A number of sources are reporting that U.S. District Court Judge Vaughan Walker will issue a written opinion in the Perry v. Schwarzenegger tomorrow. The Court released this statement:*
"On August 4, 2010, the court will issue its written order containing findings of fact and conclusions of law following the court trial held in January and June of this year. The order will be e-filed in the court's Electronic Case Filing system, and will be immediately available thereafter through ECF and PACER. There will be no court proceeding associated with the publication of the order." The decision will be posted between 1pm and 3pm PDT.
*Obviously, there is no way to know how Walker will rule, but given the evidence entered and the case law and precedents cited by Ted Olson and David Boies, I cannot fathom how Walker can uphold Proposition 8. If he does uphold Prop 8, then the concepts of equal protection, separation of church and state, and freedom of religion will be truly dead in this nation. And frankly, I will be starting on a plan of how to emigrate once my mother is gone. I simply do not want to continue living in a country where I am treated as inferior garbage. As The Advocate notes, one legal scholar observed as follows:
*
Erwin Chemerinsky, a professor at the University of California, Irvine, School of Law, believes Walker will strike down Prop. 8 on grounds that it violates equal protection principles of the U.S. Constitution. Even if Chemerinsky is wrong, the case will likely head to the ninth circuit court of appeals, but that will "surely take more than a year," he says.
*
As we wait for the ruling, it's helpful to review exactly the arguments and evidence that was entered in Perry v.v Schwarzenegger. Here are highlights from David Boies' recent op-ed piece in the San Francisco Chronicle:
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One of the most invidious of the state-sponsored discriminations against gays and lesbians is the prohibition of gay and lesbian marriage. As the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly held over more than a century, marriage is one of our most important personal relationships, and the freedom to marry the person of your choice is protected by constitutional guarantees of liberty, the right of association and due process.
*
Thus, in 1978 the court held unconstitutional a Wisconsin law preventing child-support scofflaws from remarrying. In 1987, the court unanimously struck down as unconstitutional a Missouri law preventing imprisoned felons from marrying. Legitimate state policies supported the Wisconsin and Missouri statutes. The Missouri law in particular was defended on the grounds that since imprisoned felons are unable to have any physical contact with their spouses, let alone live with them, such a marriage could not serve what was claimed to be the "traditional" purposes of marriage, including procreation. The court rejected those arguments, emphasizing in the Wisconsin case that "decisions of this Court confirm that the right to marry is of fundamental importance for all individuals" and in the Missouri case that marriages were constitutionally protected "expressions of emotional support and public commitment."
*
At the beginning of the trial in January, we said we would prove three propositions:
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First, that marriage is a fundamental right - a proposition with which even the defendants agreed. This is important because we are not asking the courts to establish a new right, only to hold that an existing right cannot be denied based on sexual orientation.
*
Second, we proved that depriving gay and lesbian couples of the right to marry seriously harmed them - and seriously harmed the tens of thousands of California children they are raising - economically, socially and psychologically. We also demonstrated that when the state decrees that a gay or lesbian relationship is not worthy of being sanctified by marriage, it sends a dangerous signal to some people that they are second-class citizens to be disapproved and perhaps feared and that discrimination and even physical harassment could be justified. Although the defenders of Prop. 8 initially sought to argue that domestic partnerships are an adequate substitute to marriage, at trial even the defendants' own expert on cross-examination conceded, demonstrated by consistent expert and empirical evidence, that they are not.
*
Third, we said we would prove that the defendants' claim that permitting gay marriage would somehow undermine heterosexual marriage is entirely bogus. This is a matter of both common sense and experience. After all, what heterosexual couple do you know of who would decide not to get married because their gay neighbors can get married? Moreover, countries as Catholic as Argentina and Spain, as different as Sweden and South Africa and as near as Canada have embraced gay marriage without any noticeable effect - except the increase in human happiness and social stability that comes from permitting people to marry for love.
*
Unable to defend Prop. 8 on the merits, defendants argued that it is protected from constitutional challenge because it was passed by 52 percent of California voters. But if we were prepared to leave minority rights up to a majority vote, there would be no need for a constitution - and many state laws discriminating based on race, sex and religion would plague us all.
*
[H]istory is no justification for continued discrimination and, "Times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress."
*
Again, if Walker upholds Prop. 8, my faith in this nation - or at least what little is left of it - will be utterly dead. Religious based discrimination will be upheld as the law of the land and ALL religious minorities and others who do not live their lives in accordance with the perverted Christianist form of Christianity should be on notice that they could be the next group to be stripped of legal rights.
*
One of the most invidious of the state-sponsored discriminations against gays and lesbians is the prohibition of gay and lesbian marriage. As the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly held over more than a century, marriage is one of our most important personal relationships, and the freedom to marry the person of your choice is protected by constitutional guarantees of liberty, the right of association and due process.
*
Thus, in 1978 the court held unconstitutional a Wisconsin law preventing child-support scofflaws from remarrying. In 1987, the court unanimously struck down as unconstitutional a Missouri law preventing imprisoned felons from marrying. Legitimate state policies supported the Wisconsin and Missouri statutes. The Missouri law in particular was defended on the grounds that since imprisoned felons are unable to have any physical contact with their spouses, let alone live with them, such a marriage could not serve what was claimed to be the "traditional" purposes of marriage, including procreation. The court rejected those arguments, emphasizing in the Wisconsin case that "decisions of this Court confirm that the right to marry is of fundamental importance for all individuals" and in the Missouri case that marriages were constitutionally protected "expressions of emotional support and public commitment."
*
At the beginning of the trial in January, we said we would prove three propositions:
*
First, that marriage is a fundamental right - a proposition with which even the defendants agreed. This is important because we are not asking the courts to establish a new right, only to hold that an existing right cannot be denied based on sexual orientation.
*
Second, we proved that depriving gay and lesbian couples of the right to marry seriously harmed them - and seriously harmed the tens of thousands of California children they are raising - economically, socially and psychologically. We also demonstrated that when the state decrees that a gay or lesbian relationship is not worthy of being sanctified by marriage, it sends a dangerous signal to some people that they are second-class citizens to be disapproved and perhaps feared and that discrimination and even physical harassment could be justified. Although the defenders of Prop. 8 initially sought to argue that domestic partnerships are an adequate substitute to marriage, at trial even the defendants' own expert on cross-examination conceded, demonstrated by consistent expert and empirical evidence, that they are not.
*
Third, we said we would prove that the defendants' claim that permitting gay marriage would somehow undermine heterosexual marriage is entirely bogus. This is a matter of both common sense and experience. After all, what heterosexual couple do you know of who would decide not to get married because their gay neighbors can get married? Moreover, countries as Catholic as Argentina and Spain, as different as Sweden and South Africa and as near as Canada have embraced gay marriage without any noticeable effect - except the increase in human happiness and social stability that comes from permitting people to marry for love.
*
Unable to defend Prop. 8 on the merits, defendants argued that it is protected from constitutional challenge because it was passed by 52 percent of California voters. But if we were prepared to leave minority rights up to a majority vote, there would be no need for a constitution - and many state laws discriminating based on race, sex and religion would plague us all.
*
[H]istory is no justification for continued discrimination and, "Times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress."
*
Again, if Walker upholds Prop. 8, my faith in this nation - or at least what little is left of it - will be utterly dead. Religious based discrimination will be upheld as the law of the land and ALL religious minorities and others who do not live their lives in accordance with the perverted Christianist form of Christianity should be on notice that they could be the next group to be stripped of legal rights.
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