From 1850, when California became a state, until 1977, it was considered self-evident that marriage was an institution in which the two people married were a man and a woman.

However, in 1977-to preclude any effort to "redefine" marriage-the California Legislature passed a statute: "Marriage is a personal relation arising out of a civil contract between a man and a woman, to which the consent of the parties capable of making that contract is necessary" (Family Code 300).

By the late 1990s, activists throughout the country were pushing for recognition of "domestic partnerships" of two unrelated people of the same sex. In 1999, the California Legislature passed AB 26 which placed in law a definition of "domestic partnership" and assigned specific rights and benefits to domestic partners.

The National Marriage Project

The mission of the National Marriage project, a nonpartisan, nonsectarian and interdisciplinary initiative located at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, is to provide research and analysis on the state of marriage in America and to educate the public on the social, economic and cultural conditions affecting marital success and child well being.

The State of Our Unions 2009:Marriage in America - Money & Marriage

Edited by  W. Bradford Wilcox, Ph.D., associate professor of sociology at the University of Virginia and Director of the National Marriage Project and Elizabeth Marquardt, Director of the Center for Marriage & Families at the Institute for American Values

”Inspired by the financial crisis our nation felt in the last year—what some are now calling the ‘Great Recession’—and its effects on the financial and emotional lives of millions of couples, the 2009 State of Our Unions focuses on the theme of ‘Marriage and Money’...As scholars who care deeply about marital and child well-being, we are convinced that our nation needs excellent arguments and accurate data to help us confront the challenges and opportunities that face marriage, and to identify strategies to strengthen the quality and stability of married life in America.”

Life Without Children: The Social Retreat from Children and How It Is Changing America

By David Popenoe, Ph.D. and Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, Ph.D., author and social critic who writes extensively on issues of marriage, family and child wellbeing

“The retreat from child-centeredness within marriage is part of a larger transformation in the meaning and purpose of marriage.  In recent decades, marriage has been deinstitutionalized—that is, it has lost much of its influence as a social institution governing sex, procreation and parenthood.  Legally, socially, and culturally, marriage is now defined primarily as a couple relationship dedicated to the fulfillment of each individuals’ innermost needs and desires.”

Institute for American Values

The Institute for American Values, founded in 1987, is a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that contributes intellectually to strengthening families and civil society by bringing fresh knowledge to bear on the challenges facing them.  The website is a consolidator of articles on American Values.

The American Family, 1988-2028: Looking Back and Looking Forward

By David Popenoe, Ph.D., Professor of Sociology emeritus and Co-Director of the National Marriage Project at Rutgers University

“Strong families remain essential for a strong and healthy society and irreplaceable for successful child rearing and for satisfying the deeper social-emotional needs of both adults and children.”

The Evolution of Divorce

By W. Bradford Wilcox, Director of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia and a Senior Fellow at the Institute for American Values

“… [B]y the time the 1970s came to a close, many Americans—rich and poor alike—had jettisoned the institutional model of married life that prioritized the welfare of children, and which sought to discourage divorces in all but the most dire of circumstances. Instead, they embraced the “soul-mate” model of married life, which prioritized the emotional welfare of adults and gave moral permission to divorces for virtually any reason.”

What Marriage Is - And What It Isn't

By Robert P. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University  

“The law is a teacher.  It will teach either that marriage is a reality in which people can choose to participate, but whose contours people cannot make and remake at will, or it will teach that marriage is a mere convention, which is malleable in such a way that individuals, couples, or indeed, groups can choose to make of it whatever suits their desires, goals, and so on.”

• Catholics for the Common Good (CDG) is a lay apostolate for the evangelization of culture based on the social teachings of the Catholic Church. It is founded in response to the call of Pope John Paul II for the new evangelization and the U.S. bishops' call for faithful citizenship. CCG was invaluable in the Proposition 8 campaign to protect the definition of marriage in California.

• The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) is a nonprofit organization with a mission to protect marriage and the faith communities that sustain it. Founded in 2007 in response to the growing need for an organized opposition to same-sex marriage in state legislatures, NOM serves as a national resource for marriage-related initiatives at the state and local level.  NOM was a major contributor to the success of the campaigns in California and Maine to ban “gay marriage.”