As organizations that represent or work with diverse racial and ethnic communities in California, or allies of such organizations, we issue the following statement in response to the California Supreme Court’s decision in the lawsuits to stop the implementation of Proposition 8:
We are extremely saddened that the Supreme Court chose to uphold Proposition 8 and allow blatant discrimination to be written into the state Constitution. As people of color, we are disturbed that the highest court in our state would abandon its responsibility to ensure that all groups are treated equally under the state Constitution. Despite the structural protections that should prevent the initiative power from being used this way, the Supreme Court has allowed a simple majority vote to strip away the rights of a protected minority group. We fear not only for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender members of our communities, but for all people of color and other vulnerable minority groups regardless of sexual orientation. We vow to restore marriage equality to California and to make our state a place that guarantees equality and justice for all.
However, we applaud the Supreme Court for ruling that the marriages entered into by the November 4th vote remain valid. Many of our community members are among the 18,000 couples who were able to marry in California between June and November 2008, and we are thrilled that they will continue to be treated equally to all other married couples in this state. We believe it is important that the Court understood that married lesbian and gay couples relied upon the rule of law, and that basic rights must not be granted temporarily and then retroactively taken away. However, it is bittersweet to uphold the 18,000 existing marriages while treating all other same-sex couples inequally.