If Obergefell is under threat, why aren't Dems trying to codify it?

Gay marriage is not the controversial issue that it was a few decades ago. The religious Right is not the force it once was — the Republican electorate, like the rest of the country, is increasingly secular and un-churched. As a result, its views on theologically informed issues such as marriage are more liberal: As of 2021, 55 percent of Republicans support same sex marriage. Among Americans writ large, support sat at 70 percent — a ten-point increase from 2015. In other words, it wouldn’t be politically toxic for Democrats to hold a vote on codifying same-sex marriage. If anything, as the progressive author Sasha Issenberg argued, a legislative push to codify Obergefell “might actually be politically wise for Democrats”: “The massive and still growing popularity of the gay-rights movement’s signal political achievement lets Democrats flip the script and make the culture wars work for them,” Issenberg wrote. “Reigniting the debate over same-sex marriage could give Democrats the perfect wedge issue.”

So given that there’s no political argument against such an effort, why is there no discussion of pro-gay-marriage legislation in Democratic circles? One explanation is that the Democrats are simply incompetent. As I argued on the heels of Dobbs, the party was completely unprepared for the end of Roe, despite the fact that they had months to see it coming. There’s a complacency in the party, particularly on social issues, that stems from the fact that it is simply accustomed to winning — for Democrats, notching substantive losses in the culture war is simply incomprehensible.