Op-Ed: The Supreme Court shouldn’t meddle with California’s standards on meat and eggs
“But we need it,” he retorted, “it’s not for naught.” In another part of the same speech his reference to “the people” would have led a reasonable observer to believe he was referring to the state’s voters.
In his speech, the president then turned to the issue of gay marriage.
“If you don’t do that… we’re going to be in big, big trouble” he warned.
The problem is, gay marriage in itself is not a matter that should be up to the states. It is not even a question of public policy; rather, it can be considered and resolved within the confines of the law.
The federal law on marriage, which the Supreme Court has ruled constitutional, mandates that states grant equal marriage rights to their residents and forbids states from denying them.
In fact, the federal statute, the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution says that “the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the states.”
And that means the federal government cannot even set standards for marriage.
Moreover, the California law that the high court’s decision on gay marriage would have applied, by permitting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, is not only a clear violation of federal law and the California constitution, it is also a direct violation of the California state government’s own law.
The question is whether the high court would use its powers to resolve a question that is not one for the federal government to address.
We’ll never know whether the high court would use its power.
Because, in fact, they haven’t used it in this case. And, in fact, they refused to hear the case; they refused to issue an opinion or to even rule on the case.
This is not the first time