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A new legal brief was filed by opponents of Proposition 8 on Monday arguing that the California Supreme Court should invalidate its ban on same-sex marriage. The National Center for Lesbian Rights, Lambda Legal, and the American Civil Liberties Union said that the state ballot initiative, which passed last November by a 52 percent margin, should be overturned as propositions cannot be used to take away a fundamental constitutional right from a minority group. The brief is in agreement also with Attorney General Jerry Brown’s arguments last month that since marriage is an inalienable right, voters do not possess the authority to take such a constitutional guarantee away from same-sex couples. The updated legal brief filed this week challenging Proposition 8 joins two existing lawsuits by private attorney Gloria Allred and local governments in the state. Prompted by Brown’s arguments, proponents of the same-sex marriage ban also filed legal briefs on Monday. Co-written by former Whitewater prosecutor Kenneth Starr, the brief took exception to the Attorney General’s views calling them “a constitutional revolution.” The California Supreme Court is expected to hear arguments as early as March and may decide on the fate of Proposition 8 and well as pre-existing same-sex marriages as soon as this summer.

GUEST: Jennifer Pizer, Senior Counsel at Lambda Legal’s Western Regional Office