# Hollingsworth v. Perry (2013) Decided **June 26, 2013**, 5–4 (Roberts joined by Scalia, Ginsburg, Breyer, Kagan). The Supreme Court ruled that the **proponents of California's Proposition 8** — the 2008 voter-approved state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage — lacked **Article III standing** to defend the law in federal court after California state officials declined to defend it. The standing ruling effectively reinstated the lower-court ruling that struck Prop 8 down, restoring same-sex marriage in California after nearly five years of restriction. ## The Long Road The case had an unusually layered procedural history: - **November 2008**: California voters approve **Proposition 8** by 52%, amending the state constitution to define marriage as exclusively between a man and a woman. The vote came **six months after** the California Supreme Court had legalized same-sex marriage in *In re Marriage Cases* (May 2008) and after approximately 18,000 same-sex marriages had been performed in California - **2009**: A federal lawsuit (*Perry v. Schwarzenegger*) was filed by Theodore Olson and David Boies — the **unlikely bipartisan attorney pairing** of the lead lawyers on opposite sides of *[[Bush v. Gore]]* (2000) — representing two same-sex couples challenging Prop 8 on federal constitutional grounds - **August 2010**: U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker ruled Prop 8 violated the federal Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses. California's Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Jerry Brown both declined to appeal the ruling - **The Prop 8 proponents** (originally led by Dennis Hollingsworth) intervened to defend the law in the absence of state defense - **2012**: Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court ruling - **June 26, 2013**: Supreme Court ruled the proponents lacked standing, leaving the district court ruling in place ## Why the Standing Ruling Mattered The standing ruling — though procedurally narrow — had two large consequences: 1. **Same-sex marriage was restored in California** immediately, making California the **13th U.S. state** with legal same-sex marriage (and by population, more than doubling the number of Americans living in marriage-equality jurisdictions) 2. **The Court declined to issue a substantive ruling** on whether state same-sex marriage bans were federally unconstitutional — leaving that question for two years later (*[[Obergefell v. Hodges]]*, 2015) The same-day pairing of *Hollingsworth* with *[[United States v. Windsor]]* (also decided June 26, 2013) gave the marriage-equality movement two simultaneous victories: federal DOMA Section 3 struck down (*Windsor*), and California marriage equality restored (*Hollingsworth*). ## The Olson-Boies Argument The Olson-Boies federal-constitutional argument — that state same-sex marriage bans violated the federal Constitution — was strategically controversial within the LGBTQ legal movement when it was filed. Many [[Lambda Legal]] and [[GLBTQ Legal Advocates and Defenders]] strategists believed it was **too aggressive too soon** and would risk producing a hostile Supreme Court ruling that would set the movement back. The Olson-Boies argument turned out to be more effective than the cautious-establishment strategy anticipated — though the Court's ultimate avoidance of the substantive question via the standing ruling vindicated some of the original strategic caution. ## Place in the Vault *Hollingsworth* is **the third major June-26-decided LGBTQ-rights case** — joining *[[Lawrence v. Texas]]* (2003) and *United States v. Windsor* (2013, same day) on the iconic calendar date that would later anchor *Obergefell* (2015). It is also the case that demonstrates how **executive-branch refusal to defend an unconstitutional law** (Governor Schwarzenegger and AG Brown declining to appeal the district court ruling) can produce major civil-rights advances through procedural rather than substantive Supreme Court rulings. --- ## See Also - [[Queer Liberation Ecosystem]] - [[Queer Liberation Timeline]] - [[United States v. Windsor]] - [[Obergefell v. Hodges]]