Vote No If You Believe in Marriage: Lessons from the No on Knight/No on Proposition 22 Campaign

These fourteen words prevent California from recognizing same-sex marriages performed in other states-despite the fact that, at the time these words appeared on the California ballot, no jurisdiction in the United States had validated such marriages. Nor is any jurisdiction seriously considering-such a move. In practical terms, then, the enactment of this new statute has no imminent effects. In legal terms, the issue is not yet ripe for adjudication, and so cannot yet be challenged. Defeating a law that does nothing might sound simple enough, but when a vote for such a law becomes a symbolic act of support for a social institution as entrenched in our lives as marriage, this law that does nothing becomes a vote that means something. It may mean simply that marriage is perceived as fragile in today's world. Or it may mean that voters are unwilling to extend marital benefits to same-sex couples. It