Indeed, the low-key court briefs filed by those opposing same-sex marriage seem to go out of their way to acknowledge the political victories of same-sex marriage proponents and the country’s rapidly changing mood on the issue.

But they are cited as reasons that the court’s intervention is unneeded.

“With an issue as fast-moving and divisive as same-sex marriage, the advantages of the political process are substantial,” wrote Paul D. Clement, who is representing Republican House leaders in their defense of Congress’s 1996 decision to deny federal recognition of same-sex marriages performed in the states where they are legal.

Charles J. Cooper, who represents proponents of Proposition 8, which added the same-sex marriage ban to California’s constitution in 2008, agreed in his brief to the court that persuasion and compromise in the political arena are preferable to a judicial solution.

“Decisions reached through this process are more likely to be regarded by a free people as legitimate and be widely accepted than decisions reached in any other manner,” he wrote.