Gay couples in Hawaii are free to marry in December after a state circuit judge ruled Thursday that the state’s new marriage equality law is legal.

Judge Karl Sakamoto refused to issue a temporary restraining order sought by state Rep. Bob McDermott and a group of Christians who wanted to prevent the state from issuing marriage licenses to gay couples Dec. 2.

Sakamoto ruled that the state Legislature has the inherent authority to define marriage independently of a 1998 constitutional amendment that gave lawmakers the power to reserve marriage for heterosexual couples. The judge also cited the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in June that legally married gay couples are entitled to federal benefits but that individual states can decide whether to approve gay marriage.

"After all the legal complexity of the court’s analysis, the court will conclude that same-sex marriage in Hawaii is legal," Sakamoto said.

Gov. Neil Abercrombie signed the marriage equality bill — known as Senate Bill 1 — into law Wednesday after an extraordinary special session of the Legislature that the governor called in response to the Supreme Court’s decision.

"I’m very pleased with the court’s ruling," state Attorney General David Louie told reporters. "I think the court clearly said that SB 1 is constitutional. SB 1 can go forward. The Legislature had the power to enact SB 1 under its general powers as a Legislature."

McDermott (R, Ewa Beach-Iroquois Point) and his attorneys did not immediately say whether they would appeal the court’s ruling.

"All you can do is all you can do, and that’s what we tried to do today. We tried to give a voice to the people of Hawaii," McDermott told reporters. "We fell short — and I guess that’s my fault — but we did the best we could do."

Many legal analysts had considered McDermott’s lawsuit a long shot given the clear legislative intent behind the 1998 constitutional amendment and the inherent authority the Legislature has to enact laws.

The Legislature had placed the amendment before voters in response to the state Supreme Court’s 1993 ruling in Baehr v. Lewin, which held that denying gay couples marriage licenses was a violation of equal protection under the state Constitution.

The 1998 vote essentially transferred power to define marriage from the Supreme Court to the Legislature.

But Sakamoto described it as a unique constitutional provision that was not as clear cut as the state and legal experts had argued. The judge said that the plain meaning behind the vote was for the Legislature to reserve marriage to heterosexual couples. He said that the vote did not give the Legislature expanded constitutional power to recognize same-sex marriage.

But Sakamoto also held that the 1998 vote did not restrict the Legislature’s separate authority — under Article III, Section 1 of the state Constitution — to enact laws that define marriage.

Sakamoto appeared satisfied by Louie’s clarification that the marriage equality law was not an expansion of the 1998 constitutional amendment, but an exercise of the Legislature’s distinct and inherent authority to pass laws.

Sakamoto also ruled that McDermott and the group of Christians had standing to bring the lawsuit as voters because marriage equality is an issue of great public importance. The state had argued that McDermott and the others did not have standing because they could not show actual harm from same-sex marriage.

The legal arguments before the court Thursday at times matched some of the color and drama of the marriage equality debate at the Legislature. Jack Dwyer, an attorney for McDermott, maintained that voters thought they were banning same-sex marriage in 1998 and should be able to vote again before the state allows gay marriage, a riff on the "Let the people vote!" chant from protesters during the session.

Dwyer brought out ballot instructions from the state and written declarations from Joe Moore, a top-rated newscaster for KHON, and Michael W. Perry, a top-rated radio personality for KSSK, that showed voters were told before the 1998 vote that the constitutional amendment would reserve marriage to heterosexual couples only.

"The fact is the people thought they were putting this issue to bed and marriage in Hawaii would thereafter be defined as a relationship between a man and a woman," Dwyer told the judge.

Louie questioned how the court could ever divine voter intent from 1998, a feat beyond what a "Las Vegas mind reader" could do.

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Staff writer Ken Kobayashi contributed to this report.