From 10 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Pacific time today, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit will hear oral argument on a trial court's August ruling that California's ban on same-sex marriage violates the U.S. Constitution.Attorneys will argue in San Francisco before Judges Michael Daly Hawkins, N. Randy Smith, and Stephen Reinhardt -- the last of the 3 having denied the motion to disqualify himself filed by proponents of the ban, contained in the state's Constitution as a result of voters' approval of a 2008 ballot initiative, Proposition 8 (prior IntLawGrrls posts available here).
The Ninth Circuit has decided to permit live dissemination of the arguments in the case, Perry v. Schwarzenegger. The court's decision gives rise to any number of ways to watch the arguments live:
► It'll be streamed into auditoriums at many law schools (including my home institution, the University of California, Davis, School of Law); and
► It'll be broadcast on C-SPAN.
The appeals court also has set up a web database on the case. Quick skimming of briefs available there indicates one good bet: whatever the panel should decide, it's unlikely to cite foreign law or practice, as no litigant appears to have mentioned any.
