SCOTUS questions standing of Prop. 8 case

What the SCOTUS members were laying down today, in oral argument, was an interesting legal question having nothing to do with marriage equality.

A state passes a law and a court says, "That law is unconstitutional." The state executive at the time of the decision (Jerry Brown, in this instance) then says, "Okay, I guess that's what it is" and declines to appeal the decision.

So a group of citizens in favor of the law mounts a legal defense of the law in a higher court. But what is their standing? If a State will not defend its own law or own Constitution, does that mean any self-appointed party can take over the State's prerogative?

(This is not quite as simple as it sounds. Standing is a big part of a lot of higher court business. If the people of Wisconsin voted for a Union rights provision that a lower court struck down, and then Scott Walker declined to mount an appeal of that decision it would raise questions. When the Obama admin. declined to pursue a case I think some congresspersons took it over, which makes some sense—it seems like institutionally Congress should be able to defend a law it passed even if the President doesn't care to. But with a ballot measure the thing is passed by the people. Who are the people? How does one gain standing as the people if the government will not do so?)

So the potentially decisive topic today was, do the concerned citizens defending Prop. 8 have standing before the court at all?

A lot of the justices seemed to think not.