New York Becomes 6th State to Legalize Same-Sex Marriage; California Next?

Albany, New York.  Last night, in a 33-29 vote, the New York Senate passed a same sex marriage bill expected to be signed into law by Governor Andrew Cuomo.  When this bill is signed by the governor, who lobbied for its passage, New York becomes the sixth state to legalize gay marriage.

A similar bill was defeated in New York in 2009.  The governor's persistent lobbying; some key Republican donors; an essentially absent Catholic Church; and voting senators that had gay family members, all factored into passage of the bill late Friday night.

Meanwhile, on the left coast, the seminal case from California continues its epic journey to the SCOTUS.  Perry vs Brown (formerly known as Perry vs Schwarzenegger) involves California's passage of Proposition 8 which banned gay marriage after it previously passed muster with California voters.  A conservative group sued in federal court; the ban was struck down, and the federal trial court's decision is now on appeal before the Ninth Circuit.

Judge Vaughn Walker, the now-retired federal court judge that initially struck down Proposition 8, publicly came out as a gay man only after his recent retirement.  His ruling was immediately challenged based on grounds of bias, becoming the first judge in history to be challenged for recusal on the basis of sexual orientation.  The chief judge of the federal bench in San Francisco upheld Judge Walker's ruling.

Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and the District of Colombia are jurisdictions that all have previously legalized same sex marriage.

This has become the civil rights issue of our time.

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California's Same-Sex Marriage Ban Grinds Along in the Ninth Circuit

This Law Blog has been tracking the same-sex marriage case out of California.  We covered Perry vs Schwarzenegger in an earlier post detailing the players and the issue framed in the constitutional law suit that originated in a federal court in San Fransisco.

Since our last post on this topic, the trial court judge issued a lengthily opinion last August, ruling that California’s Proposition 8 was unconstitutional, enjoining further enforcement.  Proponents of the marriage ban appealed to the Ninth Circuit.

The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has stayed the trial court ruling, however,  while the appeal is pending.  Recently, televised oral arguments were conducted on the case before a 3-judge appellate panel.  


Federal appellate arguments are rarely, if ever, televised; testament to the national interest in the case.

The federal appellate court appears to be trying to figure out what, exactly, should be the scope of their ruling.  Most federal judges, particularly appellate judges, eschew rulings that become broad constitutional pronouncements.

According to the SCOTUS analyst Lyle Denniston, the Ninth Circuit’s Perry panel seems likely to nullify the ban against same-sex marriage, “provided they could do so without having to write a sweeping opinion that established a national constitutional right of gay marriage.”

The initial arguments in the case before the Ninth Circuit concerned whether the appellants even had proper standing to appeal Judge Vaughn Walker’s ruling.  California’s top government officials, the governor and the attorney general, have refused to defend Prop 8, or to appeal the trial court’s ruling.

At least one of the judges on the appellate panel was troubled that no state actors showed up to argue the case.  The appellate judge suggested that perhaps the issue could be posed to the California Supreme Court for a determination as to whether California law would allow any entity to stand in as a legal “proxy” for the suit.

Perry’s well-heeled lawyers stated in response to the suggestion that even if California law allowed a proxy-style legal fight, the proxy would be unable to demonstrate how they were harmed by lifting the ban against same-sex marriage.


Scholars of the appellate courts compare this case to the famous SCOTUS decision in Loving v Virginia, which struck down state laws banning marriage between African Americans and whites.  We wonder how the Loving case would have been decided if Mr. Loving's "bride" was a man instead of a woman.

This Perry case could be our chance to find out the 21st Century answer to that question.  As a decision from the appellate court is expected soon, perhaps by the end of the year, we must ask that you to stay tuned in on this case.

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