BREAKING: U.S. Supreme Court Refuses to Rule on Gay Marriage

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46. I suspect the conservatives may be playing a waiting game

It takes the votes of four justices for the court to agree to hear a case. There is every reason to believe that four of the justices do not support marriage equality. So why didn't they vote to take the cases? Because they thought they might lose. And why didn't four of the five who support marriage equality vote to take the cases? That's a harder question, but the bottom line is that by not taking theses cases, which all found in favor of marriage equality, those decisions are still standing. It could be that both factions of the court are waiting for there to be conflicting appellate court rulings, which is the typical standard for when the court takes cases.

One of the risks is that it could be a while before a case comes up from one of the circuits holding in favor of same sex marriage bans. If one of the five that are likely to vote to strike down such a ban were to leave the court, we could end up with a situation in which the court has a 4-4 split (with Senate repubs filibustering the naming of a ninth justice). If the court divides evenly on a case, the result below is left standing.