THE TROUBLE WITH 'STANDING'

You may have heard this term used lately, usually in reference to Congress:  we don't have "standing" in the courts....

 

Bear with me while I explain that term so I can connect it to what will happen at the Supreme Court level to states whose Attorneys General have refused or will refuse to defend their Constitution in lower courts:
 

Standing and Legal Definition
Standing is the ability of a party to bring a lawsuit in court based upon their stake in the outcome. A party seeking to demonstrate standing must be able to show the court sufficient connection to and harm from the law or action challenged. Otherwise, the court will rule that you "lack standing" to bring the suit and dismiss your case.

There are three constitutional requirements to prove standing:

1. Injury: The plaintiff must have suffered or imminently will suffer injury. The injury must not be abstract and must be within the zone of interests meant to be regulated or protected under the statutory or constitutional guarantee in question.
2. Causation: The injury must be reasonably connected to the defendant’s conduct.
3. Redressability: A favorable court decision must be likely to redress the injury.

There are other requirements imposed by judge made law:

1. A party may only assert his or her own rights and cannot raise the claims of a third party who is not before the court.
2. A plaintiff cannot sue as a taxpayer who shares a grievance in common with all other taxpayers.

Below is my first example of not having standing:

 

Closer to home: any state that has passed a constitutional amendment defining marriage as being between one man and one woman (originally 33 states) in which  the Attorney General of any such state REFUSES to defend that law when it becomes challenged and further refuses to appoint someone in their stead to defend it, (and it is happening as you read this) would most likely wind up with the same determination when it reaches the  Supreme Court as California's Prop 8 did:





 

HOLLINGSWORTH ET AL. v. PERRY ET AL.

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

No. 12–144. Argued March 26, 2013—Decided June 26, 2013

 

 

"Held: Petitioners did not have standing to appeal the District Court’sorder. Pp. 5–17.

  (a) Article III of the Constitution confines the judicial power of fed­eral courts to deciding actual “Cases” or “Controversies.” §2. One es­sential aspect of this requirement is that any person invoking the power of a federal court must demonstrate standing to do so. In other words, the litigant must seek a remedy for a personal and tangible harm. Although most standing cases consider whether a plaintiff has satisfied the requirement when filing suit, Article III demands that an “actual controversy” persist throughout all stages of litigation. Al­ready, LLC v. Nike, Inc., 568 U. S. ___, ___. Standing “must be met by persons seeking appellate review, just as it must be met by per­sons appearing in courts of first instance.” Arizonans for Official English v. Arizona, 520 U. S. 43, 64. The parties do not contest that respondents had standing to initiate this case against the California officials responsible for enforcing Proposition 8. But once the District Court issued its order, respondents no longer had any injury to re­dress, and the state officials chose not to appeal. The only individu­als who sought to appeal were petitioners, who had intervened in the District Court, but they had not been ordered to do or refrain from doing anything. Their only interest was to vindicate the constitu­tional validity of a generally applicable California law. As this Court has repeatedly held, such a “generalized grievance”—no matter how sincere—is insufficient to confer standing…..”

[Note:  The courts make something complicated that shouldn't be]

 

So what is the point to all this?  The point is simply this - the voice of the people who took the time to go to the polls and vote for an amendment to their constitution to memorialize the definition of marriage as being between one man and one woman must not sit idly by and let their voice and vote be voided out.  The consequences that follow will be more than you can imagine.  You must take action to force your Attorney General, Governor and/or legislators to do their job and appoint legal counsel to defend your constitution or it will die the death of Prop 8 by default.  That is the lesson to be learned here. 

 

The sanctity of marriage was created by God's word and it must not be re-defined by man.