US Supreme Court Rule Proposition 8 Trial Can’t Be Filmed Due To Court Failing To Follow Correct Procedures

The ban that the Supreme Court had imposed on the San Francisco courts to prevent broadcasting of the Proposition 8 trial (with a delay) on Youtube came to an end yesterday with many hoping the new ruling would act to see footage soon appearing online. The reality however is that the US Supreme Court has now ruled there should be no filming at any point in the trial.

Released as an unsigned final order, the opinion was 5-4 against the the broadcasting with no names of any of the justices appearing with the ban being attributed not to the subject of the trial but instead to the fact that the San Francisco district court judges had not followed the proper procedures when they had amended the federal court rules to allow the broadcast of the trial. This was however challenged by Justice Breyer and that “the public interest weighs in favor of granting access to the courts.”

Geoff Kors of Equality California, the largest statewide LGBT right advocacy organization in California, has responded to the decisions by saying “We are deeply disappointed with the high court’s ruling. The proponents of the discriminatory marriage ban have relied on television ads chock full of destructive mistruths to propagate their harmful agenda against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Californians, and broadcasting the trial would have provided a vital opportunity for the public to hear directly from same-sex couples and their families about the overwhelming damage of Proposition 8, which serves no purpose except to assign same-sex couples a separate and distinctly unequal status.”

“Since the case will not be broadcast it is up to each of us to share with our families and friends, our neighbors and co-workers the real harm experienced by same-sex couples who are denied the freedom to marry.”