Two recent court decisions are helping to pave the path toward marriage equality. First, U.S. District Judge Barbara Jones in Manhattan recently led the fifth federal court in ruling that the Defense of Marriage Act’s section 3, the one that defines marriage, is unconstitutional.

This was on the grounds that it violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fifth Amendment.

Second, the California federal court refused an appeal by opponents of the anti-gay marriage bill, Proposition 8. That decision will move the appeal to the Supreme Court. The federal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals declined an en banc review, (French for “on a bench”), a legal term used when all the judges of a court, instead of just a selection of judges, hear one case. The appeal will now go to the top court in the United States and could begin review as early as October of this year. The Supreme Court could also choose to decline to review the case.

These triumphs have equality activists excited and hopeful. Bay Times interviewed a few.

“The dominoes continue to fall on DOMA with yet another federal court rightly calling it unconstitutional,” said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese. “All loving and committed married couples should be recognized by the federal government; yet we continue to see the terrible pain DOMA inflicts on real families.” He said the real question is when Speaker Boehner will see the writing on the wall and stop wasting taxpayer dollars defending this outrageous law, and instead work to repeal it.

“This marks another blow against DOMA, which was created solely to deny equality under the law to LGBT people and their families – refusing them all the benefits of marriage given to married heterosexual couples,” said National  Gay and Lesbian Task Force Action Fund Executive Director Rea Carey.

“It’s now been three-and-a-half years since the freedom to marry was stripped from loving and committed same-sex couples,” said Freedom to Marry President Evan Wolfson. “It is long past time for this ‘gay exception’ to marriage in California to come to an end.” He urged all Americans to join in continuing to make as strong a case in the court of public opinion as legal advocates are making in the court of law.

“Two federal courts in this case have affirmed what we know to be true - that Proposition 8 seriously infringes on the guarantee of equal protection and serves no legitimate state interest,” said Equality California Board Member David Codell. “We agree with the majority of the judges of the Ninth Circuit that there was no need to rehear this case because the decision to strike down Proposition 8 rested on solid constitutional principles.”

Marriage equality opponents now have fewer than 90 days to ask the Supreme Court to hear the case. If it declines to review, queers could be able to marry again in California later this year or early next year. “We are hopeful that soon all loving, committed same-sex couples, who are legally married in their home states, will no longer be excluded from the over 1,000 rights and responsibilities that all other married couples have under federal law,” concluded Marriage Equality USA Legal Director John Lewis.