India: Legal gay sex ruling challenged
A landmark ruling that legalized gay sex between consenting partners in India was challenged Thursday in the country’s high court, lawyers said.
Activists protest against the ruling to decriminalize gay sex in New Delhi on Sunday.
The supreme court issued a notice to the nonprofit Naz Foundation that had won a lower-court verdict after a seven-year legal fight to decriminalize gay sex.
Notices also were issued to the federal government and the New Delhi high court, which ruled last week that consensual sex between partners of the same gender was legal.
An astrologer filed a petition challenging the ruling. The petitioner argued that no constitutional right is violated by the Indian penal code’s Section 377, which had outlawed gay sex, said his lawyer Praveen Agrawal.
The petition also cited Indian culture and health as grounds for seeking a stay on last week’s ruling, he said.
The supreme court posted the next hearing for July 20.
Last week’s ruling meant the law — Indian penal code section 377, which had previously criminalized consensual homosexual acts between adults — was partly struck down but remains in place as far as forced homosexual acts are concerned.
The verdict affects law enforcement all around India because it deals with a law enacted by the federal parliament.
See India: Legal gay sex ruling challenged
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Time to review policy on gays in US military: Powell
American attitudes have changed and the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy toward gays serving in the U.S. military should be reviewed, former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Colin Powell said on Sunday.
President Barack Obama favors overturning the policy, which bars gay troops from serving openly in the military. U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has asked military lawyers to look at ways to make the law more flexible, hailed by gay rights groups as a “seismic political shift”.
“The policy and the law that came about in 1993, I think, was correct for the time,” Powell said on CNN’s State of the Union.
“Sixteen years have now gone by, and I think a lot has changed with respect to attitudes within our country, and therefore I think this is a policy and a law that should be reviewed.” he added.
See Time to review policy on gays in US military: Powell Reuters
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Federal Judge Stresses Trial Record on Calif. Gay-Marriage Ban
Whatever Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker winds up deciding on Proposition 8, it’s clear he wants an airtight trial record to support it.
Holding his first hearing Thursday on the controversial measure that outlawed same-sex marriage, Walker repeatedly stressed the importance of establishing a record that will stand the test of time.
He told a packed courtroom that he was “reasonably sure” that the challenge launched by two high-profile litigators is “only touching down in this court” and merely a “prelude” for things to come.
“How we do things here,” Walker said, “is more important than what we do.”
He noted that other courts have rendered decisions on same-sex marriage without holding full trials, which he suggested was a “problem.”
Perry v. Schwarzenegger, 09-CV-2292, was filed in May by Theodore Olson, who represented George W. Bush in the landmark Bush v. Gore case, and David Boies, who represented Al Gore. Boies wasn’t present on Thursday. The suit attacks Prop 8 on equal protection and due process grounds.
Walker had already issued a tentative order allowing Prop 8 proponents to intervene and denying a preliminary injunction (pdf). He stood by both orders during Thursday’s 50-minute session.
Olson, a partner in Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher’s Washington, D.C., office who has argued before the U.S. Supreme Court 55 times, nonetheless made a fleeting attempt to persuade Walker to change his mind on the injunction.
“Every day that Prop 8 is enforced perpetuates a tragic injustice” on gays and lesbians, he argued, saying it “brands” them as “second-class citizens, unworthy and different.”
“The Supreme Court,” Olson argued, “has held again and again and again that the right to marry is the most important relationship in life.”
Representing the Prop 8 proponents, Washington attorney Charles Cooper, who was a top Justice Department lawyer during the Reagan administration, warned that the lawsuit could “sweep away” not only Prop 8, but the definition of marriage in 43 states and the federal government.
The Cooper & Kirk partner also argued that marriage has by tradition always been the union of a man and a woman, and said that every Supreme Court case that describes marriage has noted that its central purpose is procreation.
