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News

Prop 8 Trial: Day 4 Recap, Day 5 Preview

By  Zach Behrens
Published Jan 14, 2010 11:00 PM
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Today will mark the end of the first week of the federal trial challenging Prop 8, which banned gay marriage in California. Here's quick recap from yesterday and a list of who is expected to take the stand today. As always, the Courage Campaign's live blog has been a great source for the trial.

  • Dr. Edmund Egan, Chief Economist for the City and County of San Francisco, testified that Proposition 8 is a drain on government budgets, and that legalizing same-sex marriage would generate significant revenues and increase personal wealth, and would also reduce the burden on government services from people without health insurance and other benefits.
  • Dr. Ilan H. Meyer, Associate Professor of Clinical Sociomedical Sciences at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health testified about the stigma and prejudice gay and lesbians individuals face in society, saying that they are meant to feel they are "not equal, not respected by my state, my country, my fellow citizens." Meyer said that domestic partnership is not an adequate substitute for marriage, and said he doubted that society places any value on domestic partnership. "I don’t know if it has any social meaning," Meyer said. "I think it is clear that young children do not aspire to become domestic partners. But they may desire to become married."

Today continues with...

  • Michael Lamb, Ph.D, a Professor and Head of the Department of Social and Developmental Psychology at Cambridge University, who will testify about gay and lesbian parenting and its impact on the adjustment of children and adolescents, and the benefits to children and adolescents if their same-sex parents were allowed to marry.
  • Helen Zia, a lesbian author who will testify about her sexual orientation, her experiences with discrimination, and the effects of being denied the right to marry her longtime partner.
  • M.V. Lee Badgett, Ph.D., a professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, to testify about the private harms caused by Prop. 8 and the impact of same-sex marriage on the marriages of different-sex couples.
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