OPINION: Gay marriage ban

The people and their court have spoken. In California, marriage is between a man and a woman.

The California Supreme Court voted 6-1 Tuesday to reject an argument that said a voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage violated the California Constitution's equal protection clause. Justices said voters have the right to change their constitution.

They do have a right to change their constitution, but not in ways that take from individuals those rights protected by the United States Constitution. Coloradans amended their constitution in 1992 to prohibit governments from enacting entitlements or minority status protections on a basis of sexual orientation, and the Supreme Court of the United States struck it down as a violation of the federal Constitution.

Californians cannot deprive citizens of gun rights, or religious freedoms, or freedom of speech, by voting to change their constitution. Though marriage isn't a right named in the United States Constitution, the document protects freedom of association and the rights of law-abiding adults to enter into verbal and written private contracts - the rights that have historically comprised marriages. Whether California's freshly amended constitution violates the United States Constitution will be a question for the federal courts.

In the meantime, California gays and lesbians should do their best to move. California is the most oppressive, controlling, big-government state in the union. Its government has burdened citizens with so much regulation, taxation, spending and debt that the state's economy, the seventh-largest in the world, is destined for ruin. In a statist environment such as California, no one should be surprised that voters and the court would authorize government to view some private contracts as valid, and others as worthless.

After moving from California, gays and lesbians who wed should do so without seeking state sanction from any government. Rather than playing into state marriage licensing schemes, gays and lesbians should move forward with an understanding that a marriage is nothing more than an agreement between two adults and, in some cases, God. A good marriage can be neither strengthened nor harmed by state sanction or any other form of approval. A strong marriage weathers all storms.

If married gays want equal protection regarding property, they should forget about having states bless their marriages and work toward changing corporate and government policies that discriminate against them. They should champion causes such as plus-one benefits, in which health insurance plans and other forms of noncash compensation are viewed as earnings that an employee owns and may choose to extend to one other adult. They should work toward improving all aspects of contract law, eliminating state regulations that treat some relationships as more valid than others. Let religion instruct individuals in how to live, and which contracts they shall or shall not have, because religion is something an adult can take or leave. But state governments rule by force, and government should seldom use that power to control the peaceful decisions of adults.

Heterosexual couples can help with the cause of gay liberation and freedom in general by also rejecting state marriage licenses. They should care about this, even if they oppose same-sex marriage and other gay relationships on a religious or moral basis. One can oppose a lifestyle choice, such as an interracial or gay marriage, while simultaneously opposing its legal prohibition. That's because government control of one individual or group results in control of others. "Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew... Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant... Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up." - Martin Niemoller's poem, as inscribed in the New England Holocaust Memorial.

Get married in a church, synagogue, temple or mosque. Get married by a friend or a justice of the peace. Or get married by a simple declaration of vows in a private place. But do not ask the state to validate your marriage, therefore empowering it to invalidate others. Throughout most of Western history, marriage has been nothing more than a contract based on a couple's declaration. Government licensing has crept in only to prohibit some marriages.

A historical article published by the New York Times in 2007 pointed out that marriage licenses in the United States were used in the 1920s to facilitate 38 state governments in prohibiting whites from marrying blacks, mulattos, Japanese, Chinese, Indians, Mongolians, Malays or Filipinos. Imagine state authorities deciding which color your spouse must be and you'll understand the potential of state involvement in private marriage contracts.

A marriage is, at its core, a contract between two consenting adults whether state governments say so or not. It is a manifestation of private consent, freedom of association, cooperation, and in some cases religion. A marriage should have no bond with the state. That means couples - heterosexual, gay, black, white or green - must stop asking governments to sanction their relationships.