See Federal Judge Stresses Trial Record on Calif. Gay-Marriage Ban Above the Law
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Lowenstein: Judge orders speedy ruling on Prop 8 case
When Ted Olson and David Boies filed federal suit against Proposition 8 on behalf of their clients, the case was newsworthy for two main reasons. The two lawyers at the helm famously opposed each other in Bush v. Gore, and most of the national LGBT organizations were quick to distance …
Voter ‘animus’ to be issue in Calif marriage case
When the U.S. Supreme Court overturned an amendment to the Colorado Constitution that outlawed discrimination protections for gay people, same-sex couples could not enter into civil unions or domestic partnerships anywhere in the nation, much less get married. But as they seek to persuade a federal judge to strike down California’s ban on gay marriages, lawyers for two unmarried gay couples are using that 13-year-old decision as their road map — one they expect will eventually lead the high court to take up the marriage issue. In the Colorado case, Romer v. Evans, the Supreme Court majority held that voters’ dislike of gays and the laws that several cities had approved to shield them from bias motivated the state amendment. Such “animus,” it said, was incompatible with the section of the U.S. Constitution that requires the government to treat its citizens equally absent a compelling reason to do otherwise. The attorneys behind the challenge to California’s Proposition 8 plan to argue during a pretrial hearing Thursday that by stripping gays of the right to wed, the voter-approved ban runs afoul of America’s founding framework in the same way — and for the same reason. “Romer is a strikingly similar situation to what we have here. You had a ballot initiative, a majority vote of the people, taking away a right,” said Theodore J. Boutrous Jr., a member of the legal team led by former U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson and veteran trial lawyer David Boies. “And there was no justification or rationale other than disapproval by that majority of that group.” U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker on Tuesday issued a tentative order to fast-track the case in his San Francisco court. Among the questions he said he wants covered at trial are whether sexual orientation is unchangeable, if permitting same-sex marriage “destabilizes” traditional unions and whether Proposition 8′s ballot history demonstrates the measure had “discriminatory intent.” California Attorney General Jerry Brown, a defendant in the case, has sided with gay rights advocates and declined to defend the ban, which overturned a California Supreme Court ruling that had legalized same-sex marriages. The state Supreme Court five weeks ago upheld the measure, saying it represented a valid exercise of voters’ authority to amend the California Constitution. Proposition 8′s sponsors, a coalition of religious conservative groups called Protect Marriage, has been given permission to intervene in the federal case. In court papers, the group’s lawyers rejected the assertions that anti-gay attitudes fueled the November measure and that the 1996 Colorado case was applicable. “Nothing in California law, either Proposition 8 or otherwise, indicates that Californians harbor animus towards gay and lesbian individuals,” they wrote. Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision, attorneys for gay rights and Christian conservative groups have debated whether the Romer decision could be used to expand gay rights. The ruling marked the first time the Supreme Court determined that the Constitution’s equal rights guarantees extended to gays and lesbians. “The basic point of Romer is that government cannot ever act out of hostility toward a group of people, and whether that is in the context of marriage or anti-discrimination law, the point carries over,” said Suzanne Goldberg, who worked on the case and now directs Columbia Law School’s Sexuality and Gender Law Program. The ruling has been cited, though so far unsuccessfully, in past challenges to gay marriage bans in Nebraska and Florida. At the same time, gay rights groups mostly have shied away from pursuing federal marriage cases in favor of pursuing marriage rights in state courts. Legal observers on both sides of the debate agree, however, that California’s Proposition 8 presents novel questions that could make the issue ripe for federal action.
San Francisco Chronicle
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India Decriminalizes Gay Sex
n what many are calling “India’s Stonewall”, the New Delhi High Court on Thursday decriminalized homosexual intercourse between consenting adults, by striking down section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. This law labels gay sex to be an “unnatural offense”, punishable with up to ten years in prison.
Drafted in 1860, this Colonial-era law was brought into effect by the British, and was in line with similar anti-homosexuality legislation passed in England at the time. In the past decade, gay rights activists and lawyers have strived hard to abrogate Section 377, calling it “inhuman”, and as the Naz Foundation, which filed the petition to abolition 377 in 2001 argued, a violation of constitutional rights to privacy and equality.
No Rain on Their Parade
In its ruling today, the Delhi High Court affirmed that claim, saying that Section 377 violated basic human rights. The same court, however, had dismissed a similar petition in 2001. It is clear that this latest ruling is a reflection of increased activism by gay rights groups and high profiled supporters like Bollywood actress and Former Miss World Celina Jaitley, along with a more progressive government.
See
India Decriminalizes Gay Sex
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Gates Plan May Be Beginning of the End of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — In the wake of yesterday’s unexpected Pentagon announcement about gays in the military, experts say the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy may be on the brink of irreversible change that would speed up its demise. After speaking with President Obama last week, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has asked military lawyers to explore how to modify enforcement of the policy in ways that are “more flexible until the law is changed.” The President Monday reiterated his intention to end discrimination against gay troops, saying he is working with Congress and the military to do so.
