A North West View

It was just about unanimous with all the justices except for Justice Clarance Thomas objecting to the courts decision to uphold Washington's public disclosure laws, and ruling that the signatures on the petitions for Ref 71 can be released.  They how ever are not being released at the moment because Protect Marriage Washington, the group that got R71 on the ballot back in 09 has a case to be heard in a lower court to get the release of the names prevented.  This is allowed as the case they brought before the supreme court was a challenge to conditionality of the States disclosure law that required disclosure of the names when requested, unless a court order prevented it. The court found, with Justice John Roberts Jr. writing the ruling, that Washington's disclosure law, which only effects disclosing names of those that singed, dose not violate the first amendment.  They of course left open as currently is the possibility for groups to seek action to prevent and sto...

After just finishing reading threw the 61 page transcript of the Supreme Court proceedings and I would say if you have the time that it is definitely not as dry as one would imagine it to be, however you do get the since that the press coverage is very on the ball when they say that the justices are not thrilled at all by the legal argument of Mr. James Bopp Jr the lawyer representing Protect Marriage Washington in this case.   It becomes quite clear that 7 of the justices well since they are also the only ones talking  are really not inclined to Mr Bopp's arguments with  Justice Anthony Scalia jumping him right off the bat hardly one sentence into his opening statement. Mr Bopp comes off as spending much of his time on the defensive trying to fend of constant grilling and interrogation from the justices as they poke and produce holes and gapes into his case, in the case of justice Scalia done quite often with over exuberance. 

The US Supreme Court is scheduled to start oral arguments on April 28th over the release of the names of  those that signed Referendum 71, which was the failed bid in 2009 to try to over turn WA new "every thing but marriage" domestic partnership laws at the time.   The case which concerns the release into public record, as prescribed by washington state discolor law, of 138,000 names of those who signed the potion in order to get it onto the ballot.  As noted washington state law requires that the names of those who sign potions be released into public record where they are free for any one to access, and this has been the law for the last 40 yeas since it was instituted threw a voter approved initiative itself.

The first piece of news is that the Supreme Court  has set April 28th as the day that it will start hearing arguments dealing with the release of the 130,000 petition signatures that got Referendum 71 on the Washington state ballot, which was the failed effort to overturn the states expanded "every thing but marriage" domestic partnership laws.  Depending on how the court rules this could have a large impact on open government laws not just in WA but threw out the country, as the goal of the anti gay rights group who has brought this case to the supreme court is to withhold the signature under the pretense that they are protected free speech. If ruled so it would me that in future initiatives you would not be able to see who signed and supported getting it put on the ballot and it opens up the slippery slop, that since the supreme court has found that campaign contributions are a form of free political speech (ala corporations are people and thus have a right to unlimite...

As many of you may know the US Supreme Court has decided to take up the Ref. 71 case, involving the release of the names those who signed Referendum 71. Ref 71 being the successful effort to get Washington's expanded domestic partnerships law up to a public vote last year.  The No on R 71  campaign was defeated allowing the states expanded domestic partnership laws to stay on the books and go into effect.  How ever, the political groups behind No on R 71 most notably "Protect Marriage Washington" has been waging a court battle since shortly after their petition started to under go the official counting processed to prevent the release of the names of the petition signers as required under Washington states open government laws, most notably the promotion about petition signatures having been voted into law threw the petition process it's self in the 1970's.