Opinion: Anything but marriage?

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As the California Supreme Court considers the latest challenge to Proposition 8, it’s worth remarking on a usually unstated fact: In only a few years, support for same-sex marriage has become synonymous with support for equality for gays and lesbians. For some opponents of Prop. 8, that may seem like a truism, but it wasn’t long ago that even gay activists viewed civil unions as a stepping-stone to public acceptance of gay marriage.

In 2003, Chai R. Feldblum, a professor at the Georgetown University Law Center, told me, ‘Even parents who don’t want their kids to be gay, if their kids turn out to be gay they want them [to be protected].’ Over time, she suggested, ‘people will realize that just as they’re OK with civil unions they’re OK with gay marriage.’

The speed with which same-sex marriage and gay rights have become interchangeable (though not for President Obama) is a testament to the increasing acceptance of gay rights. But it also raises a tactical question for gay activists not only in states where the courts have required gay marriage, but also in those that haven’t followed California’s example in enacting civil unions.

Many Americans who do not regard themselves as hostile to gays and lesbians still embrace the position known as ABM -- anything but marriage. Like Obama, they have a hard time articulating why equality for same-sex couples should stop at what might seem its logical culmination. But inarticulate positions can be influential in politics. Whether to accommodate them will remain a difficult question for advocates of gay rights regardless of how the California Supreme Court rules.

The good news is that, as even opponents of gay rights acknowledge, younger Americans are more supportive of same-sex marriage than their elders -- and impatient with the way station of ABM. Victory for same-sex marriage may just be a matter of time.