Possible High Court Nomination Didn't Deter Calif. Justice on Marriage Vote
Carlos Moreno is the only justice on the California Supreme Court to marry a gay couple, and the only justice who dissented from a decision last May upholding a ballot referendum banning gay marriage.
Moreno’s opinion “has raised his profile and encouraged speculation that he may be stepping into a more visible role,” the Los Angeles Times reports. Observers interviewed by the newspaper are reappraising the justice and suggesting that the opinion signals growing independence, the story says.
University of California-Irvine law dean Erwin Chemerinsky told the Times it is remarkable that Moreno stuck with his position even as he was under consideration for the U.S. Supreme Court. “He knew he was being considered for the U.S. Supreme Court, and it would have been very easy for him in a 6-1 case to make it unanimous,” Chemerinsky told the publication.
The California Supreme Court opinion was issued on May 26, the same day that President Obama nominated Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Moreno told the Los Angeles Times he didn’t change his mind on his dissent, even though he knew his position would be controversial if he were nominated. “I thought it might come up,” he told the Times.
Moreno has a gay nephew and lesbian niece. He told the Times that feelings about gay marriage are generational. “The bans against interracial marriage were at one time widely accepted, but no one would tolerate that kind of restriction in modern times,” he said. “And I think the same is true for gay marriage.”
Yet Moreno views himself as a centrist who believes the law should develop incrementally. “I am not in favor of big leaps,” he said.
