BREAKING: Ninth Circuit Passes on Further Review of Prop 8 Case, Setting Up Appeal to Supreme Court
Posted by Chris Geidner |
June 5, 2012 12:55 PM
http://www.metroweekly.com/poliglot/2012/06/ninth-circuit-passes-on-further-review-of-prop-8-c.html (http://www.metroweekly.com/poliglot/2012/06/ninth-circuit-passes-on-further-review-of-prop-8-c.html)
The federal appeals court hearing the challenge to California's Proposition 8 passed on taking another look at the ruling. The decision today by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit not to reconsider the appeal, in which a three-judge panel had found the amendment to be unconstitutional in February, starts a 90-day clock for the proponents to decide whether they will ask the Supreme Court to hear the case.
"A majority of the panel has voted to deny the petition for rehearing en banc," the court wrote.
The proponents of Proposition 8, who are defending the 2008 enactment in court, had requested the en banc rehearing. The court did not give a reason for its decision. Under the court's rules, a majority of the 26 active judges on the court would have needed to agree to grant the rehearing.
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Scottie Thomaston
Queer and criminal justice rights and disability rights activist and writer; contributor, Courage Campaign Institute's Prop 8 Trial Tracker
Ninth Circuit Denies Request to Rehear Prop 8 Case, So What Happens Now?
Posted: 06/05/2012 1:22 pm
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scottie-thomaston/9th-circuit-prop-8_b_1571220.html (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scottie-thomaston/9th-circuit-prop-8_b_1571220.html)
The judges sitting in the Ninth Circuit have issued a new order in the Perry v. Brown case today. The full panel of Ninth Circuit judges has decided that en banc rehearing of the three-judge panel's decision will not be granted. This comes after a months-long wait: The proponents of Proposition 8 announced their intention to seek en banc review of the Ninth Circuit's three-judge panel decision on Feb. 21 of this year. As we noted yesterday, the decision to deny rehearing of the case with a new, randomly selected, 11-judge panel means that Judge Reinhardt's opinion, which was joined by Judge Michael Daly Hawkins and garnered a dissent by Judge N. Randy Smith, either way, will likely be appealed to the Supreme Court, where the proponents will now likely file a petition for certiorari, asking them to review and possibly overturn Judge Reinhardt's opinion for the Ninth Circuit's panel of three judges.
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No one is certain if the Supreme Court would grant review of the case as it currently stands. Judge Reinhardt's opinion for the three-judge Ninth Circuit panel is very narrow, and the holding is specific to California's unique legal circumstances. A denial of rehearing in this case leaves the decision California-specific, and there may not be four Justices -- the number needed to grant certiorari -- who want to visit an issue that's so limited in scope. On the other hand, the panel's decision did strike down an amendment to a constitution of an enormous state involving a contentious issue. And allowing gay couples to marry in California would nearly double the amount of people in the United States who live in an area that allows same-sex marriage.