Is that putting it too strongly? I don’t think so. How else to describe a judiciary that apportions basic rights by putting its finger in the wind? It is a bit glib to say that the Supreme Court follows the polls, but on the subject of gay rights the court has done pretty much that. The obvious case in point is the legal status of gay sex itself. In 1986 our Supreme Court upheld Georgia’s statute making sodomy a crime. It took 17 years, until most of the offensive state statutes had been withdrawn, for the Supreme Court to reverse itself. Equal rights were only equal rights when enough states said so. The current cases on gay marriage offer the Supreme Court a similar opportunity to split the difference between equality and bigotry, by leaving the matter of marriage to the states.

It is true that South Africa’s young Constitution specifically forbids discrimination based on sexual orientation. Our founders neglected to consider such a provision. (Jefferson, in fact, favored castration for gays, and in 18th-century Virginia that was the liberal position.) But the South African ruling in favor of marriage equality leaned just as hard on Section 9 — equal protection of the law, a replica of our own 14th Amendment. “You would have gotten to the same conclusion on equality grounds,” Cameron told me, even if the South African Constitution did not explicitly protect gays.

Of course it’s possible our divided court will have an attack of fortitude and agree that equal rights are equal rights, not options for the states to consider and deny. I try, like Justice Cameron, to be sunny-side up.

Which brings us to our president. As best I can tell, President Obama’s position on same-sex marriage is that it should not be imposed on unwilling states. He has carefully measured out just enough courage to accept same-sex marriage, and by opposing the monstrous Defense of Marriage Act he has said states that enact marriage equality should be respected under federal law. But our president would still leave the legalization of marriage to the states rather than pursue it as a fundamental right.

Eusebius McKaiser is as black as Obama, so I will stand aside and leave the obvious fraught analogy to him:

“What are the chances,” McKaiser wondered, “of Obama saying, ‘Black people should be allowed to vote, ideally, but I’d let the states decide when they are ready.’ ” Just let us know, Mississippi and Alabama, when you think the time is right.

Justice Cameron admits to being addicted to American political news, and he recalled reading an interesting analysis by Micah Cohen in The Times. Cohen’s article pointed out, based on exit polling, that voters who identified as heterosexual split 49-49 between Obama and Romney, while 76 percent of gays, lesbians and bisexuals voted for Obama. It seems to me the president now has a chance to justify their faith in him by having the Justice Department weigh in at the Supreme Court with a full-hearted defense of equal rights for gay Americans. Compared with all the other demands on the president’s political capital — a budget deal, gun laws, immigration reform — this one should be easy, and give us reason to be proud.