Litigation

ABA Urges Marriage Equality for Gays, Lesbians

By Peter Hardin

The American Bar Association has voted in support of a resolution urging state legislatures to permit marriages of same-sex couples.

The ABA, meeting in San Francisco, cast its vote only days after a federal judge in the same city struck down California’s Proposition 8 ban on same-sex marriages, according to an Associated Press article.

The only speaker against the ABA resolution was Leslie W. Jacobs, past president of the Ohio State Bar Association, the ABA Journal reported.

Constitutional law scholar Laurence Tribe, now the Justice Department’s senior counselor for access to justice, told the ABA annual meeting earlier he thinks there is a good chance the U.S. Supreme Court would uphold the recent ruling of federal Judge Vaughn R. Walker, with the deciding vote likely coming from Justice Anthony M. Kennedy.

Judge Walker has been the focus of a backlash in some conservative quarters over his ruling (see Gavel Grab). Some critics have contended that Judge Walker, who has been identified by some newspapers as gay, should have recused himself. In a San Francisco Chronicle commentary, former dean at Chapman University School of Law John C. Eastman raised the issue:

“If Judge Walker is indeed in a long-term, same-sex relationship, he certainly has an ‘interest that could be affected substantially by the outcome of the proceeding’ – he and his partner are now permitted to marry! – and that, according to Judge Walker’s own finding, has financial benefits as well. Such conflicts would have required recusal, and cannot be waived by the parties.”

“Judge Walker’s failure to disqualify himself or at least to disclose his potentially disqualifying relationship to the parties requires that the opinion in the case be vacated and a new trial conducted before a different judge.”

Some other legal experts have said it was too late to raise the recusal issue, or that it would be unfounded (see Gavel Grab).

The American Bar Association is a partner of Justice at Stake.

Full post as published by The Gavel on August 11, 2010 (boomark / email).