Thanks to Bradley Fikes’ reference to SCOTUSBlog, I found this:
New skirmish over same-sex marriage
If you’ve been following the same sex marriage debate, you’ll see that SCOTUS found that the petitioners didn’t hold “legal standing” in the Hollingsworth v Brown case. SCOTUS ruled that only the State of California (through its attorney general) had the “legal right” to defend state constitutional law. That’s all SCOTUS said in its decision. The result is that the decision of a Federal District Court stands and that Kamala Harris (whom SCOTUS recognizes as having legal standing) refused to defend Proposition 8, for the People of California, in a Federal Court.
Politically, that means that Republicans can claim that Democrats might ignore some laws while enforcing others; a classic case of cronyism or favoritism.
Dronenburg’s petition puts Kamala Harris in an interesting position. From the article on SCOTUS Blog:
The legal arguments in the new forty-six-page petition closely parallel those that are already before the state court in the case of Hollingsworth v. Brown (docket S211990). State officials are to file their written legal arguments in opposition in that case on Monday. Those will be arguments on the merits of the current status of ”Proposition 8″ in California. State officials contend that the federal order applies throughout the state, and binds state officials. They contend that they have the authority to control marriage licensing policy, in order to keep it uniform throughout the state.
Harris now has to defend her personal definition of marriage, which was made possible by a decision from a Federal District Court. Why? SCOTUS set a precedent that only Harris has standing. Harris claims that the State of California has the ultimate authority to control marriage licensing policy. That very claim puts her at odds with the majority of the voting citizens in California.
The Federal District Court ruled, in Perry v Schwarzenneger, that Proposition 8 was unconstitutional but it did NOT direct the State of California to authorize same sex marriage. Keep in mind that same sex marriage was originally implemented on a city level in 2004, in defiance of Proposition 22 (which wasn’t overturned by the California Supreme Court until 2008).
Is same sex marriage “legal” in California? I don’t know. I DO know that it’s illegal to pass a law PROHIBITING same sex marriage but no direction was given to the State of California about legalizing same sex marriage or even regulating marriage whatsoever. Harris claims though the the State of California DOES have the right to uniformly regulate marriage something that she refused to state or do earlier.
Now, Republicans can say that Democrats will not only refuse to defend certain laws, they will actively work against the will of the people when it suits their ideological agenda.
That useful talking point probably has nothing to do with same sex marriage and everything to do with Proposition 13, the very popular cap on property taxes and supermajority vote in the Legislature. Democrats really want to overturn Proposition 13. Lawsuits will be filed, Kamala Harris will refuse to defend it, a sympathetic Federal District Court will overturn it, and Kamala Harris (the only person with standing to appeal this decision) will refuse to to do so.
Democrats never really cared about same sex marriage until they saw the fundraising potential of holding Dick Cheney’s long-held position on the issue. Democrats DO want your money though and Kamala Harris will be absent when they try to take it from you then present when they do.
I think that’s ultimately what Dronenburg is trying to accomplish here.