Members of the GLBT community held a national celebration today after the California Supreme Court overturned a ban on gay marriage making California the second state in the US to recognize civil unions. Same sex marriages have been recognized in Massachusetts since May 2004.

In a 4 to 3 ruling today the justices extended marriages to gay and lesbian couples offering equality and affirmation to California’s countless same-sex couples. The court also ruled that marriages performed outside California must be recognized as legal by the State of California. Members of several national GLBT advocacy groups applauded the decision today.

Fifteen couples along with Equality California and the Our Family Coalition brought the case in San Francisco after the court halted the city’s month-long same-sex wedding march.

Christopher Sanders, president of the Tennessee Equality Project (TEP), said today's decision could eventually bring about positive benefits for same-sex couples in Tennessee.

“We want to congratulate all the groups that worked so hard for the ruling,” Sanders said. “California is a long way from Tennessee but we hope that in time the ripple effects will be felt here.”

Joe Morris, president of the Nashville Chapter of National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association (NLGJA), expects the decision to have a large affect on politics leading to November’s presidential, senatorial and congressional elections.

“…The topic is going to filter down from national to local levels pretty quickly,” Morris said. “How the so-called “liberal media” takes this story and runs with it in the coming months will be instrumental in shaping debate on the issue going in to the fall.”

In a press release The Tennessee Transgender Political Coalition said it congratulated the National Center for Lesbian Rights, Equality California, Lambda Legal, American Civil Liberties Union, Heller Ehrman, the Law Office of David C. Codell, Our Family Coalition, and the courageous plaintiff couples and their families "who worked for this historic victory today."

"This historic decision by the California Supreme Court is a victory for fairness and opportunity for hundreds of thousands of loving, committed couples and their families in California.  We look forward to the day when people in Tennessee and the rest of the country are able to share in the same rights extended to our friends in California," said Dr. Marisa Richmond, president of TTPC.

“Today’s ruling affirms that committed couples, gay and straight, should not be denied the duties, obligations and protections of marriage,” said Neil G. Giuliano, president of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD).  "This decision is a vital affirmation to countless California couples -- straight and gay -- who want to make and have made a lifelong commitment to take care of and be responsible for each other."