GAY MARRIAGE - Look at the 'State of the Union'

Pun intended.

"States Grapple With Same-Sex Marriage Rulings Via Bills, Ballots and the Bench" PBS Newshour 8/20/2013

Excerpt

RAY SUAREZ (Newshour):  The June decisions on the Defense of Marriage Act and California's Proposition 8 didn't end the debate over gay marriage.  The issue is still on the docket in courthouses in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and elsewhere, up for debate in state legislatures, and on the ballot.

For an update, we turn to John Eastman, a Chapman University Law School professor and chairman of board of the National Organization for Marriage, and James Esseks, the director of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender and AIDS Project at the American Civil Liberties Union.

James Esseks, did the twin decisions of the Supreme Court on DOMA and Prop 8 change the legal strategy, change the landscape that faces both pro-legalization and anti-legalization forces?

JAMES ESSEKS, American Civil Liberties Union:  Well, it didn't change the doctrine or the strategy.

What it does -- but it reinforces what we're already doing.  That is, we have gotten to the place we're at right now, which is 13 states plus the District of Columbia, that allow same-sex couples the freedom to marry, through three different means.

We have got it through some court decisions.  A bunch of state legislatures, seven state legislatures passed those bills.  And then the people voted for the freedom to marry last fall at the ballot in three states.  And our way forward is really more of the same.  We're going to go to the state legislatures.  We're going to go to the ballot and where appropriate we're going to go to court.