Same sex marriage has now been defeated in the Tasmanian Upper House as well as in both the House of Representatives and the Senate.
Will the issue now fade away or is ultimate success for the same sex marriage cause inevitable? The political commentator, Paul Kelly, discussed this question in The Australia recently and forecast what he calls a lengthy cultural conflict. In doing so he drew several comparisons with the republic question, but he neglected important differences between their politics.
The defining characteristic of the same sex marriage debate in Australian politics is that it has a big international dimension. It is this characteristic that will probably ensure its political longevity. There are more important political arenas, including the United Kingdom and the United States, than Australia for this debate.
If same sex marriage continues to gain momentum around the Western world then the Australian debate will not go away. If much of the West adopts same sex marriage then the pressure on Australia to do so will eventually be great. But should international interest fade away then it probably will in Australia too.
Whatever the future of republic-monarchy debates in Australia they are not of the same international character and therefore are quite different from same sex marriage. There are a number of Commonwealth countries seriously considering the move to a republic from the monarchy, including Jamaica, but Australia's international comparators are really only Canada and New Zealand. Effectively it is a stand-alone domestic issue.
A second important difference lies in a factor that Kelly did recognise, which is that same sex marriage is also very much a state and territory issue. The ACT has shown this for some time and several states are currently debating the question. This will continue. Importantly this means that within Australia there are multiple parliamentary avenues for advocates to pursue the same sex marriage cause.
This has not been the case with the republic question, which is about national constitutional reform. Certainly the states play a role, as they are constitutional monarchies too, but the state parliaments have never been major arenas for monarchy-republic debates.
This difference gives same sex marriage advocates a big advantage over republicans as they have many more real avenues to take. These avenues can be used for building momentum and ultimately for achieving national-level success. Together with the international character of the issue it means that same sex marriage can be debated at multiple levels: international, national and state.
A closer political parallel with same sex marriage is the euthanasia question, which also has state, national and international elements.
However, the international momentum for euthanasia is much weaker and doesn't feed into domestic Australian debates in the same way. Euthanasia is a fringe issue, though it has advocates in each state and territory. It has already had one major national parliamentary debate in 1996–97 on the back of Northern Territory legislation. The Federal Parliament overrode the NT legislation on that occasion.
Finally, at the moment, same sex marriage is not yet a constitutional issue like the republic. Constitutional issues have their own politics, most notably, the demanding referendum process. There are some calls for a referendum on same sex marriage but if one were to occur now it would not be a binding constitutional referendum, under the provisions of s.128, but a plebiscite.
It may become a constitutional issue if a state parliament introduced same sex marriage and the legislation was challenged on constitutional grounds in the High Court, and the challenge upheld. At that stage the politics would enter a new era and success would be harder for its advocates to achieve.
Continuing momentum internationally, in terms of pro same sex marriage legislation passed in some other countries, would make its achievement in Australia more likely. The same would be true if one or more Australian states were able to pass legislation which survived constitutional challenge.
John Warhurst is an Emeritus Professor of Political Science at the Australian National University and Deputy Chair of the Australian Republican Movement.