So, the California Supreme Court has voided all the same-sex marriages that Mayor Gavin Newsom allowed in San Francisco last February. The court did not rule on the ultimate constitutionality of same-sex marriage (that issue is working its way through the lower courts and the state Supreme Court is not expected to address it before next year), but rather ruled on the issue of whether Mayor Newsom could legally ignore existing state law. The court unanimously found that he could not, and ruled 5-2 to void all of the nearly 4,000 same-sex marriages that had been performed.

I think this was the right decision. While Newsom’s actions were wonderfully inspiring, effective in humanizing the issue of same-sex marriage, and absolutely correct on principle, a mayor can’t just decide which state laws he will or won’t enforce. It’s not a city official’s job to interpret the state constitution.

That said, it was a heartwarming act of civil disobedience that put a human face (or rather, many human faces) on what many people see as an abstract issue. It’s one thing to think about gay marriage in theory, but — I hope — it’s another thing to have seen all those photos and footage of happy couples streaming out of San Francisco’s City Hall last February and March.

Here’s hoping all 4,000 of those couples will someday soon be able to get legally married. They, and we, deserve no less.