Poll Dancing With a Walker

Carol J. Williams had this piece in the Los Angeles Times to follow up on their touting of recent polls, so they could re-tout those polls and try to convince people, especially judges, they belong in museums if they think that marriage is about uniting a bride and a groom.

A series of recent polls suggesting a majority of Americans support the right of gays to marry may influence the outcome of the legal dispute over California's ban on same-sex marriages, some legal experts and gay rights advocates predict.

They hope. Gays have just as much right to marry as anybody else. So let's rewite that opening line:

A series of recent polls that that were nothing like this one are going to be used by marriage neutering advocates to try to unduly influence the courts.

In the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Roe vs. Wade opinion on abortion rights, late Justice Harry Blackmun is said by historians to have kept polling data in the case files and relied on it to help shape his decision, said Loyola Law School professor Douglas NeJaime, an expert on sexual orientation law.

So are we to believe Blackmun would now overturn his own decision? Somehow I doubt it. Actually, come to think of it, he probably now wishes he could.

"It's now unquestionable that the majority of the American people support the freedom to marry and that those who oppose respect for gay families and fairness under the law are in the minority," said Evan Wolfson, president of Freedom to Marry, campaigning for same-sex marriage rights across the country.

Of course the majority of Americans support the freedom to marry - marriage means uniting a bride and a groom. But notice his slight-of-hand here. He presents those who are not in favor of neutering marrige as opposing respect for gay families and fairness under the law. I respect gay people, their freedom of association, and prefer everyone engage in stable monogamy over other relationships and behaviors. I am thankful for same-sex couples who rescue children from orphanages and give them individual parental attention, albeit lacking a mother or a father, as a father or a mother is better than a government guardian. And the bride+groom requirement for state marriage licensing is fair. But what do we expect from someone who claims to fight for the "freedom to marry" but either ignores or ridicules concern over the lack of the freedom to polygamous marriage, given the fact of the historical and worlwide practice of polygamy, including in the USA?

Advocates with ProtectMarriage.com, which sponsored Proposition 8, dispute that the polls have any significance in their legal battle in defense of the gay marriage ban.

"Gay marriage ban"? Not so much. I can point this out as often as they print it.

"Different polls come to different results all the time on this issue, but when voters are given a chance to vote, they side with traditional marriage despite what the polls say," said Andrew Pugno, the attorney arguing on behalf of ProtectMarriage.com, adding that the majority that matters is the 52% that voted for Proposition 8 in the November 2008 election.

Exactly. It's very simple, marriage neutering advocates. Persuade others that neutering marriage is a necessary thing to do, and then you'll be able to do it... either by direct votes in states that have that, or by electing lawmakers who will do it. All of this "but all the cool kids are doing it" is tiresome.

Chemerinsky and others said the polls may have some relevance if the matter goes to the high court.

"I think that Justice [Anthony M.] Kennedy wants very much to be on the right side of history, and an opinion poll like this could matter in his thinking of the issue."

You mean like Blackmun?

Some gay rights advocates have been pondering whether to ask voters to repeal Proposition 8 in next year's election, citing the encouraging shift in public opinion. But many prefer to let the litigation over Proposition 8 and other gay marriage restrictions make their way through the federal courts so the justices in Washington can make a definitive ruling that would settle the matter nationwide.

Just like Roe v. Wade settled the abortion issue nationwide, right?

Although opinion polls are supposedly going to encourage judges to neuter marriage, debates over the fact that Judge Walker could have personally benefitted from his insulting decision and that he didn't disclose that should not have any effect, according Maura Dolan's piece in the Los Angeles Times.

Same-sex marriage opponents want the judge's decision overturned because he did not explicitly disclose before the trial that he is gay and in a long-term relationship.

We're not "same-sex marriage opponents". We oppose judicial activism neutering state marriage licensing, especially a federal judge intruding on a state's constitution. We support children, marriage, and family. So we're also "shacking up" opponents, adultery opponent, "having kids out of wedlock" opponents, and divorce opponents, if you want to be more accurate.

A federal district judge in San Francisco has scheduled a June 13 hearing to decide whether Walker's ruling should be wiped from the legal record as a result of his personal situation. Legal scholars, even those who disagree with Walker's ruling, predict that the effort by Proposition 8 sponsor ProtectMarriage will fail.

We'll see. It is worth a shot. Maybe more plays can be written about it, so your side can get something out of it, too.

New York University Law School Professor Stephen Gillers said that as long as Walker did not wish to marry his partner in California, there was no reason to disqualify him from the case. But Gillers said Walker should have disclosed his situation prior to trial.

"A judge should always disclose facts that are not publicly available, as in public financial disclosure filings, to give the parties a chance to seek recusal," Gillers said.

He cited an American Bar Assn. model of conduct that says a judge should disclose information that the litigants or their lawyers "might consider relevant to a possible motion of disqualification, even if the judge believes there is no basis for disqualification."

Of course, you can always find different opinions, and the paper cites them.

The U.S. Supreme Court once nullified a judicial ruling that had been in place for 10 months after determining that the judge had an undisclosed conflict, but Freedman said such actions are "very unusual."

So is a federal judge neutering state marriage licensing despite the state's constituton.

Those who say Walker did nothing wrong, if they are also marriage neutering advocates, claim with one side of their face that marriage licenses are vital to getting financial rights and benefits for same-sex couples, yet with another side of their face say it doesn't matter that Walker could have been making it possible for he and his partner to get a marriage license. Their argument is that it doesn't matter at all that he could have personally benefitted tremendously, including financially.

During that meeting, Walker said that he never considered removing himself from the Proposition 8 case because he was gay and assumed that his sexual orientation was not considered newsworthy because reporters rarely mentioned it, according to published reports.

Doesn't that contradict his own "finding of fact" that homosexual people are constantly being villified? So he says that the sexual orientation of other people matters to everyone, but that sexual orientation isn't "newsworthy". Well, newsworthy or not, Judge, it was worthy of disclosure. If it a big deal had been made about it, he would have cited that as an example of oppression. It's heads he wins, tails you lose.