Pro-gay marriage groups urge legal caution

LOS ANGELES, June 11 (UPI) -- Groups supporting same-sex marriages are urging gay couples to refrain from filing federal lawsuits seeking a U.S. Supreme Court showdown on the issue.

In what is being seen as an admission of legal weakness, a coalition of advocacy groups sympathetic to the gay marriage cause have issued an unusual memorandum cautioning that a premature legal action seeking to uphold the rights of gay couples on a national scale could backfire, the Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday.

The American Civil Liberties Union and Lamba Legal were two of the co-authors of the memorandum, which has emerged only days before California is set to become only the second U.S. state to give legal status to gay unions. In it, the authors note that the U.S. Supreme Court rarely sanctions social change until many states already have done so, and say the issue must be approached strategically, the newspaper said.

Noting that 27 states have passed constitutional amendments banning gay marriage, John Eastman, dean of the Chapman University School of Law, told the Times the memo "is a stark recognition of how their efforts have fared in the rest of the country any time the issue has been taken up in the ballot box."