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Comment by shotmaker | Hacker News Reader

no it didn't. The people lost.

"The system" is a constitutional democracy. That means the constitution trumps all other laws, including laws created by narrow margins in voter referenda. It is exceedingly difficult to change the constitution on purpose.

The founders of this country very definitely architected our system of government such that laws like Prop 8 would not stand up in court.

If you want to live in a pure democracy, try to get congress to repeal the Constitution.

Actually, the system is a constitutional democratic republic. There are many who believe that ballot propositions and referendums (like Prop 8) are in direct conflict with the structure and spirit of the system. Madison, notably, referred to direct democracy as the "tyranny of the majority." Hence, Congress.

Exactly.

You're making an argument based on popular vote, but black people and white people wouldn't be able to intermarry either if our system was entirely based on the will of the masses.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority

So its the Tyranny or the majority, that I have to put up Obama too right? Which by the way is against gay marriage.

Not all states use the Electoral College (4 to 6 don't), more and more left leaning states want pure majority.

The election of President is not a direct election by U.S. citizens. See Electoral College:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_College_%28United_Sta...

Also, each presidential term is limited to 4 years.

That’s why there is Congress. That’s why there is a Supreme Court. That’s why there are independent state and local governments. That’s why there are term limits.

You are losing sight of the fact that restricting gay people from marrying is unjust.

Fuck that. the people have no right to vote on individual freedoms

Here in DC, there was a movement to get a Prop 8 style ballot initiative to overturn our new gay marriage law. Luckily, the drafters of the DC charter had far better foresight than in California. You're simply not allowed to create a ballot initiative that would violate the Human Rights Act. Period. Doesn't matter how many signatures you get.

People have no business voting on how we should treat minority groups.

What do you mean by "minority group"?

The polygamous, drug users, people who want to rent rather than own, or people who wish to stay single are all minority groups. Do you favor eliminating all laws which discriminate against such people?

I suspect you mean a certain types of minority group. If so, could you explain which minority groups deserve the protection you describe, which do not, and why?

I guess you're trying to characterize laws that happen to apply to a particular subset of population that you'll label a "minority" and characterize them as "discrimination" hence equal them with laws that are really discriminating.

The point you're missing is that those other laws are against behaviors that we find bad for society. We don't have laws that discriminate against drug users as a group (e.g. disallowing drug users to enter restaurants), we just have laws that penalize drug use and distribution. Our laws don't discriminate smokers but penalize smoking.

Denying marriage to gays discriminates against gays. It doesn't penalize a behavior.

This is not a subtle distinction.

Gays are not denied marriage - there is nothing stopping gays from marrying opposite sex partners.

It's true that opposite sex marriage is given a privileged position, and this benefits people who want to engage in it. It's also true that purchasing a home is given a privileged position, and this benefits people who want to buy a home with a mortgage.

Thus, denying subsidies to renters (unless they go against their preferences) is discrimination against people who prefer to rent, just as denying marriage to gays (unless they go against their preferences) is discrimination against gays.

Sure, and there was nothing stopping blacks from using the water fountain set aside for them. It still wasn't right.

The rich are a minority group. Regressive taxation seems pretty uncontroversial, though highly discriminatory.

But we did vote on individual freedoms. We voted on every single one in the Constitution and in the Bill of Rights and in all the subsequent amendments. Each and every one required a vote.

Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to eat for dinner. You seem to think we live in one, but actually, we live in a constitutional republic.

…a right to discriminate a minority just because they want to. Shocking.

its about the definition of marriage in California, not against any people. People can go to Massachusetts to get married if they wanted to, there is no law about that.

If its not legal the will have to settle for civil unions. In fact all states should have civil unions for all people, and leave marriage to the churches.

What happens if every state has the same law?

So if John wants to marry Jane, he can do so easily right in his home state and town, with all his friends and family in attendance, etc. But if John wants to marry James, he's gotta make an expensive and time consuming journey halfway across the fucking country? A journey that's long enough to pretty much guarantee that John and James won't have much chance of having all of their friends and family in attendance at their wedding?

And you think that's fair?

Let's put a minority rights issue up to majority vote. What could possibly go wrong?

He's getting downvoted, but he's right. The majority voted for this, but the majority didn't get what they voted for. "The System" DID NOT work for the majority in this case (although for the record, I'm very happy with the outcome).

I would understand "the system" to include judicial review.

"The System" dictates that states cannot deny rights protected under the Federal Constitution. I'd argue that it's working beautifully to prevent tyranny of the masses.

No, he's not. The court's job is not to decide based on simply majority.

I disagree wholeheartedly. The system protected the rights of the minority from the tyranny of the majority.

Check out John Stuart Mill's On Liberty: http://books.google.com/books?id=ScTePJKjiTMC

There's something called the Bill of Rights. It's to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority. Just because the majority wants something doesn't mean it's legal.

Democracy does not mean "majority always gets what it wants". Another part is "protecting the rights of minority".

At one time, the majority in the US supported discriminating against people based on the color of their skin. Do you that should have been upheld also?!?

Jeez, read my comment. I'm happy it was overturned, so the answer to your question is obviously no. My comment was about a democractic system and how it doesn't always work to give the majority what they want. I never said the majority should get what they want or that they're correct when they have a majority.

Doh! (smacks self upside head). :-)

The people who are actually affected by it won.

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