The federal challenge to Proposition 8 brought by Ted Olson and David Boies today withstood a motion to dismiss from Prop 8's backers, setting the stage for a full court trial:
"Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker, in a ruling from the bench in
San Francisco, said a trial was needed to resolve crucial issues,
including whether gays and lesbians are persecuted minorities entitled
to judicial protection from discriminatory laws…Sponsors of Proposition 8, approved by 52 percent of the voters in
November, argued that the initiative was clearly constitutional under
U.S. Supreme Court precedents, which have never recognized a right to
marry a person of the same gender…The sponsors contended that Prop. 8 was based on an ages-old
tradition of male-female marriage and the ability of opposite-sex
couples to conceive children. But Walker said the Supreme Court, in striking down laws against
interracial marriage and by allowing prisoners to marry, had defined
the right to wed as fundamental without limiting it to certain groups."
Walker, who said in July that he wanted to expedite the case, has scheduled the trial to begin in January.
