In Massachusetts, when someone suggests that a judge’s sexual orientation interferes with both logic and law, that suggestion invites public ridicule and rebuke. In California, it’s grounds for an appeals hearing. That, as much as anything, shows the fractured state of the nation’s debate over same-sex marriage, more than seven years after gay and lesbian couples won the right to legally marry in Massachusetts.
James Ware, a federal judge in California heard arguments yesterday from a group seeking to reinstate Proposition 8, California’s voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage. Attorneys for Proposition 8’s supporters argued that a recent federal ruling that overturned the ban should be nullified on the grounds that the ruling judge has had a long-term relationship with another man. That fact, the Prop. 8 group argues, means the ruling judge had a vested interest in the case’s outcome.
The Prop. 8 group hasn’t explicitly alleged that the judge they’re targeting, Vaughn Walker, couldn’t have been impartial because he’s gay. The line they’ve gone with is that Walker obviously wants to marry his partner, so he shaped his ruling in a way that favored his own interests. That assumption was challenged yesterday, with the appeals judge asking the Prop. 8 group how, exactly, they knew Walker would take advantage of his own ruling. Lawyers fighting to uphold Walker’s ruling alleged that the ruling was being challenged primarily because of Walker’s sexual orientation, not because he might want to marry his partner someday.
The back-and-forth calls to mind the row that followed the recent nomination of Barbara Lenk to the Supreme Judicial Court. Charles Cipollini, the governor’s councilor who’s doing more than anyone else to speed the end of the Governor’s Council, alleged that Lenk wouldn’t possibly be impartial on future challenges to the legality of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts because she’s openly gay. “She’s not going to be impartial, let’s face it,” Cipollini groused. Cipollini advanced that line of logic at Lenk’s confirmation. He argued that identity politics would trump jurisprudence, that Lenk’s reading of the law was baked into her sexuality, that she had an inherent conflict of interest on matters of marriage that her heterosexual colleagues didn’t share.
Cipollini’s stance won him a stern rebuke from the Globe’s editorial page. In dismissing Cipollini’s opposition, the paper wondered aloud whether “gays, unlike blacks or Asian-Americans, are an acceptable target of derision.” Ware, the federal judge in California, signaled a similar stance yesterday, questioning why the Prop. 8 supporters assumed Walker’s orientation would necessarily rob him of his ability to read and interpret the law. “There was probably the same kind of struggle when race or gender were the issue,” Ware said.
–PAUL MCMORROW
BEACON HILL
US Rep. Niki Tsongas urges a legislative redistricting committee to keep her district intact.
Former House speaker Sal DiMasi awaits a jury’s verdict — one that Chief Judge Mark Wolf predicts will be appealed all the way to the Supreme Court.
The Boston Herald lines up behind a proposal by state Sen. Stanley Rosenberg to cut the number of registries of deeds from 21 to 14, and then suggests that the county register’s position should become an appointed position.
Reporters chase House Speaker Robert DeLeo through the State House, seeking an update on alleged House chamber tryst between a freshman lawmaker and a legislative aide. Margery Eagan wishes the two kids a lifetime of love — or at least a great summertime fling.
MUNICIPAL MATTERS
Lawrence Mayor William Lantigua’s acting chief of staff, Patrick Blanchette, has another run-in with the police, this time over noise at a graduation party, the Eagle-Tribune reports.
Employees of the the quasi-public agency overseeing the development of the former South Weymouth Naval Air Base will be getting 4.5 percent raises after a split vote by the appointed five-member board of directors.
The Springfield City Council approves a new redistricting plan.
CASINO GAMBLING
The Mashpee Wampanoag tribe is now eyeing the dormant Raynham race track as a casino site. The Cape Cod Times report is here.
NATIONAL POLITICS/WASHINGTON
The Springfield Republican weighs-in on MIT economist Peter Diamond’s decision to withdraw his name from consideration for a seat on the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. Republicans said that he was unqualified.
President Obama says that US Rep. Anthony Weiner should step down. Nancy Pelosi’s blunt approach to Weiner has put the former House speaker back in the spotlight.
The Supreme Court unanimously upholds the legality of legislative conflict-of-interest laws.
ELECTION 2012
NECN’s Alison King has key moments in the New Hampshire Republican presidential debate. The Wall Street Journal argues that the current GOP field makes Mitt Romney’s nomination hunt much easier. The New York Times fact-checks the debate. The whole awful spectacle gives David Bernstein a headache. On The New Republic site, Walter Shapiro reviews the generally uninspired session. One takeaway he offers: Michele Bachmann was expected to be part of the “crazy-relative-in-the-attic sweepstakes,” he writes. But her performance suggested she “never got the memo.” We think that was a compliment. Mitt Romney holds his own, especially since the rest of the pack spent their time attacking President Obama.
President Obama goes to Puerto Rico in search of votes…back on the mainland. His trip marks the first official visit by a president to the island in 50 years.
BUSINESS/ECONOMY
“Greater Boston” takes a look at the growing number of “boomerang kids,” college graduates who move back home after getting their degree.
It’s business as usual for Cognos, the Canadian software firm at the center of the DiMasi corruption trial, the Globe reports.
EDUCATION
Time looks at the push for parent trigger laws that would enable parents at failing schools to fire the principal, fire half the teachers, and close the school down or turn it into a charter school.
The head of the Stetson School in Barre says special education students are being shortchanged in the funding battles on Beacon Hill.
If Pittsfield teachers don’t agree to a new contract by the end of the month, they forgo a 1 percent salary increase.
HEALTH CARE
Miracle-Gro targets the medical marijuana market.
ENERGY/ENVIRONMENT
Hess has withdrawn its application to build a controversial LNG terminal in Fall River.
RELIGION
The Vatican defrocked four long-inactive Massachusetts priests, including three with ties to the South Shore, who were accused of sexual abuse.
The Globe profiles the Boston priest whose plans for an “All Are Welcome” Mass to commemorate Gay Pride Month were scuttled by the archdiocese. For good measure, Kevin Cullen also devotes his column to Father Unni.
MEDIA
The Los Angeles Times finds civility is running short in reader comments. The story also notes that the Globe has been forced to disable comments on obituaries and all stories about people who have experienced a personal tragedy. It temporarily disables comments overnight on stories about immigration, religion, and religious figures.