Posted on 05/14/2008 12:23:13 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
The California Supreme Court says it plans to issue its long-awaited decision on whether to legalize same-sex marriage on Thursday.
The high court announced the pending opinion on its Web site Wednesday morning. Justices heard oral arguments in a series of cases brought by gay and lesbian couples, the city of San Francisco and two gay rights advocacy groups in early March.
The court has been asked to decide whether the state's one man-one woman marriage laws violate the civil rights of same-sex couples.
If it rules in favor of the plaintiffs, California could become the second state after Massachusetts where gays and lesbians can legally wed.
bkmark
My nephew will be thrilled. I’m sure they’ll decide to legalize it.
Gay Marriage was used a the precedent to overturn Parental Notification Laws in MA. The Judge ruled that the state has a compelling interest in teaching 3rd graders about Homosexuality.
In this case, they would have ignored the explicitly stated words of the state constitution.
Just waiting for the 9th Circus to rule on the legality of marriage between a man and his ‘endangered’ polar bear. Will enviro rights trump ‘alternative’ sexual orientation?
The Founding Fathers are spinning in their graves.
“If it rules in favor of the plaintiffs...”
What do they mean IF?
It’s California, isn’t it?
Homosexuals need to keep in mind, however, that the good news of the gospel is not about how God despises same-sex sexual relationships. In fact, 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 indicates that certain members of that church had been slaves to such relationships but had been cleansed in Jesus' name. So these former homosexuals had evidently repented and accepted God's grace to straighten their lives out.
John 3:16
Revelation 3:20
The California Supreme Court called for a halt to gay marriages a couple years back and has been a strong ‘conservative-leaning’ court for a quite a few years. Unfortunately Fed Judges have been hell-bent on their own agendas on issues that don’t usually fall under the domain of the Ca Supreme Court.
The most recent female replacement by the Gub is likely to be one vote to approve of gay marriage, but in the end, I suspect the vote will be 5-2 or more like 6-1 to support the state Constitution and not the Mass. approach.
Just a hunch. ;-)
Good, now I may be free to marry Bill Gates. If he’ll have me. No prenup.
Good. I’m glad to hear it.
I hope your prediction is correct.
Norm - yes, the Court, is, thankfully, more conservative under the stewardship of Ronald George. I can’t see him negating the will of the California electorate, especially when no challenge to the validity of the law was brought at the time it was passed.
Me too. I bet my sub-prime mortgage on it. ;-)
They’re one of the last vestiges of hope on many issues and even then, they astound sometimes too.
Pictured en banc in the Supreme Court Courtroom in Sacramento are the court’s seven justices, from left to right: Associate Justice Carlos R. Moreno, Associate Justice Joyce L. Kennard, Associate Justice Kathryn Mickle Werdegar, Chief Justice Ronald M. George, Associate Justice Ming W. Chin, Associate Justice Marvin R. Baxter, and Associate Justice Carol A. Corrigan. (Photo: Sirlin Photographers
Arnie’s supreme court choice, Carol Corrigan, looks very sympathetic... to the left.
This is from oral arguments in March.
http://www.law.com/jsp/ca/PubArticleCA.jsp?id=900005505009
Gay Unions Seem OK to George
The Recorder
By Mike McKee
March 5, 2008
As gay couples and conservative demonstrators exchanged insults outside the California Supreme Court on Tuesday, history was being made inside the building during oral arguments over same-sex marriage.
Questions by the court hinted strongly that the justices are leaning 4-3 in favor of declaring unconstitutional an 8-year-old law prohibiting the state from recognizing nuptials between gays and lesbians. Such a ruling would be one of the court’s biggest civil rights bombshells since it invalidated the state’s miscegenation law in 1948.
“If preventing marriage between interracial couples is racial discrimination, why isn’t preventing marriage between same-sex couples sexual discrimination?” Justice Joyce Kennard asked Sacramento-based Deputy Attorney General Christopher Krueger, who argued against gay marriage.
