A 2008 Jim Crow law

Proposition 8 has raised numerous issues, many so strongly divisive that we have been willing to form alliances that give the impression of just two points of view.

Some issues that will certainly be of interest to the California Supreme Court when it deliberates are:

— Is marriage a civil right?

— In our democracy, does the majority have the right to oppress a minority?

— Can we amend our state constitution by a simple majority vote?

In a unanimous 1967 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Loving v. Virginia that marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man."

Thus, in our society, marriage does appear to be a right. We have exceptions that protect our children and prohibit marriage between a man and several women, although the latter is certainly consistent with the procreation argument of Proposition 8 supporters.

The Nov. 4 vote was only one of many hurdles for this idea, and like the Jim Crow laws and anti-miscegenation laws that preceded it, it will eventually disappear from our laws.

— Nick Fotheringham, Thousand Oaks

A nation of sore losers?

It is a sad day in our country when true democracy loses the respect of its citizens.

On Nov. 4, California voted to pass Proposition 8. This is what is called "democracy" — people actually getting to vote and having a say in how they want their country or state run. We also elected a new president, another exercise in the democracy that makes America the best country in the world.

For the past eight years, we have dealt with many people, most usually empty-headed celebrities, speaking badly about the leader of our country. Sean Penn, Susan Sarandon and a host of others made no secret of how unhappy they were with George Bush.

Not everyone in the country voted for Barack Obama, but let's hope that the Republicans won't be as childish and disrespectful as the sore-losing Democrats have been for the past eight years.

The people this really hurts are the brave men and women who are overseas fighting for our freedom and our right to have a democratic vote. I doubt their morale soars when they hear people saying they want to move to Canada and they are ashamed to be American.

Californians voted on Proposition 8. Now supporters have to deal with their churches being trashed, cars with bumper stickers promoting Proposition 8 being vandalized, and people being threatened with bodily harm.

We are not a Third World country. This is America. Democracy prevails. People go to great lengths to move here. We have rights and privileges in this country that many others can't even imagine.

Let's respect each other's opinions and the official vote of our democracy. Otherwise, we may find that the next country our armed forces are needed in to maintain peace and order is our own.

— Cristen Cervellini-Calfo, Thousand Oaks

It's all semantics

We are arguing over the word "marriage."

Proponents of Proposition 8 want to keep "marriage" as the concept we have always known it — the union of a man and a woman.

Most people would not deny gay or lesbian couples the legal and tax privileges they already have. But the word "marriage" is the bonus they would reserve for a heterosexual couple.

Will someone please come up with, or invent, a word that will be acceptable to gay couples but will distinguish one kind of "couple" from the other?

— Betty Murray, Camarillo