Christopher Neff, political director of the Palm Center, said the remarks by Secretary Gates marked the first time the Defense Secretary has made clear that the Pentagon is onboard with the President’s determination to lift the ban. “‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’ is a package — both a law and a policy — that hasn’t been penetrated for fifteen years,” Neff said. “This is a crack in humpty dumpty, and it gets the ball rolling for a political solution since it gives cover to lawmakers who have been waiting for a nod from the Pentagon.”
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Lawyers: Gay couples’ rights justify injunction San Jose Mercury New
SAN FRANCISCO—Two high-profile lawyers are arguing that any bureaucratic inconvenience caused by suspending California’s same-sex marriage ban is outweighed by the ongoing discrimination being suffered by gay and lesbian couples.
Theodore Olson and David Boies, who represented opposing sides in the 2000 presidential election challenge, Bush v. Gore, filed papers Thursday buttressing their argument that Proposition 8 should be lifted while a federal lawsuit challenging the voter-approved measure proceeds in court.
See Lawyers: Gay couples’ rights justify injunction
San Jose Mercury New
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Federal gay marriage challenge has Hollywood style Reuters
The story of two famous U.S. lawyers from opposite ends of the political spectrum banding together to launch a bold and unexpected fight for gay marriage sounds like it could have been written in Hollywood.
In many ways, it is.
A handful of political filmmakers led by a Democratic consultant have crafted a gay rights challenge they hope will reach the U.S. Supreme Court.
The case which has its first hearing in a federal San Francisco court on July 2 could quickly make gay marriage a national right, or, some veteran gay rights advocates fear, cripple the movement.
The team has political experience, winning referenda in California in particular, and has brought together real-world firepower in the form of Ted Olson and David Boies, the lawyers who faced off in the 2000 election vote recount that led to George W. Bush’s presidency.
What sets them apart is the willingness to take on a court case that advocates steeped in the cause have avoided.
“Patience is a virtue I’ve quite frankly never possessed — if patience is a virtue,” said Chad Griffin, 35, who began his career in the political big leagues more than a decade ago as the youngest person to work on a president’s West Wing staff.
“History is on our side, law is on our side,” added Griffin, who is gay.
Rob Reiner, the “When Harry Met Sally” director and advocate for children’s health, and Bruce Cohen, the producer of “Milk,” a film about the first openly gay elected politician in California, are two of the six-member board of the American Foundation for Equal Rights, founded for the court challenge.
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Reuters
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Citing law, city reluctantly argues for release of gay employees’ names
Anti-gay-rights activist wants names of city-sponsored LGBT club
As attorneys for all sides prepare to square off in court, the City of Seattle and a self-described “civil rights leader” seeking the release of the names of gay and lesbian city workers involved in a city-sponsored club have lined up on the same side of the issue.
In separate court filings, the city and the Seattle City Light employee requesting the records argue that the state public-records act requires that the city release the records. City of Seattle employees associated with the department’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered, Questioning and Friends Club have asked the court to order the city not to release their names.
Reiterating statements made by Seattle City Attorney Tom Carr shortly after the suit was filed, lawyers for the city now assert, reluctantly, that the records requested by City Light employee Philip Irvin.
“The city sympathizes with the concerns that plaintiffs have expressed,” Assistant City Attorney Gary T. Smith said in court documents. “Nonetheless, the city believes that the Public Records Act obligates it to disclose the records at issue.”
Irvin, who claims he’s been barred from attending LGBTQF club meetings because he is heterosexual and opposed to gay rights, has requested that the city release the names of employees belonging to or attending the Seattle Public Utilities-sponsored group.
According to the city’s filing, the department sponsors eight such “affinity” groups for employees “with similar concerns.” Included in the array are groups for employees of different ages or ancestry, including European. Each group is provided with up to $1,000 annually for events, and members are allowed to spend two work hours a month toward group activities.
In arguing that the records should be released, attorneys for the city assert that earlier appeals-court rulings have shown that employee information must be released even if it could result in harassment. The city cites a 2002 case in which King County was ordered by the state Court of Appeals to release a list of sheriff’s deputies’ names.
Attorneys for the plaintiffs assert that the employees’ identities are not releasable under the law, in part because they are of no legitimate public interest.
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Seattle Post Intelligencer
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