Hollingsworth v. Perry and US v. Windsor - Thoughts?

[Sujoah]

I'm curious as to what everyone has to say about these two cases. So far, Hollingsworth v. Perry has had it's oral arguments heard - US v. Windsor will be occurring tomorrow, March 27th.

So - thoughts?

[dok]

When the pro-Prop8 side of Hollingsworth v. Perry boils down to "Gay Marriage doesn't actually improve heterosexual marriage... oh and y'all shouldn't bother since the voters will strike this down soon anyway", I'd say that the civil rights end of things appears to be winning the day.

My favorite exchange:

Spoiler Alert!

JUSTICE SCALIA: You — you've led me right into a question I was going to ask. The California Supreme Court decides what the law is. That's what we decide, right? We don't prescribe law for the future. We — we decide what the law is. I'm curious, when -*when did — when did it become unconstitutional to exclude homosexual couples from marriage? 1791? 1868, when the 14th Amendment was adopted? Sometimes — some time after Baker, where we said it didn't even raise a substantial Federal question? When — when — when did the law become this?

MR. OLSON: When — may I answer this in the form of a rhetorical question? When did it become unconstitutional to prohibit interracial marriages? When did it become unconstitutional to assign children to separate schools.

If past rulings and his commentary yesterday are any indication, Kennedy will be writing a ruling along with the liberal justices. The only question is how big he goes. I suspect it will be relatively narrow, but who knows. Kennedy's getting old and he might want one more big decision on his legacy (so people remember him for something other than writing the Citizens United ruling, perhaps).

I've always felt that the government attaches too many civil benefits to marriage, but given that we do, I think the way we're headed is pretty clear.