Free Republic

To those calling for Justice Alito's (and Justice Thomas') recusal on January 6th cases because their wives expressed personal political opinions (3 years ago): Meet the-late Ramona Ripston. For 38 years, she led the ACLU of Southern California. She was the wife of the-late Judge Stephen Reinhardt on the Ninth Circuit. Ramona Ripston filed an amicus brief in the trial court in a same-sex marriage case. Judge Reinhardt--her husband--heard the appeal. He faced calls for his recusal. The left expressed indignation in this 2013 court filing:

German Medical Association president Klaus Reinhardt has been forced to clarify his position on mask-wearing after his claim that there was no “scientific evidence they are actually helpful” sparked an outcry from politicians and doctors. Reinhardt told a TV talk show on public broadcaster ZDF that he had doubts wearing simple non-medical masks outdoors was effective against the coronavirus. Such face coverings, he said, offered “no protection at all” to those wearing them, and only “very little protection against infecting others.” A sharp rise in coronavirus cases across Germany in recent weeks has led to stricter rules in many cities,...

WASHINGTON — In the spring of 2014, a friend tried to nudge Judge Stephen Reinhardt, then an 83-year-old liberal stalwart on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, into stepping aside from full-time duties so President Barack Obama could nominate a successor. The friend, Erwin Chemerinsky, now the dean at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, said he had gently suggested to Judge Reinhardt that he and another longtime liberal figure on the San Francisco-based court make way while Democrats still had the power to assure that jurists with a similar philosophy would take their...

Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit has died, a court spokesperson confirmed. He was 87. A liberal champion, Reinhardt was appointed to the bench by President Carter in 1980. He authored key liberal court opinions on hot-button topics ranging from abortion and marriage equality to assisted suicide and immigration. At the same time, the opinions made him a target of criticism from conservative corners — and of regular reversal from the Supreme Court.

In what may seem like a bad joke, a U.S. federal appellate court has spared an illegal immigrant convicted of kidnapping from deportation ruling that it’s not necessarily a crime of moral turpitude. The decision, issued this week by the famously liberal 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, rambles on for 27 pages and is almost comical. “This undoubtedly appears to be a difficult question at first glance,” it reads. “Kidnapping is a serious crime, and our instincts may be that it would meet the moral turpitude definition. Even for serious offenses, we must look to the specific elements of the...

Eugene Volokh’s post below discusses a dissent by the Ninth Circuit’s Judge Reinhardt in a capital sentencing case. Judge Reinhardt accurately states that carrying a gun is a Second Amendment right, to make the broader point that carrying a gun is not, in itself, illegitimate behavior. Judge Reinhardt could have strengthened his opinion by citing two cases in which the U.S. Supreme Court reversed capital convictions because the district court had improperly treated gun carrying as evidence of malign, homicidal intent. The first of these is Gourko v. United States, 153 U.S. 183 (1894). John Gourko was 19 year old...

Complete title: Homosexual nuptials: A sweetheart deal--Judges ignore conflicts of interest to push radical social agenda Judge Stephen R. Reinhardt of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals refuses to disqualify himself from a case challenging California's homosexual "marriage" ban even though his wife has been directly involved in the case. His insistence on serving as one of three judges to consider Perry v. Schwarzenegger is an affront to the rule of law.The case involves a ban on homosexual "marriages" that was passed by statewide referendum. Federal District Court Judge Vaughn Walker, himself a homosexual, ruled the law unconstitutional, and...

Here, for reasons that I shall provide in a memorandum to be filed in due course, I am certain that “a reasonable person with knowledge of all the facts would [not] conclude that [my] impartiality might reasonably be questioned.” United States v. Nelson, 718 F.2d 315, 321 (9th Cir. 1983); see also Sao Paulo State of the Federated Republic of Brazil v. Am. Tobacco Co., 535 U.S. 229, 233 (2002) (per curiam). I will be able to rule impartially on this appeal, and I will do so. The motion is therefore DENIED.

SAN FRANCISCO -- Sponsors of California's ban on same-sex marriage asked a liberal federal appeals court judge Wednesday evening to disqualify himself from the panel that will review the ban next week because of his wife's leadership role in the American Civil Liberties Union. Judge Stephen Reinhardt's "impartiality might reasonably be questioned" because his wife, Ramona Ripston, is an outspoken opponent of Proposition 8 and has taken part in legal proceedings to overturn the ballot measure, lawyers for the measure's supporters told the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. Reinhardt, an appointee of President Jimmy Carter who...

Judge Orders Compensation For Gay Couple Denied Benefits November 18, 2009 A federal judge today ordered compensation for a Los Angeles couple denied spousal benefits by the federal government because they are gay men. U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Stephen Reinhardt deemed the denial of healthcare and other benefits to the spouse of federal public defender Brad Levenson to be a violation of the Constitution's guarantee of due process and discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, which is prohibited by California state law. Levenson married his longtime partner, Tony Sears, on July 12, 2008, during the five-month...

