If your argument is that Romney could have refused to follow the law, and thus forced a same-sex couple to file with the court and get a court ruling specifically forcing him to follow the law, you are correct, but only in the same way that a governor can always ignore the law and wait until the courts order him to follow the law.
But the question isn’t whether Romney was ever found in violation of a court order, it was whether Romney was required by the court order to implement marriage. He was, and if he had refused, the court would have issued a ruling compelling him to follow the previous ruling.
Courts don’t usually include such language in their rulings, because by and large the executive branch asks their lawyers and then does what the courts required them to do, without having to be found in violation of the law first.
After all, you could walk into a shop and take things off the shelf and walk out. If nobody gets a court to find you guilty, you can keep what you took. But nobody would argue that that means you had a right to take things UNTIL the court found you guilty of doing it.
Charles, everything you are arguing is provably false. The MA court can’t make laws, can’t order the governor or legislature, and they have repeatedly admitted that. There was no new law in Goodridge, no order to anyone. Please, get the basics right. Romney alone imposed homosexual “marriage.” The court never even asked him to. They urged to legislature to legalize it.
Read this, then you’ll see why you need to go back to square one:
“44 conservative leaders across America challenge Romney’s claim he ‘defended’ marriage and the constitution.”
http://www.massresistance.org/docs/marriage/romney/dec_letter/letter.pdf