Prop. 8 Gay Marriage Ban Backers, Defeated, Seek Full Ninth Circuit Court Do-Over
Updated at the bottom with a copy of the petition for review. First posted at 1:41 p.m.
Ninth Circuit Court
Backers of California's overturned same-sex-marriage ban said today that they'll ask the full Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for a review.
The move avoids for now taking the matter to the U.S. Supreme Court, but it could ultimately end up prompting the high court to step in and make a decision.
The Protect Marriage Coalition told news outlets including Associated Press Tuesday that it planned to ask for the review. A 2-1 vote by a Ninth Circuit panel earlier this month ...
... struck down California's same-sex-marriage ban, with the majority writing:
Proposition 8 served no purpose, and had no effect, other than to lessen the status and human dignity of gays and lesbians in California.
Prop. 8 was a voter initiative passed with the help of huge money from the Mormon Church.
Protect Marriage has said it wanted to take the matter all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court but now seems to be trying this out.
Protect Marriage's legal counsel, Andy Pugno, told AP:
Generally speaking, we think the 9th Circuit as a whole deserves the chance to basically fix this because the decision is such an outlier, it's really not representative of what the 9th Circuit's thinking on this issue has been.
Their case doesn't have a chance in the liberal Ninth if you ask us.
But if the 11 judges of the Ninth knock this thing down one more time, it could prompt the U.S. Supreme Court to issue a nationwide ruling that could favor the bigots. The New York Times:
There have been suggestions, though, that they would be better off to seek further review in the appeals court. They could win, or, failing that, they could lose more thoroughly and so elicit a decision that the Supreme Court would feel compelled to hear and be more likely to reverse.
[Update at 3:29 p.m.]: The court sent us a copy of Protect Marriage's petition, embedded below.
It argues, in part:
The panel majority's holding that California must recognize same-sex relationships as marriages conflicts not only with the binding authority cited above, but also with the decisions of every other state and federal appellate court to address this question.
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