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Title: Prop. 8 challenge to gay judge's ruling rejected
Source:
sfgate.com
URL Source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/artic ... 011/06/14/BA261JTP5D.DTL&tsp=1
Published: Jun 14, 2011
Author: Bob Egelko
Post Date: 2011-06-14 19:24:36 by Ferret Mike
Keywords: None
Views: 295
Comments: 1
(06-14) 13:53 PDT SAN FRANCISCO -- The federal judge who overturned California's ban on same-sex marriage last year was not obligated to disqualify himself from hearing the case because he was in a long-term relationship with another man, another federal jurist ruled today. Sponsors of the voter-approved 2008 ban offered no evidence that then-Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker had planned to marry his partner and can't rely on mere speculation to show that he had a conflict of interest, said James Ware, who succeeded Walker as chief judge and inherited the case. The fact that a judge is in a relationship doesn't necessarily mean he is "so interested in marrying the person that he would be unable to exhibit the impartiality which, it is presumed, all federal judges maintain," Ware said. A gay judge is entitled to rule in a gay-rights case, even if his ruling could provide him "some speculative future benefit," Ware said. The contrary argument by Walker's opponents, he said, would require "recusal of minority judges in most, if not all, civil rights cases." Walker ruled in August that Proposition 8, which amended the state Constitution to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman, discriminated unconstitutionally on the basis of sexual orientation and gender. Sponsors of the measure have appealed his ruling. They also sought to have the decision overturned by arguing that Walker should have removed himself from the case, based on his disclosure in April after retiring from the bench that he was in a 10-year relationship with his partner. Walker has not said whether they plan to marry. Prop. 8's backers argued that the public was entitled to presume that the judge intended to wed his partner, taking advantage of his own ruling, unless he expressly denied it. Ware rejected that argument today and said Walker had no duty "to disclose information about his personal life." E-mail Bob Egelko at begelko@sfchronicle.com. Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/06/14/BA261JTP5D.DTL#ixzz1PIOjdTfL
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This was a good ruling based on very sound logic. Of course the important thing is to get back on track and allow people to marry whomever it is they love and want to enter into marriage with. The state should not decide who marries who.
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