The United States Supreme Court today voted in favor of marriage equality by striking down two controversial laws.
In the case of Hollingsworth v Perry the court voted 5-4 hat the supporters of Proposition 8 lacked standing to defend the law. The decision of the 9th Circuit Court Of Appeals is vacated and the case is remanded to that court with order to dismiss the appeal for lack of standing. In essence this means the law is gone but there will be procedural things to get it done.
Justice Roberts wrote the majority opinion in this case and was joined by Scalia, Ginsburg, Breyer, and Kagan (how’s that for a wild lineup).
It appears that the dissenting Justices disagree on the issue of standing but that does not mean that they would have upheld Proposition 8 (indeed per Kennedy and Sotomayor in Windsor it is likely we would have them striking down Perry with Scalia upholding it for a 6-3 lineup)
In the case of Windsor v. United States the court voted 5-4 to uphold earlier rulings that Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act is also unconstitutional under equal protection and thus should be struck down. That section stated that same sex couples who were legally married under state law could not receive federal benefits.
Justice Kennedy wrote the majority opinion in this case.
The net effect of the two rulings is that same sex marriage will return to California and that same sex couples who are legally married under the law of their state will be eligible for benefits like Social Security, immigration, filing taxes jointly and so on (there are over 100 benefits they will now get).
The exact timeline on how quickly these things happen is unclear at this point. With regard to DOMA and the federal benefits in some cases benefits could begin immediately but in others it may take changes in other laws and/or regulations. As to Proposition 8 and California there may still be some procedural questions as to how to implement the law as well as some challenges over the extent of the ruling. But in both cases the process should not take too long.