This ruling is on a technical ground, I believe. The state of CA refused to defend this prop even though it passed. So this organization that opposes same-sex marriage defended the prop. The ruling is that this was not valid because this group had no standing to substitute for the state’s lack of defense.
The resulting demise of the prop is terrible, agreed.
But this was a legalism, not a moralism, or so it claims.
It's hard to make this case when the California Supreme Ct, Judge Walkers federal court, and the Ninth Circus ALL deemed the defender of Prop 8 has having standing. How did the Supremes go off the rails so badly on this?
It is a decision that precludes the people from passing a referendum that the executive branch opposes because the opinion seems to say that only the governor and attorney general of a state have standing to defend it. I don’t know the consequence of an executive branch decision not to defend a law duly and validly passed by a state legislature.
True. Next up probably will be the Constitutionality of same-sex marriage. I'm not very hopeful with this SCOTUS.
Agree, but then how do you allow the Sierra Club to have standing in environmental cases as a ‘stakeholders’? Would seem to be the same in theory.
They have no standing at the federal level, but did it overturn the state law allowing plantiffs who supported/organized the proposition to defend it in state court?
I know for sure Scalia’s position on this so I have to wonder if he voted to deny standing because Kennedy was ready to join the four lefties in declaring gay marriage a fundamental right.
Running interference seems like a plausible explanation.
But that would mean that one of the four lefties was uncomfortable with such a sweeping decision.
We will likely never know.