Two state supreme courts in the united states, the New York Court of Appeals and the Geogia Supreme Court, have rejected arguments for same-sex marriage.
In Georgia, a recent ammendment to the state constitution was passed (by an overwhelming majority) prohibiting same sex marriage and civil unions. A challenge was filed against this ammendment claiming that the ammendment violated the state constitutional requirement for ammendment questions to relate to one issue only. The argument was that the ammendment related to both civil unions and marriage. The challenge was successfully in the initial trial, but has now been overturned unanimously. Critically the case involved only issues of state law, and so consequently there are no grounds for appeal to any federal court. Both civil unions and same-sex marriage remain illegal in Georgia.
The challenge in New York was somewhat different. The argument was that the current law defining marriage as between one man and one woman was unconstitutional - that is, unconstitutional relative to the state constitution rather than the US constitution. The New York Court of Appeals ruled by a vote of 4-2 that the state constitution did not provide any grounds for requiring same sex marriage. The majority stated that such a question should be left to the legislature.
From the majority's opinion:
The Legislature could find that this rationale for marriage does not apply with comparable force to same-sex couples. ...el4 There is a second reason: The Legislature could rationally believe that it is better, other things being equal, for children to grow up with both a mother and a father. Intuition and experience suggest that a child benefits from having before his or her eyes, every day, living models of what both a man and a woman are like. It is obvious that there are exceptions to this general rule - some children who never know their fathers, or their mothers, do far better than some who grow up with parents of both sexes - but the Legislature could find that the general rule will usually hold. ...
In sum, there are rational grounds on which the Legislature could choose to restrict marriage to couples of opposite sex. Plaintiffs have not persuaded us that this long accepted restriction is a wholly irrational one, based solely on ignorance and prejudice against homosexuals. This is the question on which these cases turn. ...
Until a few decades ago, it was an accepted truth for almost everyone who ever lived, in any society in which marriage existed, that there could be marriages only between participants of different sex. A court should not lightly conclude that everyone who held this belief was irrational, ignorant or bigoted. ...
The majority essentially argued that there are legitimate grounds upon which the legislature could claim that there is a different between traditional marriage and same sex marriage. Whether or not those claims are correct is not a question for the courts. The authors of the state constitution never envisioned it claiming any different, and so the question of marriage is left to the legislature to decide.
I think this is definitely the correct decision. The state constitution never talks about same sex marriage, and so a ruling from the court stating that it is constitutionally required would be simply absurd.
Again, this question only involves matters of state law, and so consequently cannot easily be appealed to a federal court. However, a separate case is heading towards the Court of Appeal regarding whether same-sex marriages established in Massachussets (which does allow it) should be recognised in New York. That will be interesting...
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