A federal appeals court has rejected an attempt to suspend California’s ban on gay marriage while it is challenged in court. The ban was approved in 2008 when California voters passed the initiative known as Proposition 8, but last year U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker ruled it was unconstitutional. The judge’s decision has been put on hold pending an appeal to the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. LGBT rights advocates, along with California’s attorney general, had requested gay marriages be allowed to proceed while the appeal is underway.