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I remember the Mormons well along California's main thoroughfares, all in identical yellow raincoats, complete with kids, advertising the gay marriage ban. (and me yelling "Fascists!" out the car window) The Catholic "Knights of Columbus" donated millions to the cause. Both Apple and Microsoft donated money for the gay marriage cause, btw. Every Catholic bishop in California(put together, they had to fork over a billion dollars for child molestation, San Diego diocese even filed for bankruptcy) called on voters to ban gay marriage, the idiotic and thus effective tv ads aiming to scare soccer moms....and the fuckers won, not by much though (thanks largely to counties no one would volunteer to live in).

Just now, a federal judge in California has knocked down the state's voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage, ruling Wednesday that the state's controversial Proposition 8 violates the U.S. Constitution.

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker found in his ruling that the ban violated the Constitution's equal protection clause under the 14th Amendment.

From the ruling (emphasis mine):

The question here is whether California voters can enforce those same principles through regulation of marriage licenses. They cannot. California's obligation is to treat its citizens equally, not to "mandate [its] own moral code." (citing Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa v Casey, 505 US 833, 850, (1992)). "Moral disapproval, without any other asserted state interest," has never been a rational basis for legislation. Lawrence, 539 US at 582 (O'Connor, J, concurring). Tradition alone cannot support legislation. See Williams, 399 US at 239; Romer, 517 US at 635; Lawrence, 539 US at 579. Proponents purported rationales are nothing more than post-hoc justifications. While the Equal Protection Clause does not prohibit post-hoc rationales, they must connect to the classification drawn. Here, the purported state interests fit so poorly with Proposition 8 that they are irrational, as explained above. What is left is evidence that Proposition 8 enacts a moral view that there is something "wrong" with same-sex couples.

The evidence at trial regarding the campaign to pass Proposition 8 uncloaks the most likely explanation for its passage: a desire to advance the belief that opposite-sex couples are morally superior to same-sex couples. FF 79-80.

And, later:

Moral disapproval alone is an improper basis on which to deny rights to gay men and lesbians. The evidence shows conclusively that Proposition 8 enacts, without reason, a private moral view that same-sex couples are inferior to opposite-sex couples. FF 76, 79-80; Romer, 517 US at 634 ("Laws of the kind now before us raise the inevitable inference that the disadvantage imposed is born of animosity toward the class of persons affected.). Because Proposition 8 disadvantages gays and lesbians without any rational justification, Proposition 8 violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

In conclusion:

Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license. Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite- sex couples are superior to same-sex couples. Because California has no interest in discriminating against gay men and lesbians, and becauseProposition 8 prevents California from fulfilling its constitutional obligation to provide marriages on an equal basis, the court concludes that Proposition 8 is unconstitutional.