When your obligation under the state constitution is to defend the laws of the state -- and any constitutional amendments passed by the people of your state -- your duty should be pretty clear.

Unfortunately, California Attorney General Jerry Brown doesn't believe he has to fulfill the duty he owes to the people.

In a surprise move, state Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown asked the California Supreme Court on Friday to invalidate Proposition 8. He said the November ballot measure that banned gay marriage "deprives people of the right to marry, an aspect of liberty that the Supreme Court has concluded is guaranteed by the California Constitution."

It is the attorney general's duty to defend the state's laws, and after gay rights activists filed legal challenges to Proposition 8, which amended the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage, Brown said he planned to defend the proposition as enacted by the people of California.

But after studying the matter, Brown concluded that "Proposition 8 must be invalidated because the amendment process cannot be used to extinguish fundamental constitutional rights without compelling justification."

In other words, Brown has arrogantly taken it upon himself to substitute his view of the matter for the view of the people of the state of California who passed an amendment to the state constitution to formally establish the definition of marriage as that which it has been since the founding of the American Republic -- one man and one woman.

In other words, what Brown has done here is to promulgate as the official position of the state of California the position taken by the losing side in the last election. What's more, he has taken the position that right of the people to govern themselves and to alter or abolish their form of government does not exist -- and that they have no recourse in the face of judicial tyrants who impose novel interpretations of the very document from which they derive their authority. In other words, he has rejected the notion that the people are sovereign and instead seeks to have the California Supreme Court rule that the people of that state are mere subjects. As such, he has actively violated his oath of office and should be immediately impeached and removed from office.

That will not happen, of course, given the predilection of some members of the gerrymandered General Assembly to ignore the vote of the people on the same issue and attempt to legalize what the people of California had banned when they voted for a proposition against gay marriage in 2000 -- despite explicit constitutional prohibitions on repealing such initiatives through legislation.

What is even more frightening is that the California Supreme Court may take it upon itself to use Brown's filing to overturn Prop 8 -- after all, it is a specific rebuke to that activist court that overturned the previous vote of the people because it overturns last spring's decision legalizing gay marriages.

What we may have here, then, is a situation in which it may become the obligation of the Federal Government to intervene in California, under the authority conveyed by Article IV, Section 4 of the US Constitution.

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.

After all, if the ruling of the court is that the people may not alter or abolish the government established by their state constitution and that the voice of the people on matters of public policy carry no force, then it is clear that there does not exist a Republican Form of Government in that state.

And of Congress or the Obama Administration were to fail to act in such a situation? Jefferson addresses that matter well.

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."

Like the patriots of old, prepare the tar and feathers -- and like the people of Italy at the end of WWII, prepare the piano wire and meat hooks.

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