Federal Appeals Court Issues Strongly-Worded Ruling Against Lower Court Judge
The 1st Circuit Court of Appeals has just handed down a decision overturning a lower court’s ruling that had found Puerto Rico‘s ban on same-sex marriage to be constitutional. In early March a federal judge ludicrously decided that because the U.S. territory was not an incorporated territory, the U.S. Constitution was to be applied differently, despite previous rulings, including the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell.
Same-sex marriage once again is constitutional in Puerto Rico.
Today’s ruling clearly mocks the decision of the lower court judge, U.S. District Court Judge Juan Pérez-Giménez, and does not mince words in doing so.
“The district court’s ruling errs in so many respects that it is hard to know where to begin,†the 1st Circuit Court ruling begins.
There’s plenty of legalese below, but suffice to say that the federal appeals court, as Chris Geidner at Buzzfeed notes, “stated unambiguously that Puerto Rico’s ban on same-sex couples’ marriages is unconstitutional, throwing a federal judge off a case after the judge had ruled in March that the ban was still in effect.”
The ruling can be read at Equality Case Files.
Some excerpts:
“In any event, for present purposes we need not gild the lily,” the 1st Circuit Court’s ruling states. “Our prior mandate was clear: Upon consideration of the parties’ Joint Response Pursuant to Court Order filed June 26, 2015, we vacate the district court’s Judgment in this case and remand the matter for further consider in light of Obergefell . . . . We agree with the parties’ joint position that the ban is unconstitutional. Mandate to issue forthwith.”
The 1st Circuit adds, “the district court both misconstrued that right and directly contradicted our mandate. And it compounded its error (and signaled a lack of confidence in its actions), by failing to enter a final judgment to enable an appeal in ordinary course. Error of this type is not so easily insulated from review. This court may employ mandamus jurisdiction when a district court has misconstrued or otherwise failed to effectuate a mandate issued by this court.”
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