Roy Badger (left) speaks in Milwaukee about Monday’s Supreme Court decision with his partner, Garth Wangemann. Both were plaintiffs in the lawsuit challenging Wisconsin’s ban on gay marriage. Credit: Mike De Sisti

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Without explanation, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday rejected appeals from Wisconsin and four other states seeking to preserve their same-sex marriage bans, setting up an immediate and historic return for those unions here but leaving unanswered the broader question of the practice at the national level.

In the order, the high court provided no breakdown of how the nine justices had voted and no reason for rejecting the appeals from Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen and officials in the states of Indiana, Oklahoma, Utah and Virginia. The action surprised legal observers by signaling that the nation's highest court favors the side of same-sex marriage advocates but without actually stating that or establishing a precedent for the rest of the nation.

The court's order allowsgay marriage in Wisconsin and these other states, said Van Hollen and Gov. Scott Walker, the top state Republican officials who had sought to preserve the ban. Walker, a defendant in Wisconsin's case, said he would work to implement the decision and Van Hollen encouraged others to respect it, as well.

"For us, it's over in Wisconsin," Walker said of the fight over same-sex unions. "Others will have to talk about the federal level."

The lawsuit against the ban was brought by the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin on behalf of eight couples.

"It is wonderful that marriage is now law in Wisconsin," said Judi Trampf, one of the 16 plaintiffs. "After 25 years together we have watched straight friends marry the person they love and we see how important this is to family, friends and the community."

Within hours, Dane County Clerk Scott McDonell, a Democrat and strong supporter of same-sex unions, issued a marriage license to two women who declined to be interviewed.

"It's a huge victory. Now couples who have been denied their civil rights can get married in Wisconsin and most of the rest of the country," McDonell said.

Both McDonell and Milwaukee County Clerk Joe Czarnezki, also a Democrat, decided to begin issuing licenses after conferring with attorneys forboth counties.

In a statement, Van Hollen said Wisconsin officials would now have to treat same-sex couples just as opposite-sex couples. Defending the ban "was our obligation, and our attorneys did so admirably, regardless of whether they agreed with the underlying policy question," Van Hollen's statement said.

Under the ruling, married same-sex couples will have the same benefits of other married couples when it comes to taxes, adoption, inheritance, hospital visitation rights and the like.

The Supreme Court's order means same-sex marriage now is effectively legal in 30 states and the District of Columbia, according to The Associated Press. But the justices did not address the question of whether same-sex marriages should be legal in the rest of the country or whether lower federal courts were correct in striking down the bans on those unions in states like Wisconsin.

Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond in Virginia, said the order's lack of explanation leaves it open to speculation about what the Supreme Court is doing. He noted that in theory the nation's highest court could still accept a lawsuit against another state's same-sex marriage ban and then uphold that state's ban.

If that happened, then same-sex unions would once again be prohibited in Wisconsin. But that scenario would create needless confusion and hardship for same-sex couples here, he said. If the Supreme Court is looking to accept a different state's case, the justices could have simply waited to reject Wisconsin's appeal until that happened.

"The Supreme Court does not want to look stupid or foolish. So why would they do that?" Tobias asked. "My sense is this is resolved. They know where they want to go."

Julaine Appling, president of Wisconsin Family Action, lamented the order that for now and perhaps for good undoes the constitutional amendment that her social conservative group helped pass eight years ago.

Appling said that she was disappointed the justices didn't accept the case from Wisconsin or one of the four others, saying that states like Wisconsin have been "victimized by the federal courts."

"Because that's what I believe it is," she said. "They're redefining marriage."

Appling said she still believed that the Supreme Court could rule on the issue if an appeals court in another region of the country upholds a same-sex marriage ban.

"I'm hopeful that at some point and very soon the high court will take up these matters," she said.

Speaking to reporters after a campaign event Monday at a Sun Prairie farm and then later at the state Capitol, Walkersaid he had voted for Wisconsin's ban in 2006 andstill supported it, but was accepting the Supreme Court's decision.

Asked if the U.S. Constitution should be amended to ban same-sex marriage as Appling and others have suggested, Walker downplayed the notion, saying, "I think it's resolved."

Walker's opponent in the Nov. 4 election, Democrat Mary Burke, embraced the decision.

"Today's ruling marks an important step forward for Wisconsin. No loving, committed couple should ever be denied the freedom to marry — and those who have stood in the way of this progress, including Gov. Walker, are squarely on the wrong side of history," Burke said in a statement.

Wave of litigation

Lawsuits challenging state same-sex marriage bans accelerated after the U.S. Supreme Court last year struck down the federal Defense of Marriage Act, which prevented the national government from recognizing same-sex marriages.

Amid that national wave of litigation, the eight same-sex couples sued in February to overturn the amendment to the Wisconsin Constitution banning gay marriage and civil unions. U.S. District Court Judge Barbara Crabb in Madison agreed with them in June and struck down the ban but a week later stayed her decision to prevent couples from marrying while state officials pursued their appeal.

About 500 couples in Wisconsin married between June 6 and 13 — after Crabb's initial ruling but before she issued a stay that halted marriages during the appeals process.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago upheld Crabb's ruling striking down same-sex marriages as unconstitutional. Van Hollen appealed a month ago to the Supreme Court.

While the matter remained on appeal, Van Hollen and Walker's administration did not recognize those marriages held in June. In response, four of those couples sued last monthfor that state recognition.

Walker said he would defer to Van Hollen on whether to recognize those marriages. Van Hollen spokeswoman Dana Brueck had no immediate comment on whether the state would now do so, saying the case was still in court.

Larry Dupuis, legal director of the Wisconsin ACLU, said he hoped the state would reverse course.

"To not do so would be mean spirited in the extreme. But until we have a binding agreement to treat those couples equally, the litigation will have to continue," Dupuis said in an email.

Monday's decision did not result in a rush to get marriage licenses in Dane County, as the initial ruling allowing gay marriage in June did. Then, couples knew a court could halt the marriages at any moment — a possibility that now seems unlikely.

This summer, county clerks around Wisconsin waived a requirement that people not get married until seven days after getting their licenses. Now, Dane County officials aren't waiving the waiting period.

Because the state lost, taxpayers will likely have to pay the still undisclosed legal costs of representing the couples who brought the suit.

Voters approved Wisconsin's ban in 2006 with 59% of the vote but since then public opinion in the state has shifted in the direction of same-sex unions. In 2009, Democrats in the Legislature and Gov. Jim Doyle passed legislation creating a domestic partnership registry that granted same-sex couples some, but far from all, of the rights and obligations of married couples.

Dupuis said that the state's domestic partnership registry wouldn't automatically disappear and that same-sex couples who are domestic partners can now also marry each other. That has already been happening in Wisconsin since some couples who married outside the state also became domestic partners here because previously the state didn't recognize their marriages.

"Having both now would be sort of belt and suspenders, but I don't think the law would prevent it," he said.

Journal Sentinel staff member Jason Stein reported from Madison, with Crocker Stephenson contributing to this report from Milwaukee and Patrick Marley from Sun Prairie.