Great line from the Prop 8 Trial: One we've all used here at DU

B: Yes, your honor. That’s why courts defer to district court. Defendant claims that this is not targeted at minorities. CC said that even judge who supports institution of marriage, not just his marriage, need not disclosed. 5th Circuit says that for every claim is counterclaim. The defendants argue that gay marriage so threatens the institution of marriage that they must be denied access to the institution. By the defendants’ logic, any straight judge with such a view would have to recuse. Only people who can judge here according to them is gay or straight judge who does not have an interest in marriage.

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So only a judge, gay or straight, who has no interest in marriage can be trusted.

:shrug:

self defeating argument.

With that kind of an attitude they might as well not go to the courts.

They've pretty much defeated themselves with that kind of an argument and is thus a poor argument to use.

The majority of all judges are heterosexuals who have some sort of interest in being married.

And many of them are.

What more can I say?

how else could we have ever had an unbiased ruling in cases involving slavery?

:eyes:

http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2011/12/08/Walkers_Ruling_Appears_Unshakeable_After_Latest_Prop_8_Hearing/

In what was likely the last hearing before a ruling is delivered on the constitutionality of Proposition 8, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday appeared unconvinced that a previous ruling on the ban be tossed because the judge was in a longterm same-sex relationship.

Before the issue of whether former Chief District Judge Vaughn Walker should have recused himself from the 2010 case where he ruled Prop. 8 unconstitutional, the Ninth Circuit dealt with the release of videotapes of that trial. Prop. 8 proponents have been fighting for years to keep the tapes unavailable to the public, while gay rights advocates want the public to see them. Both David Thompson, arguing for the Prop. 8 proponents, and Ted Olson, arguing against Prop. 8 for the American Foundation for Equal Rights, were grilled by Ninth Circuit judges. Thompson made the case that witnesses would be harassed and intimidated should the tapes be made public; judges didn't seem convinced. Nontheless, they argued with Olson over whether tapes of the trial were necessary when transcripts were available.

Moving to the issue of Walker, it seemed the Prop. 8 proponents had a much bigger mountain to climb. Lawyer Charles Cooper tried to convince the judges that Walker had a stake in the Prop. 8 case, since he was in a longterm gay relationship. The judges questioned whether it was clear Walker wanted to marry, since he didn't during the brief period when same-sex marriage was legal in California.