By not taking action, the Supreme Court put an important set of actions in motion this week in support of gay marriage. Justices declined to hear appeals from five states that sought to maintain legal bans on same-sex matrimony. And by turning away those petitions, the court raised to 30 the number of states where such marriages are legal.

That's a significant milestone in the battle for full marriage equality — a basic civil right that has been denied to many gay couples for far too long.

On Monday, the high court declined to hear appeals from Indiana, Oklahoma, Utah, Virginia and Wisconsin, where state officials tried to preserve gay marriage bans by challenging lower court rulings. As a result, the court opened the door in six other states — Colorado, Kansas, North Carolina, South Carolina, West Virginia and Wyoming — where couples should be able to marry soon, because those states will now have to comply with appellate court rulings that had been on hold.

Challenges to bans are pending in another 20 states, and they may now have an easier time being successful.

Last year, justices struck down the worst parts of the federal Defense of Marriage Act, giving some lower courts the legal precedent they needed to promote equity. Since that ruling, federal and state courts around the country have used it as a basis to strike down state bans on same-sex marriage.

And as courts struck down marriage bans over the last year, the legal trend was bolstered by states where elected officials, such as Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring, a Democrat, declined to defend discriminatory laws.

The justices did not offer an explanation of why they chose not to hear the appeals. But by not acting, they sent ''a signal to the other courts of appeals that the Supreme Court does not think it's so wrong to allow same-sex couples to marry, and that even conservative justices don't think they have a good shot at getting five votes. And that sends a message that this essentially is over," said Jon Davidson, legal director of Lambda Legal, an advocacy group for gay rights.

It has been heartening to see how quickly attitudes have shifted in support of that view. In 2004, gay marriage was a wedge issue, with some Republicans looking to boost turnout in the presidential election by putting constitutional bans before voters in nearly a dozen states. Until a couple of years ago, statewide votes regularly approved marriage bans.

Now a majority of Americans supports the right of same-sex couples to marry, compared with about a quarter in 1996. Among those under 30, support is at nearly 80 percent.

Here in Minnesota, a constitutional ban was rejected by voters in 2012, and a newly minted DFL Legislature put marriage equality into state law a year later.

But many who object to marriage equality have not given up the fight. There are still states where gay and lesbian couples are legally and unfairly denied the right — along with the financial benefits that come with legal marriage.

And though the ripple effect of the recent court decision is generally positive, the downside of the nonintervention is that it allows a patchwork of state laws to persist. Being legally married in one state and not another can create problems for couples.

That's why there should be a high court ruling to extend marriage equality to all of America.

Yet by standing back on the appeals, the court has further encouraged the march toward that goal. It has laid the foundation for the remaining 20 states to do the right thing and realize that efforts to block this civil right are in vain. Thanks to the court, they are now outliers in America, with one less legal leg upon which to stand.