Same-sex marriage in California
has been legal in California since June 28, 2013. The State of California first issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples from June 16, 2008 to November 5, 2008, as a result of the Supreme Court of California finding in the case of In re Marriage Cases that barring same-sex couples from marriage violated the Constitution of California. The issuance of such licenses was halted from November 5, 2008 through June 27, 2013 due to the passage of Proposition 8—a state constitutional amendment barring same-sex marriages. In 2024, the passage of Proposition 3 repealed Proposition 8. The granting of same-sex marriages resumed following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Hollingsworth v. Perry, which restored the effect of a federal district court ruling that overturned Proposition 8 as unconstitutional.
California was the second U.S. state to legalize same-sex marriage. Those marriages granted under the laws of other state governments, foreign and domestic, were legally recognized and retained state-level rights since 2008. On November 12, 2008, Connecticut took over California's former position as the second state issuing legal same-sex marriages. On November 5, 2024, California voters passed Proposition 3, a constitutional amendment that enshrined the right to same-sex and interracial marriage in the state constitution. The measure passed with 63% of the vote.
History
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. During the month that licenses were issued, couples traveled from all over the United States and from other countries to be married. On August 12, citing Newsom's lack of authority to bypass state law, the Supreme Court of California ruled that the marriages were void. Consolidated lawsuits against the state government in favor of same-sex marriage eventually reached the Supreme Court of California. On May 15, 2008, it overturned the state's ban on same-sex marriage with its ruling In re Marriage Cases. The four-to-three decision took effect on June 16, 2008. Two weeks earlier, an initiative to override this result of the court decision qualified for the November election ballot. The court declined to stay its decision until after the November elections. Some reports suggested that out-of-state same-sex couples would marry in California prior to the 2008 elections because California does not require the marriage to be valid in the couple's home state.The ballot initiative, Proposition 8, a state constitutional amendment titled Eliminates Right of Same-Sex Couples to Marry Act, appeared on the California general election ballot on November 4, 2008 and passed with a 52% majority. One supporter of Proposition 8 was the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which donated $20 million to campaign for its passage. The California Supreme Court heard several challenges to Proposition 8 in March 2009, but ultimately upheld the amendment, though the over 18,000 same-sex marriages that were performed before the amendment was passed remained valid.
In the wake of Proposition 8's passage, California continued to allow domestic partnerships. This granted same-sex couples almost all state-level rights and obligations of marriage, but did not apply to "federal-level rights of marriage that cannot be granted by states." Before Proposition 8 passed, the Williams Institute projected in June 2008 that about half of California's more than 100,000 same-sex couples would wed during the next three years and 68,000 out-of-state couples would travel to California to exchange vows.
On August 4, 2010, U.S. District Court Chief Judge Vaughn Walker declared Proposition 8 a violation of the Due Process and Equal Protection clauses of the U.S. Constitution in Perry v. Schwarzenegger, a decision upheld by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on February 7, 2012. The case, known as Perry v. Brown in the Ninth Circuit, was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court on July 31, 2012. The case was granted review as Hollingsworth v. Perry on December 7, 2012 and a decision was issued on June 26, 2013. The court decided that the official sponsors of Proposition 8 did not have legal standing to appeal the district court decision when the state's public officials refused to do so. The judgment of the Ninth Circuit was vacated and the case was returned to that court with instructions to dismiss the appeal. On June 28, 2013, a stay of execution was lifted and same-sex marriages were able to resume. Same-sex couples began marrying later that day.
Legislation
Assembly Bill 607 (1977)
From the enactment of legislation in 1971 to replace gendered pronouns with gender-neutral pronouns until 1977, the California Civil Code defined marriage as "a personal relation arising out of a civil contract, to which the consent of the parties capable of making that contract is necessary." 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".Fears that the Civil Code would allow marriage between parties of the same sex had arisen due to a couple in Orange County who sought a marriage license after the passage of legislation which repealed the criminality of homosexuality in California in 1976. The Orange County Clerks Association submitted a call to Nestande to clarify the law as it pertained to same-sex couples. The act amended the Civil Code to define marriage as "a personal relation arising out of a civil contract between a man and a woman, to which the consent of the parties capable of making that contract is necessary". Opponents of the bill included Assemblyman Willie Brown and Senator Milton Marks. The bill passed 23–5 in the California State Senate and 68–2 in the Assembly. It was signed into law on August 17, 1977 by Governor Jerry Brown. The section was repealed in 2015.
Legislation, authored by Assemblyman John Burton, in 1991 would have deleted gender requirements. It failed to garner enough votes for passages and died in the Assembly. The bill was supported by the San Francisco Bar Association, which had issued a statement in favor of same-sex marriage in 1989, and the California Lawyers Association.
Proposition 22 (2000)
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.In the March 7, 2000 primary election, Proposition 22 was adopted by a vote of 61% to 39%, thus adding section 308.5 to the Family Code, largely replicating the 1977 enactment. The one-sentence code section explicitly defined "the union of a man and a woman as the only valid or recognizable form of marriage" in California. Proposition 22 was authored by Senator Knight, and the measure was dubbed the "Knight initiative" in an attempt to link it to the failed Briggs Initiative of 1978 that would have banned gays and lesbians from working as teachers in California's public schools. The California Supreme Court invalidated the results of Proposition 22 in 2008.
Proposition 22 was formally cited as The California Defense of Marriage Act.
Passage of same-sex marriage legislation (2005–2007)
When California State Legislature opened the 2005–2006 session, Assemblyman Mark Leno introduced Assembly Bill 19, which proposed legalizing same-sex marriage. The bill gained the support of Speaker Fabian Núñez among others. Leno had introduced a similar bill in the prior session, but it died in committee. Assembly committees reported out AB 19 favorably, but the measure failed on the Assembly floor on June 2, 2005. Later that month, Assemblywoman Patty Berg amended the text of her fisheries-research measure, Assembly Bill 849, which was already in the Senate, to the text of Leno's failed bill.On September 2, 2005, the California Senate approved the bill 21–15, and on September 6 the California State Assembly followed suit with a vote of 41–35, making the California State Legislature the first in the nation to approve a same-sex marriage bill without court pressure. 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. Ultimately, the bill was delivered on September 23 and vetoed on September 29, 2005. Schwarzenegger said he believed that same-sex marriage should be settled by the courts or another vote by the people via a statewide initiative or referendum. He argued that the State Legislature's bill simply complicated the issue, as the constitutionality of Proposition 22 had not yet been determined, and its ultimate disposition would render AB 849 either unconstitutional or redundant.
Shortly after the newly-elected Assembly was sworn in, Leno resubmitted a similar bill on December 4, 2006. The bill was passed by the State Legislature in early September 2007, giving Governor Schwarzenegger until October 14, 2007 to either sign or veto the bill. Schwarzenegger had stated months before that he would veto the bill on the grounds that the issue at hand had already been voted on by California voters by way of Proposition 22. Schwarzenegger followed through on his statement and on October 12, 2007 he vetoed the bill. 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.