Massachusetts' Supreme Judicial Court responded to a request from Governor Mitt Romney and opponents of same-sex marriage on Wednesday, saying it had no authority to force the legislature to vote on a measure that would place a proposed amendment banning same-sex marriage on the ballot.
The request was a response to a move made in early November by lawmakers who dealt the measure a “fatal blow” by voting to push a constitutional convention to the last day of the legislative session on January 2nd, effectively killing a vote on the proposed anti-gay amendment.
Said the Court: “Beyond resorting to aspirational language that relies on the presumptive good faith of elected representatives, there is no presently articulated judicial remedy for the Legislature's indifference to, or defiance of, its constitutional duties…Those members who now seek to avoid their lawful obligations, by a vote to recess without a roll call vote by yeas and nays on the merits of the initiative amendment (or by other procedural vote of similar consequence), ultimately will have to answer to the people who elected them.”
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