The court could have done that- but the court- just like it did in Loving v. Virginia- chose to recognize the fundamental right to marry.
And States do not have the right to ignore rights unless they can provide a compelling reason (i.e. denying convicted felons the right to own guns).
The court also said segregation was just peachy, and a black person has no standing to sue at one time. Courts change, and things change.
and you rest your laurels on a 5-4 decision, not smart.
Yep- the courts have made bad decisions- and good decisions also.
Would I have preferred a 9-0 decision? Sure. And that only happens extremely rarely.
Bad 5:4 decisions include Bush v Gore- but I survived that.
And Citizen's United-
Both of those cases are what you would have called 'unresolved'- as in large segments of the population still consider those to be bad rulings- but guess what- they are the decisions that were made. A vote the other way would have been a 5:4 vote the other direction.
I am not 'resting my laurels' on anything- the majority of Americans now favor the right to marriage of Americans regardless of the gender of their spouse. Unlike Loving v. Virginia, the Court actually is following American opinion- in Loving v. Virginia the Court anticpated public opinion by 20 years.
And that worked out just fine.
Lets see how opinions shift when PA laws are really used to go after people, and when the activists start going after Churches, Synagogues, Mosques, and Temples.
Progressives can't stop, they have to keep going, and there is a line that once crossed will evaporate a lot of the support and sympathy being had.
I'm an example of that, considering I don't have an issue with SSM when enacted legislatively, and when people are not punished by government for their beliefs. Yet I have to take a position also held by people with far more hateful views because of the way it was enacted, and the future I see because of it. I do this because when you only support the rights of people you agree with, you really aren't supporting rights at all.