Less than two weeks after roughing up attorneys for the states of Wisconsin and Indiana in a heated oral argument, a three-judge panel of the Chicago-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit issued a unanimous decision in Baskin v. Bogan, 2014 WL 4359059 (September 4, 2014), striking down the bans on same-sex marriage in those states. Writing for the panel, Circuit Judge Richard Posner, one of Ronald Reagan’s earliest judicial appointees in 1981, … <Read More>
Federal Judge Rules Against Marriage Equality in Louisiana
U.S. District Judge Martin L. C. Feldman, appointed to the federal bench by President Ronald Reagan in 1983, has rejected a constitutional challenge to Louisiana’s state constitutional and statutory ban on same-sex marriage. Parting company from every federal district judge who has decided a marriage equality claim since the Supreme Court’s June 2013 decision striking down a federal ban on the recognition of same-sex marriages, U.S. v. Windsor, Feldman insisted that existing precedents preserve Louisiana’s … <Read More>
Florida Appeals Court Calls for Florida Supreme Court to Decide Marriage Equality Question
In a highly unusual move, most of the judges on the Florida Second District Court of Appeal have agreed to certify to the state’s Supreme Court the question whether a Florida trial court has jurisdiction over a divorce proceeding of a same-sex couple who were married in another state. A panel of the court had rejected a request by the parties to refer the case to the Supreme Court on June 26, but the parties … <Read More>
7th Circuit Panel Roughs Up State Attorneys in Marriage Equality Arguments
A panel of three judges of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, based in Chicago, gave a very rough time to attorneys from the states of Indiana and Wisconsin on August 26 during oral arguments about marriage equality appeals from those states. Three district court rulings from Indiana and one from Wisconsin issued earlier in 2014 had found unconstitutional those states’ refusal to allow same-sex couples to marry or to recognize their … <Read More>
Oregon Federal Court Refuses to Dismiss Title VII Retaliation Claim by Lesbian Employee
U.S. District Judge Michael McShane ruled on August 21 that a lesbian former employee could sue a hospital under Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act for 1964 for retaliatory discharge, even though the complaints she claims to have made before her discharge concerned sexual orientation discrimination. Bennefield v. Mid-Valley Healthcare, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 116554 (D. Or.). Title VII outlaws discrimination because of sex, but federal courts have generally held that this … <Read More>
Florida Federal Court Rules for Marriage Equality; 10th Circuit Stays Colorado Ruling; Virginia Clerk Petitions for Certiorari
There were several developments on the marriage equality front late last week. On August 21, U.S. District Judge Robert L. Hinkle, of the Northern District of Florida, granted a preliminary injunction to the plaintiffs in Brenner v. Scott, 2014 WL 4113100, a consolidation of two marriage equality cases, but stayed his ruling pending the state’s appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. On the same day, two judges of the U.S. … <Read More>
Supreme Court Stays Virginia Marriage Ruling
The Supreme Court issued an unsigned order today staying the 4th Circuit’s mandate in Bostic v. Schaefer, the Virginia marriage equality case. The 4th Circuit panel had rejected Prince William County Clerk Michele McQuigg’s motion to stay pending Supreme Court review, and McQuigg promptly renewed her request for a stay by filing the motion with Chief Justice John Roberts. Roberts requested input from the other parties, and then referred the matter to the full Court, … <Read More>
Indiana Judge “Calls Out” Governor in Marriage Recognition Ruling
Chief U.S. District Judge Richard L. Young was clearly perturbed by the actions of Indiana Governor Mike Pence in response to Young’s June 25 ruling requiring the state to allow same-sex couples to marry, Baskin v. Bogan.
There were several marriage equality cases pending in Indiana, all assigned to Judge Young, and Governor Pence had moved to be dismissed as an individual defendant in those cases, claiming that he was not appropriately sued because he … <Read More>
Jean Genet’s “The Maids” at Lincoln Center Festival
I attended the next-to-last showing of Jean Genet’s play “The Maids” at Lincoln Center Festival last night. This production was brought to New York by the Sydney Theater Company. To me, the big discovery was the least well-known of the three actresses – Elizabeth Debicki, who played the Mistress. Cate Blanchett and Isabelle Huppert, both major international film stars, played the two sisters who are the Mistress’s maids.
Of course Genet wrote this in French, … <Read More>
New York Human Rights Agency Rules Against Discriminatory Wedding Venue
The New York State Division of Human Rights ruled on August 8 in McCarthy v. Liberty Ridge Farm, Case Nos. 10157952 & 10157963, that a rural wedding venue violated the state’s Human Rights Law by its policy against same-sex weddings. Commissioner Helen Diane Foster formally adopted a recommended decision by Administrative Law Judge Migdalia Pares, awarding the complainants $1,500 each in compensatory damages and fining Liberty Ridge Farm $10,000 for its violation of the law.… <Read More>