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Arguments commenced yesterday in a San Francisco courtroom on the future of California’s ban on same-sex marriage. The unprecedented case, Perry vs. Schwarzenegger, is seeking to challenge the constitutionality of the state’s passage of Proposition 8 back in November 2008. The lawsuit argues that the initiative passed by a majority of California’s voters was mobilized by a campaign motivated by prejudice against homosexuals and that the denial of marriage equality violates their rights to protection and due process under the U.S. constitution. Defenders of Prop 8 say that the courts should refrain from the question of the legality of the voters’ decision and that traditional marriage as they define it should be preserved for the sake of children in families. In hearing arguments from both sides, the federal trial will, for the first time, place witnesses on the stand on the issue of same-sex marriage. Marriage scholars, gay and lesbian couples and others will be called to testify in the case expected to reach all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Just prior to the trial’s beginning yesterday morning, the highest court in the land issued a stay in the case blocking the live transmission of proceedings via YouTube until Wednesday. On Friday, the Courage Campaign Institute and CREDO Action, presented U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn R. Walker with more than 140,000 signatures in support of televising the proceedings.

GUESTS: Rick Jacobs, Chair of the Courage Campaign Institute, Reverend Susan Russell, Senior Associate of All Saints Church in Pasadena.

For more information, visit www.prop8trialtracker.com, www.couragecampaign.org, and www.allsaints-pas.org.