A win for justice and a win for Malcolm Turnbull

Kevin Rudd wanted a "big Australia". On Wednesday, we got something better: a big-hearted, inclusive Australia.

This is a win for justice. For courage. For modernity. For social cohesion. For the LGBTQI community.

It is also a faith-restoring win for democracy and thus, a victory of sorts for Malcolm Turnbull. Certainly a relief anyway.

The Prime Minister staked his political hide on the Australian people, confidently predicting they would support equality, promising the Parliament would swiftly reflect that outcome.

As such, Turnbull can now claim a measure of vindication for dragging the country through this tortuously long process even if the injury to some is still under-appreciated.

One hopes that the harm has been at least partially assuaged by the strength - and warmth - of public affirmation. Were this a referendum it would have passed easily registering a staggering majority in every state and territory.

Turnbull welcomed the result calling it "an unprecedented exercise in democracy", pledging to "get on with it and get this done, this year, before Christmas".

It is ironic that he chose a Christian festival, because first, Christmas has come early in the form of an emphatic, enveloping embrace of a minority too long discriminated against, too long "tolerated but not accepted".

Second, because this represents a black eye for the men of the cloth.

Clearly, Christians of good conscience voted both ways.

But respect goes to those who bravely ignored denominational leaders ordering a last defiant stand against creeping permissiveness.

Of course, the postal vote was controversial. Commentators, including this one, slammed its cost, and the exceptionalism of publicly judging private relationships, as if one's sexuality is somehow a matter of choice.

Even Turnbull had argued persuasively against any plebiscite under Tony Abbott, urging colleagues to proceed quickly to the parliamentary stage.

He saw Abbott's plebiscite idea for what it was: pseudo-democratic artifice – part delaying tactic, part cynical manoeuvre aimed at killing it dead.

So when Turnbull switched to that path himself, to get the leadership, he looked craven, beholden to the Abbott rump.

Now however, Turnbull believes the result vindicates his political calculus.

Whether Australians demanded their say, as he would have it, or simply stepped up where parliament had failed, is a matter of perspective.

But there is no gainsaying the momentum imparted here. The extra authority is palpable.

It means this change once legislated will be functionally irreversible - a legitimacy that may not have attached to a narrow and grimly fought two or three-vote margin secured via the parliamentary route alone.

Even now, the Australian Christian Lobby's Lyle Shelton says no matter is ever definitively settled, but frankly, that dog won't hunt. Australians have spoken.

Like it or loathe it, their emphatic endorsement via this expensive, traumatic, but surprisingly enlarging process, has ensured an overdue reform is real and durable.

That's a win for Turnbull who, however expensively, has neutralised his party's reactionaries. And an even bigger win for Australian respect.