Hollingsworth v. Perry
| Hollingsworth v. Perry | |
|---|---|
| Argued March 26, 2013 Decided June 26, 2013 | |
| Full case name | Dennis Hollingsworth, et al., Petitioners v. Kristin M. Perry, et al. |
| Docket no. | 12-144 |
| Citations | 570 U.S. 693 (more) 133 S. Ct. 2652; 186 L. Ed. 2d 768 |
| Argument | Oral argument |
| Case history | |
| Prior | Judgment for plaintiffs, Perry v. Schwarzenegger, 704 F. Supp. 2d 921 (N.D. Cal. 2010); Certified question, 628 F.3d 1191 (9th. Cir. 2011); Answered, Perry v. Brown, 52 Cal.4th 1116 (2011); Affirmed, 671 F.3d 1052 (9th Cir. 2012); Cert. granted, 568 U.S. 1066 (2012). |
| Holding | |
| Opponents of same-sex marriage do not have standing to intervene in litigation about the constitutionality of same-sex marriage because they cannot demonstrate that they are harmed by a court's decision about it. | |
| Court membership | |
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| Case opinions | |
| Majority | Roberts, joined by Scalia, Ginsburg, Breyer, Kagan |
| Dissent | Kennedy, joined by Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor |
| Laws applied | |
| U.S. Const. Art. III | |
Hollingsworth v. Perry was a series of United States federal court cases that reinstated same-sex marriage in the state of California. The case began in 2009 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, which found that banning same-sex marriage violates equal protection under the law. This decision overturned California ballot initiative Proposition 8, which had banned same-sex marriage. After the State of California refused to defend Proposition 8, the official sponsors of Proposition 8 intervened and appealed to the Supreme Court. The case was litigated during the governorships of both Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jerry Brown, and was thus known as Perry v. Schwarzenegger and Perry v. Brown, respectively. As Hollingsworth v. Perry, it eventually reached the United States Supreme Court, which held that, in line with prior precedent, the official sponsors of a ballot initiative measure did not have Article III standing to appeal an adverse federal court ruling when the state refused to do so.
The effect of the ruling was that same-sex marriage in California resumed under the district court trial decision from 2010.