Same-sex marriage in California

[4] From February 12 to March 11, 2004, under the direction of Mayor Gavin Newsom, officials in San Francisco issued marriage licenses to approximately 4,000 same-sex couples despite it being illegal to do so at both the state and federal level.

On August 12, citing Newsom's lack of authority to bypass state law, the Supreme Court of California ruled that the marriages were void.

This definition was uniformly interpreted as including only opposite-sex partners, but, because of worries that the language was unclear, Assembly Bill 607, authored by Assemblyman Bruce Nestande, was proposed and later passed in 1977 to "prohibit persons of the same sex from entering lawful marriage".

[20] Following Senator William J. Knight's failure to pass anti-marriage legislation on two different occasions in 1995 and 1997 in the California State Legislature, Proposition 22 was created as an initiative statute to add section 308.5 to the Family Code, largely replicated the 1977 language.

[26] When California State Legislature opened the 2005–2006 session, Assemblyman Mark Leno introduced Assembly Bill 19 (AB 19), which proposed legalizing same-sex marriage.

The next day, September 7, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger indicated he would veto the bill, citing Proposition 22, which had passed with the approval of a majority of voters five years earlier.

The State Legislature avoided physically delivering the bill to Governor Schwarzenegger for over two weeks, during which time advocacy groups urged him to change his mind.

He wrote in his veto statement that to solve the issue of same-sex marriage, the California Supreme Court needed to rule on the constitutionality of Proposition 22.

[42] The organizers of the "No on Prop 8" campaign conceded defeat on Thursday, November 6, issuing a statement saying, "Tuesday's vote was deeply disappointing to all who believe in equal treatment under the law.

"[43] On Wednesday, November 5, 2008, three lawsuits were filed, challenging the validity of Proposition 8 on the grounds that revoking the right of same-sex couples to marry was a constitutional "revision" rather than an "amendment", and therefore required the prior approval of two-thirds of each house of the California State Legislature.

On October 12, 2009, following the passage of Proposition 8, Governor Schwarzenegger signed into law The Marriage Recognition and Family Protection Act, legislation proposed by Senator Leno.

In light of In Re Marriage Cases and Hollingsworth v. Perry, which collectively forbade the enforcement of any law which would prohibit same-sex couples from marrying, the committee determined that the State Legislature has the capacity to repeal enjoined statutes.

[57] Following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade, in June 2022, a group of state lawmakers, including representatives Scott Wiener and Evan Low, said they had prepared a draft bill to repeal Proposition 8 from the California Constitution.

[64][65] In February 1993, Benjamin and Marcial Cable-McCarthy submitted an application for a marriage license to the Los Angeles County Clerk's Office, but it was rejected.

[69] The court held there was no rational connection between forbidding same-sex marriage and any legitimate state interest and the opposite-sex requirements impermissibly discriminated based on gender.

The opinion, written by Chief Justice Ronald M. George, cited the court's 1948 decision in Perez v. Sharp where the state's interracial marriage ban was held unconstitutional.

[74] The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, by contrast, did not find sexual orientation to be a protected class, and instead voided its same-sex marriage ban on a rational basis review in Goodridge v. Department of Public Health in 2003.

[79] On June 20, 2008, gay rights groups filed suit with the California Supreme Court seeking to remove the initiative from the November ballot; their lawsuit was later dismissed on July 16, 2008.

[81][82] Prior to the election date, backers of Proposition 8 also filed a lawsuit after Attorney General Jerry Brown changed the title of the initiative from "Limit on Marriage" to "Eliminates the Right of Same-Sex Couples to Marry".

[83] On August 8, 2008, Superior Court Judge Timothy Frawley ruled that "The Attorney General did not abuse his discretion in concluding that the chief purpose and effect of the initiative is to eliminate the right of same-sex couples to marry", so the new name would appear on the ballots.

It addressed questions as wide-ranging as whether being gay diminishes one's contribution to society, affects one's ability to raise children, impairs judgment, or constitutes a mental disorder.

[89] Opponents of same-sex marriage filed an emergency petition on June 29 asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the lifting of the stay issued by the Ninth Circuit.

[91] Proposition 8 proponents argued that the district court's injunction was applicable only to the two couples who were the plaintiffs in the case or, at most, applied to the two counties whose clerks were named as defendants.

However, legislators and groups opposing same-sex marriages quickly reacted, filing a suit and requesting a court order to prevent the city from performing the ceremonies.

California is home to hundreds of indigenous peoples, many of whom have traditions of two-spirit individuals who were born male but wore women's clothing and performed everyday household work and artistic handiwork which were regarded as belonging to the feminine sphere.

Same-sex marriage is legal on the reservations of the Blue Lake Rancheria,[108] the Colorado River Indian Tribes,[109] and the Iipay Nation of Santa Ysabel.

Native Americans have fought hard to establish and protect their own rights, and Santa Ysabel is determined to support our own, and other same sex couples in their struggle to be recognized and treated fairly as citizens of this great nation", said Virgil Perez, the tribal chairman.

They "lived as women, associated with them, wore the same dress [...] and enjoyed great consideration among their companions", married men, and also helped with raising young girls in the tribe.

[113] The Cahto people, who live at the head of the South Fork Eel River, call two-spirit individuals tc'eek-aaldeeltcii (pronounced [tʃʼeːkʰ aːlˈteːltʃʰiː]).

[123] Among the Shasta people, who live in present-day Siskiyou County, two-spirit individuals, known as kitúk̓uwaˑxiˀ (pronounced [kìtúk’ùwàːxìʔ]), wore women's clothing and performed the occupations of both sexes.