California’s Appellate Court granted a stay on Judge Vaughn’s ruling pending appeal. This was, in my opinion, to be expected since this is such a high profile case and precedent setting case, Â so nothing drastic there. However, there is some good news as far as this process is concerned as is covered here BREAKING: 9th Circuit STAYS Judge Walker’s ruling; Appeal scheduled December 6 on Prop 8 Trial Tracker:
- the appellate court is expediting the the appeal of the ruling of the unconstitutionality of Prop 8 and set the date for the week of 6 December, which is awesome. The sooner the, hopefully, better.
- they are also specifically asking the Prop8’ers:
In addition to any issues appellants wish to raise on appeal, appellants are directed to include in their opening brief a discussion of why this appeal should not be dismissed for lack of Article III standing.
which is huge. Judge Vaughn said that they do not have standing for a stay or appeal, if I remember correctly, and the appellate court obviously pretty much agrees with them, but are giving them a chance to sound at least a little rational and try to retain some self respect.
In the scheme of things this is pretty huge. The appeal process could end up being pretty short (comparatively speaking) since they do not have standing for appeal, so this may most likely get dismissed with prejudice, which would prevent a Supreme Court Appeal. This will be a massively huge win and precedent for gay rights all throughout the US if this does happen, since there will be a court ruling stating that banning gay marriage is unconstitutional and they have no standing.
If  the Supreme Court does not dismiss out of hand due to lack of standing, which would rock, then the appellate court’s decision will be appealed to the Supreme Court.
Cross your fingers everyone. History and justice is happening. =)
