Marriage Amendment Hearing Denied

Special Report - June 7, 2012
The fate of California’s Marriage Protection Amendment, Proposition 8, will most certainly be decided by the United States Supreme Court, after a full panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit denied an appeal on Tuesday in the ongoing legal battle over the amendment’s constitutionality. In an order issued June 5, the Ninth Circuit denied a petition from the Proposition 8 legal team that asked the full court to review a February decision by a three-judge panel of the same court that struck down the amendment. The 2 to 1 ruling by the panel upheld a district court ruling that Proposition 8 violates the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

In response to Tuesday’s order from the full Ninth Circuit, the ProtectMarriage.com legal team, which includes the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), announced its intention to appeal the February 2012 decision by the three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit to the U.S. Supreme Court. “Marriage is a universal good that has been honored by diverse cultures and faiths for the entire history of Western Civilization,” said ADF Senior Counsel Brian Raum in a press release. “The Protectmarriage.com legal team looks forward to standing before the U.S. Supreme Court on behalf of the people’s right to preserve the fundamental building block of civilization, especially since the dissent accompanying today’s decision strongly supports our arguments.”

Three judges on the Ninth Circuit dissented from the majority opinion’s decision not to rehear the Proposition 8 case. “Based on a two-judge majority’s gross misapplication of Romer v. Evans…, we have now declared that animus must have been the only conceivable motivation for a sovereign State to have remained committed to a definition of marriage that has existed for millennia….”states the dissent, which was issued with the June 5 order denying a review of the case. “Even worse, we have overruled the will of seven million California Proposition 8 voters based on a reading of Romer that would be unrecognizable to the Justices who joined it, to those who dissented from it, and to the judges from sister circuits who have since interpreted it. We should not have so roundly trumped California’s democratic process without at least discussing this unparalleled decision as an en banc court.”

Related resources:
CA Marriage Amendment Rulled Unconstitutional - February 8, 2012
The Gold Standard - FNC - Winter 2012
Prop 8 Ruling Gets Green Light - November 18, 2011
Why Gender Matters to Parenting - FNC - Spring 2010
9th Circuit Punts Prop 8 - January 6, 2011
NCFPC Joins Prop 8 Brief - September 24, 2010
9th Circuit Stays Prop 8 Ruling - August 16, 2010
Judge Won't Stay Prop 8 Ruling - August 13, 2010
Judge Rules Prop 8 Unconstitutional - August 5, 2010
The Issue That Will Not Go Away - FNC Spring 2010
California Court Upholds Marriage Amendment - May 26, 2009
Why Not Same-Sex “Marriage” - FNC - Spring 2010
California Amendment Not Retroactive - August 8, 2008

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