San Francisco (AP) -- A federal judicial panel heard closing arguments Tuesday in a long-running legal battle over crowding in California prisons, a case that will have far-reaching consequences for the state's corrections system, its budget and public safety. At issue are cases stretching back more than two decades that claim overcrowding is the cause of poor medical and mental health treatment. Courts already have found the care so poor that it violates inmates' constitutional rights. Inmates' attorneys argued Tuesday that releasing tens of thousands of prisoners is the answer.

The American Civil Liberties Union received an early holiday present this year, but as a result thousands of Arizona schoolchildren may find coal in their stockings. That’s because a bogus legal challenge to Arizona’s individual scholarship tax credit program will be heard by a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit that includes Judge Stephen Reinhardt. When the Arizona Supreme Court upheld the scholarship program against a First Amendment and state constitution claim in 1999 and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the decision, the teachers’ union plaintiffs went home. But not the ACLU, which...

He’s the judge who says parental rights end at the schoolhouse door and that the Pledge of Allegiance in public school classrooms is unconstitutional. He admires an Israeli judge who’s outlawed spanking and radically expanded the power of the federal judiciary. He considers an opinion he wrote in 1996 in favor of assisted suicide his greatest achievement. He’s Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals—the most infamous member of the most radical court in America. He’s notorious because he’s caused real harm—to parental rights, public safety and the reputation of the federal courts. But one of...

News Advisory: Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change, a group of retired ambassadors and senior military officers, will hold a Morning Newsmaker news conference Wednesday, June 16, at 8 a.m. EDT at the National Press Club (Zenger Room), 13th floor, 529 14th St., N.W., Washington, D.C. The topic will be "The Need for Change in U.S. Foreign and Defense Policy." The group includes former ambassadors Jeffrey Davidow, William DePree, Charles Freeman Jr., William Harrop, Arthur Hartman, H. Allen Holmes, Samuel Lewis, Princeton Lyman, Jack Matlock Jr., Donald McHenry, Richard Murphy, David Newsom, Phyllis Oakley, John Reinhardt, Ronald Spiers, Nicholas Veliotes...

Having seen the defense exhibits, General Reinhardt changes his original views and concludes that General Hadzihasanovic took substantial steps to discipline the perpetrators of crimes from the ranks of the BH Army. The prosecution military expert, however, believes that the 3rd Corps "had ways to discipline a hundred or so mujahedin" with whom the BH Army, in his view, had been "cooperating closely." THE HAGUE, 7.5. (SENSE) - At the end of his five-day testimony at the trial of the BH Army commanders accused of crimes in Central Bosnia in 1993, German Army General Klaus Reinhardt changed his original views...

NEVER FORGET Will longtime HILLARY & BILL CLINTON Friend & 9th Circuit Judge STEPHEN 'No Under God Pledge in our Schools' REINHARDT perform a Sept. 11th Airstrike on the California Recall Gov. GRAY DAVIS Election and push it back to March 2004 ...in order to save DAVIS next Thursday, September 11, 2003..? ...This is the Los Angeles ACLU Lawsuit over Machine and CHAD Recall Election Voting that was brought by Judge REINHARDT's Head of Los Angeles ACLU... ...W-I-F-E..!!! ...Or will Judge REINHARDT go against his grain and follow today's lead set by his longtime Friend Judge JEREMY D. FOGEL of...

NEVER FORGET ...At the end of the Day yesterday, Friday August 15, 2003 San Jose U.S. District Court JEREMY D. FOGEL ruled that in 2 weeks he may push California's October 7, 2003 Election to Recall and Replace Friend of CLINTON California Gov. GRAY DAVIS back to the March 2004 Presidential Primary Election, thus increasing DAVIS' Chances for Survival. ...Shades, perhaps, of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge and Friend of the CLINTONS ..STEPHEN REINHARDT's getting a retired 9th Circuit Judge other than himself to ban our "UNDER GOD" Pledge of Allegiance in our California Schools over a...

On the 5th of December 2002, a three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit ruled in favor of the “collective rights” view of the 2nd Amendment and the “Right to Keep and Bear Arms” (RKBA). Penned by Judge Reinhardt, the Silveira decision wasn’t just wrong, it was deliberate fraud upon the entire judicial system, penned in such bad faith it constitutes strong evidence for outright impeachment.

<p>GET READY for a knock-down-drag-out fight in America's high courts over the rights of gun ownership.</p> <p>This month Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals wrote an opinion in which he argued that gun ownership is not an individual right but a "collective" right. He's not the first judge to come to that opinion, but his writings essentially throw down the gauntlet before an earlier appeals court ruling that found gun ownership to be an individual right.</p>