Going into Tuesday’s arguments, Chief Justice Ronald George was considered the swing vote, but no one had any idea where he stood.
That changed quickly as he joined Kennard and Justices Carlos Moreno and Kathryn Mickle Werdegar in what appeared to be solid votes for gay marriage. George led the way in batting down all arguments against the concept.
When lawyers argued that the state Legislature couldn’t overrule the people’s will, George pulled out case cites for two rulings in which courts invalidated voter-adopted rules they found unconstitutional. One was 1966’s Mulkey v. Reitman, 64 Cal.2d 529, in which the state high court voided a law that would have allowed discrimination in housing laws. The other — Citizens Against Rent Control v. Berkeley, 454 U.S. 290 (1981), was a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in which Chief Justice Warren Burger said, “Voters may no more violate the Constitution by enacting a ballot measure than a legislative body may do so by enacting legislation.”
The chief also fought off arguments that most other states’ high courts have ruled against gay marriage by pointing out that most of those decisions were by one vote. He also referred to a recent New Jersey government report on that state’s civil unions, and noted that the California court had taken judicial notice of it.
“That report,” George said, “seems to be rather negative about civil unions, domestic partnerships, as opposed to marriage.”
George and Moreno tag-teamed at one point, noting that the court’s 1948 ruling on interracial marriage — Perez v. Sharp, 32 Cal.2d 711 — contained wording that supported a right by Californians “to marry the person of one’s choice.”
The two justices also brought up Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, in which the U.S. Supreme Court in 2003 invalidated anti-sodomy laws nationwide. Moreno and George suggested that Lawrence was just as much about freedom of association as it was about sodomy, and wondered whether the court shouldn’t apply a similar broad view to the marriage case.
“Doesn’t that authority … support the view of the petitioners,” George asked, “that we need to consider a right to marry, rather than the creation of a new right to marriage by the same sex?”
Moreno, the court’s sole Democratic appointee, pointed out that even U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who dissented in Lawrence, said that ruling “left no room” to deny gay marriage.
When Deputy AG Krueger argued that Scalia was simply engaging in hyperbole about possible legal scenarios down the line, Moreno stopped him and said, “We’re here. We’re here.” Several audience members laughed.
On the other side of the coin were justices Ming Chin, Carol Corrigan and Marvin Baxter, who seemed to believe the domestic partnerships currently offered by the state are sufficient.
Chin asked San Francisco Deputy City Attorney Therese Stewart whether benefits provided through domestic partnership aren’t “substantially the same” as those in marriage. As Stewart tried to answer, Chin cut her short, twice more demanding a quick answer to the same question.
At one point during arguments, Chin said he saw differences between the arguments against interracial and same-sex marriage. Racism was rampant in the 1940s, he noted, while today’s domestic partner laws are very favorable toward gay couples.
“Does the fact that the Legislature has made domestic partnerships and heterosexual partnerships equal” make a difference, he asked? “Is there still a disparate treatment?”
Some of Chin’s strongest comments were directed at Shannon Minter, legal director of the San Francisco-based National Center for Lesbian Rights. He asked whether Minter’s position would force “priests, rabbis and ministers” to perform same-sex marriages despite their beliefs.
Chin later stung the chief justice’s observation that Perez supports marrying a person of one’s choice by invoking the polygamy scenario. “Why doesn’t the same argument,” he asked Minter, “apply to a person who wants to marry two people?”
“Or,” Justice Corrigan chimed in, “a cousin?”
Minter said same-sex couples wouldn’t be changing the state’s rules on substantive rights, whereas the scenarios posed by Chin and Corrigan “would require a very wholesale drastic revision of our marriage laws.”
Corrigan, meanwhile, acknowledged that the state of marriage law is evolving in California. But she noted that more than 60 percent of voters approved Proposition 22, the 2000 ballot initiative that defined marriage as an institution between a man and a woman.
