Prop 8 is a bill of attainder, and those are unconstitutional in and of themselves. The judge in this ruling is ruling on the issue of what states must do under the constitution, specifically the 14th amendment.
If this is a states rights issue, it can't go further than the CA State Supreme Court. If it is considered a civil rights issue (which isn't the crux of the issue before the judge), then it may go to the US Supreme Court.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100804/ap_on_re_us/us_gay_marriage_trial Walker, however, found it violated the Constitution's due process and equal protection clauses while failing "to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license." Walker was nominated by Reagan but democrats delayed his confirmation until GHW Bush's term. He's a (gay) republican. That whole "due process" bit is about it being a bill of attainder, FTW.
Interestingly enough, I'm watching the two attorneys who won this case, on CNN (AC360). David Boies was the attorney who prosecuted Microsoft for much of the Clinton years (but that case was eventually dropped). Ted Olson was solicitor general for GHW Bush administration, a staunch republican. Solicitor General is the attorney for the USA in all cases before the Supreme Court. Olson was attorney for W Bush during Bush v. Gore, and Boies was attorney for Gore. Now they're on the same side. The winning side.
It clearly shouldn't be considered a conflict of interest that he is gay. If that does make it a conflict of interest, then the opposite would have to be considered a conflict of interest as well. I guess the only way to decide this with one person would be to find someone who is bisexual??? I am kidding about the bisexual part for the most part but unless you can find someone who is asexual you are going to have this issue. As to the judge's quote about there not being a rational basis to single out gays and lesbians, that right there is just plain irrational to say. I also don't want to see lawsuits trying to force churches to marry same sex couples. IF they don't want to do it they shouldn't have to. They also shouldn't have to worry about losing their tax exempt status over any lawsuits. They should however lose their tax exempt status, but only because a church is a business in my opinion. I went to church as a kid and I helped collect the offering once or twice and recall walking a butt load of cash back to the pastor's office and dumping it on his desk. I bet nobody ever took any. Plus if an NBA superstar can buy his formerly drug addicted mother a church..................
Bodyman is correct. Would someone say only whites could adjudicate civil rights cases? Only men women's rights? Only Protestants the rights of religious minorities? Would the reverse hold true, for example, could only a GLBT judge adjudicate a divorce and custody battle of a heterosexual couple? Have any of those beating their manly breasts over the Prop 8 ruling followed the trial? Read the questions the judge put to both sides at the end of trial? Are aware of the issues of fact and law raised in the case? Read Judge Walker's opinion? Yes? No? I'm willing to bet in a lot of cases, including the originator of the thread, the answers are resounding no. Read the Constitution. Judges don't just exist for criminal cases but precisely to rule on Constitutionality. Including of popular measures. For example, Loving v. Virginia was decided in 1967. It took nearly 25 years before a majority of Americans agreed with that decision. BTW, do those beating their manly breasts know how loathed Judge Walker was in the GLBT community? That some in our community were dismayed that he was the judge in the case and thought Olsen and Boies should have challenged him? That in fact both sides agreed to accept Judge Walker? Have any of those beating their manly breasts ever read Boies' and Olsen's companion articles, respectively, The Liberal Case for Gay Marriage and The Conservative Case for Gay Marriage, in which they explain how they came from very different places to the same conclusion, but for diferent reasons? Hilariously, the supporters of Prop 8 are arguing for a stay on the grounds that if gay and lesbian couples were allowed to start marrying again and Judge Walker's decision was later overturned on appeal, this would cause trauma to these same sex couples. Talk about gall, when they sought in court to have 18,000 marriages overturned. They are also saying that the GLBT community was led astray by two lawyers with big egos. Because these poor dumb queers are incapable of knowing what's good for us. (Almost identical to what opponents of women's rights say about women seeking birth control and abortion, led astray by evil Planned Parenthood, poor little girls don't know what they are doing.) Lest I sound mad, I'm not. Maybe by tomorrow. Or this afternoon. As I sit in my Pride T-shirt and rainbow earrings, the rainbow flags in my home and cubicle are flying a little higher and prouder today. Or as the really really corny song says: Sign carried by a woman at last night's celebration in SF: "Lesbians Love Boies".
Tried to edit post but function won't work. The case was about civil marriage. Ministers may refuse to marry same sex couples just as Catholic priests refuse to marry divorced people and Orthodox rabbis refuse to marry Jews to non-Jews. The difference is that all these marriages are legally valid regardless of who chooses to bless them.
Exactly why goverment needs to get out of the "marriage" business (which in itself is a mixing of church and state that might be unconstitutional). Governmental recognition of "civil unions" should be a completely seperate process from the religious "marriage", as it is when people choose to get hitched before a Justice of the Peace or some other governmental offical. Some gay people (oops, excuse me, GLBT) might object from the semantic barring from being "married" vs. a civil union, but there are plenty of GLBT-friendly churches out there that would happily marry a gay couple.
I wouldn't worry about that if I were you: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_people_and_the_Latter_Day_Saint_movement If Mormons were legally allowed to discriminate against blacks until 1978 (well past the Civil Rights Movement), why shouldn't they be allowed to discriminate against gay people indefinitely? Bigotry is perfectly legal if you wrap it around the way you worship Invisible Sky Daddy. There probably will be some law suits (it's America--we sue over everything) but I don't see them winning.
What cracks me up is that Prop 8 was passed on huge black support, since they came out to vote for Obama in droves. Yep, there's nothing like one minority who constantly feels discriminated against discriminating against another.
No, not really. The actual (not hypothesized) vote totals were not significantly different among African-Americans. Although I agree that Equality California did a monumentally crummy job of outreach outside white, middle class, urban folks.
It was federal courts who declared abortion legal--effectively saying f--- you to every unborn child.
Yes, because as of that date every unborn child has been aborted. Do you even read what you type through the hate?
