Prop 8 supporters say they'll continue their fight against same-sex marriage

Opponents of same-sex marriage in California were left to devise new strategies after Wednesday's Supreme Court decision invalidating Proposition 8.  Several contacted on Wednesday agree that the battle over same-sex marriage is not over. 

Californians passed Prop 8 with 52 percent of the vote, but in a recent L.A. Times poll, 58 percent of the public now approves of same-sex marriage.

The American Family Association put $500,000 into the Prop 8 campaign in 2008. Spokesman Bryan Fischer said that while opinions in California have since shifted to support same-sex marriage, other states might enact bans because the Supreme Court left intact the right of states to define marriage for themselves.
 
"So that's Job One," Fischer said, "is to strengthen the spines of the governors in these states, their attorney generals, strengthen the spine of the state legislatures in these 30 states, to uphold and defend the will of the people they were elected to represent."
 
Protect Marriage put Prop 8 on the California ballot and defended it in court. Executive Director Ron Prentiss said the Supreme Court did not rule on the merits of Prop 8 itself, merely finding that his group did not have standing to challenge the federal court decision overturning it.
 
"This is still a legal decision that is yet to be made," he said in an interview with A Martinez of KPCC's Take Two show.
 
Prentiss said said the group will look for people more immediately affected by the demise of Prop 8 in hopes of restoring the ban on same-sex marriage.

The Los Angeles Catholic Diocese did not comment today, deferring instead to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which called the Supreme Court decision tragic for the church and nation.
 
"Tragic, because I think people are moving very fast on this and are forgetting how important marriage is, understood as the union between a man and a woman," said Kim Daniels, spokeswoman for the bishops conference. "And that definition is quickly being lost."
 
Daniels  said the court decision does not prevent other states passing laws like Prop 8.
 
"The Supreme Court today struck down part of the Defense of Marriage Act, refusing to rule on the merits of the challenge of Proposition 8 as well, and that this conversation will continue in states across the country, that's where it's headed," she said.