“Who decides where we are as Californians in our evolution?” she asked Stewart. “Is it for this court to decide or the people of California to decide?”
The competing George and Chin factions came together on one thing — trashing the arguments of arch-conservative attorneys Glen Lavy, representing the Proposition 22 Legal Defense & Education Fund, and Mathew Staver, with the Campaign for California Families.
Especially galling to the court were Lavy’s arguments that a prime purpose of marriage is procreation and Staver’s insistence that same-sex marriage would undermine the institution of marriage.
“What about people who are incapable biologically or don’t want to have children?” George asked Lavy, of Scottsdale, Ariz. Added Kennard: “Should infertile couples be prohibited from entering into marriage?”
The arguments by Staver, of Maitland, Fla., got no sympathy even from Corrigan and Chin. Corrigan said she couldn’t see how allowing gays to marry would rob heterosexual couples of any rights.
Staver said if gays could wed, marriage “would lose its meaning” and eventually result in “a new system that wouldn’t be recognizable as marriage.”
The futility of Staver’s position was summed up best when Chin sarcastically asked Stewart, who was getting ready to make her rebuttal: “Did Mr. Staver just make your argument for you?”
The arguments, which were heard on the high court’s 158th anniversary, drew huge crowds inside and outside the court. Protesters outside the building held up placards saying such things as “Gay = Pervert” and “Sodomy Is Sin,” while gay-rights supporters held signs saying “Stop Ignorance. Being Gay Is Not a Choice” and “Your Religion Is Not My Government.”
A ruling in In re Marriage Cases, S147999, is due in 90 days.
We are talking the Gub here, yaknow, who would abide the court’s decision over and above the poeple’s votes in the past.
It is only fitting he lose this one as he surrounds himself with those who would ask the court to turn from the Constitution and to their hearts instead.
It’s hard to take the liberal out of a fella when what he espouses is just that..
Hey there! Long time no talk to.
Well, that article certainly shoots my impression of George completely out of the water.
I’m trying to grasp the significance of them saying “by one vote” - because, isn’t that all it takes. California voters spoke to this. California voters said marriage is between a man and a woman. Period. There is no compelling judicial reason or precedent to override the voters.
The California Supreme Court (which is not the same court as the 9th Circuit, a federal court based in California) is actually fairly conservative. I will be very surprised if they rule in favor of gay marriage.
Gay marriage will, however, come to California before too long. The (overwhelmingly Democratic) Legislature has voted in favor of it several times, only to see it vetoed by Arnold. Since Arnold is term-limited and the next Governor will probably be a Dem, it will be enacted (just not by the courts).
I think the U.S. Supreme Court sees this train heading straight for them, under the auspices of the “Full Faith and Credit” doctrine. If California sanctions it, it will now be on an express track, because gays will marry in California, go back to Nevada, and be told their marriage is not valid. They’ll use Idaho, Arizona, etc., as their testing ground because that keeps the appeal in the 9th Circuit. They aren’t going to risk going to a less liberal court.
If the state Supreme’s really do this (and I’m not certain that they will), look for some of them to be voted out and others to be recalled. Former and current Californians remember what happened to “Rosie & The Supremes,” the out-of-control leftist judges that Jerry Brown appointed, in 1986.
True enough. If people and/or the legislatures in various states vote for same sex marriage, it’s far different than having it imposed by a court.
Marriage laws as they stand are not discriminatory. Any eligible man can marry any eligible woman. Everyone is limited to one partner. Certain close relatives are off limits in marriage. Everyone is treated equally under the current marriage laws. So the discrimination argument is clearly lacking. Of course I’m not a judge. The judges might make up the law as they go along.
Well, it was written in a SF newspaper, so it may have some bias or hopeful thinking. I don’t know enough about any of them to have formed an independent view. But it was the most detailed account I could find so thought I would post it as a refresher on the issues and the players.
