similar ruling that gays could not be singled out for official discrimination because of “animus.” Now, with the issue of same-sex marriage headed for California’s courts, gay rights advocates are counting on the state’s history of rulings on their side. The state Supreme Court is expected to decide this summer whether San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom exceeded his authority when he began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Many legal analysts expect Newsom to lose that fight. But the more explosive legal question is wh