As to the issue, Prop 22 defined marriage as it is included in the Code. We should have made it a Constitutional Amendment at the time and we wouldn’t be giving the lefties a chance to undo it.
Next they will use their authority to enforce the laws, so why do we need a governor?
Why are you sure? Do you know anything about these justices?
Yup. "Let the judges, decide" was a direct quote, IIRC.
I don’t doubt it.
Sorry, I guess I wasn’t giving Cali the benefit of the doubt.
If the Supreme Court declares Gay Marriage legal, look for a constitutional amendment referendum on the ballot in November to nullify the decision.
That's an idiotic statement. What do you know about these particular justices?
Nice prediction. It already qualified and it will be on the ballot regardless.
I should have known. Of all the dumb-a** petitions being shoved in my face at Wal-Mart, THIS one they didn’t give me!
My money is on the California Supreme Court forcing the state to allow gay marriage. Yes, the court is conservative by California standards, but reports of oral argument make me very pessimistic.
BOHICA!
Also keep in mind that just because we are talking about a Blue State, doesn’t mean that its high court will hand down a Liberal decision. In New York, its high court ruled 4-3 that only the State Legislature could legalize gay marriage; and that’s a State that doesn’t ban gay marriage in its State Constitution or statutorily.
Thank you very much for your VERY belated input.
I have already been corrected by, and had a very nice exchange with, another “poster” who is MUCH more polite and pleasant than you.
I’m sorry if your Left Coast sensibilities were offended by me sarcastic comments. Perhaps you should seek counseling.
Thank you. I have also heard from others who agree with you. I hope you are all correct.
If the CA Supreme Court DOES rule against Gay marriage once, can’t they do it again if the DEM legislature passes another law?
G.D.!!! Have you been watching THIS???
I haven’t paid much attention to it.
More than likely the somewhat conservative California Supremes will say no.
If they say yes, then it will go to our somewhat conservative ScotUS.
The claim in this case is that the state Constitution requires gay marriage, regardless of what the Legislature does. If the Court decides against that claim, it doesn't prevent the Legislature from recognizing gay marriage, unless there is a Constitutional amendment (which in California can be done by referendum of the voters) passed to ban it.
Look’s like this Virginian knows “those particular justices” better than a particular Californian, doesn’t it?
Whose idiotic now?
I’m hearing on the radio that it can’t go to the SCOTUS!!!
What was idiotic was to declare automatically that because it was California the judges would rule that way. In fact it was so close that no one knew right up until the final moment. Predicting a coin toss accurately doesn't prove anything. But claiming that it shows some kind of skill is indeed idiotic.
“I’m hearing on the radio that it can’t go to the SCOTUS!!!”
I don’t know that sounds like liberal bs when they win in a lower court.
Apparently, a county official in the Southland is asking for guidance incase this goes to the Supreme Court.
It is a pretty safe bet that a given branch of the government of California will, when given the opportunity, do the WRONG thing. I was betting WITH the odds.
I know you are live in California and I you probably love your state; but as an objective observer (and I really am objective even if i AM a smart-a$$), who has visited Califoarnia a couple times, I assure you it is NOT a nice place. There is beautiful scenery and spectacular views and wonderful natural features in many parts of it; but the state is run by, and for the most part inhabited by, absolute lunatics.
Of course, Virginia is not even conservative enough for me any more. I am considering moving to northern Alabama to get away from the crazies here.
Shouldn’t be an “are” in the first sentence of second paragraph. Sorry.
Not the State Supreme Court, their rulings are pretty good most of the time. Until Bush appointed Janice Rogers Brown to the DC Court, it was a solid, mostly good court.
He further went on to say that even if the people pass a State constitutional amendment, that the State Supremes find "unconstitutional," that the US Supremes can't over-rule that either.
I could be wrong, but that there sounds like we be's screwed!!!(If you'll pardon the Ebonics)
No hunching allowed on this thread!!! (grin)(smirk)(snicker)
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