Baker v. Nelson

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Richard John Baker v. Gerald R. Nelson[1] was a case in which the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that Minnesota law limited marriage to opposite-sex couples and that this limitation did not violate the United States Constitution. The plaintiffs appealed, and the United States Supreme Court dismissed the appeal "for want of a substantial federal question." Because the case came to the U.S. Supreme Court through mandatory appellate review (not certiorari), the summary dismissal constituted a decision on the merits and established Baker v. Nelson as controlling precedent.[2]

Contents

[edit] Facts and trial

On May 18, 1970, two University of Minnesota gay student activists, Richard Baker and James McConnell, applied for a marriage license in Minneapolis. The clerk of the Hennepin County District Court, Gerald Nelson, denied the request on the sole ground that the two were of the same sex. The couple filed suit in district court to force Nelson to issue the license.[3]

The couple first contended that Minnesota's marriage statutes contained no explicit requirement that applicants be of different sexes. If the court were to construe the statutes to require opposite-sex couples, however, Baker claimed such a reading would violate several provisions of the U.S. Constitution:[4]

The trial court dismissed the couple's claims and ordered the clerk not to issue the license.[5]

[edit] Appeal to the Minnesota Supreme Court

The couple appealed the district court's decision to the Minnesota Supreme Court, where they renewed all of their claims. In a brief opinion issued on October 15, 1971, the state's highest court affirmed the trial court's dismissal.

The Court first dealt with the statutory interpretation. Based on the common usage of the term "marriage" and gender-specific references elsewhere in the same chapter, the Court held that the statutes prohibited marriage between persons of the same sex.[6]

This familiar restriction, the Court reasoned, did not offend the Due Process Clause because procreation and child rearing were central to the constitutional protection given to marriage.[7]

The Court was not persuaded that an equal-protection violation was present either. Childless heterosexual marriages presented no more than a theoretical imperfection, which doesn't violate the Fourteenth Amendment. The couple's reliance on the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in Loving v. Virginia (striking down an anti-miscegenation law) also failed: "in commonsense and in a constitutional sense, there is a clear distinction between a marital restriction based merely upon race and one based upon the fundamental difference in sex."[8]

The Court acknowledged that Justice Goldberg's concurrence in Griswold v. Connecticut (criminalizing contraceptives violated the right to marital privacy) found support for marital privacy partly in the Ninth Amendment. But, the Court distinguished Griswold and found no authority for the Ninth Amendment being binding on the states.[9]

The Court dismissed without discussion the claims under the First and Eighth Amendments.[10]

[edit] Decision in the U.S. Supreme Court

Baker and McConnell appealed the Minnesota court's decision to the U.S. Supreme Court. There, they claimed the Minnesota marriage statutes abridged their fundamental right to marry under the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause, discriminated based on gender contrary to the Equal Protection Clause (also Fourteenth Amendment), and deprived them of privacy rights flowing from the Ninth Amendment.[11] On October 10, 1972, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a one-sentence order dismissing the case "for want of a substantial federal question."[12]

In most cases presented to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Court's refusal to hear the case is not an endorsement of the decision below.[13] Because this case came to the Court through mandatory appellate review, the summary dismissal is a decision on the merits of the case.[14] As binding precedent, the Baker decision prevents lower courts from coming to a contrary conclusion when presented with the precise issues the Court necessarily considered in dismissing the case.[15]

[edit] Application of the Baker precedent

When dealing with precedents like Baker, lower courts may have to guess at the meaning of these unexplained decisions.[16] The Supreme Court has laid out rules, however, to guide lower courts in narrowly applying these summary dispositions:[17]

  • The facts in the potentially binding case must not bear any legally significant differences to the case under consideration.[18]
  • The binding precedent encompasses only the issues presented to the Court, not the reasoning found in the lower court's decision.[19]
  • Of the issues presented, only those necessarily decided by the Court in dismissing the case control.[20]
  • Subsequent developments by the Court on the relevant doctrines may cast doubt on the continuing validity of a summary judgment.[21]

[edit] Baker in federal courts

In applying the guidelines for summary dispositions, federal judges have come to differing conclusions on where and how Baker controls.

[edit] Citizens for Equal Protection v. Bruning, U.S. Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit (2006)

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit rejected claims by Nebraska citizen organizations that the state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage offended the U.S. Constitution's Equal Protection Clause, among other provisions.[22] While Baker did not appear in the court's Fourteenth Amendment analysis, the court's opinion did note in its concluding passage:

Indeed, in Baker v. Nelson, when faced with a Fourteenth Amendment challenge to a decision by the Supreme Court of Minnesota denying a marriage license to a same-sex couple, the United States Supreme Court dismissed "for want of a substantial federal question." There is good reason for this restraint.

(emphasis added in the Bruning opinion, citations omitted.)[23]

[edit] Wilson v. Ake, U.S. District Court (2005)

Two Florida women who married in Massachusetts claimed that Florida's marriage statutes and the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) violated the due process and equal protection guarantees of the Fourteenth Amendment (and implicitly the Fifth Amendment),[24] among other claims. The judge dismissed the claims against the U.S. Attorney General, in part, because Baker controlled; "The Supreme Court has not explicitly or implicitly overturned its holding in Baker or provided the lower courts, including this Court, with any reason to believe that the holding is invalid today."[25]

[edit] In re Kandu, U.S. Bankruptcy Court (2004)

Lee and Ann Kandu, Washington residents, were married in British Columbia. They jointly filed for bankruptcy protection. Kandu claimed, among other things, that the portion of the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) that precluded the bankruptcy court from allowing a joint proceeding violated due-process and equal-protection principles under the Fifth Amendment.[26] The court concluded that Baker did not control. Among the distinguishing features the court noted were the dissimilarity between state laws governing marriage licenses in Baker and the federal DOMA and bankruptcy code in this case as well as the possibility that the Supreme Court's decision in Lawrence v. Texas (striking down Texas' sodomy statute) marked a shift in the Court's "analysis of same-sex conduct."[27]

[edit] Baker in state courts

In state courts, the relevance of a precedent like Baker partly depends on what claims the litigants make. If the litigants claim protection of the U.S Constitution, a U.S. Supreme Court precedent may control the outcome of those claims. If the claims arise under state constitutional provisions, federal precedents need not control.[28] There are some state courts, however, that treat provisions of their constitution in the same way as the federal courts treat the analogous portion of the U.S. Constitution.[29] In these circumstances, precedents like Baker may control state constitutional analysis.[30]

In state courts, judges also come to somewhat differing conclusions as to Baker's reach.

[edit] Morrison v. Sandler, Indiana Court of Appeals (2005)

The Indiana Court of Appeals upheld the dismissal of a case brought by several same-sex couples who challenged Indiana's marriage statutes. On appeal, the couples claimed that the statutes violated several provisions of the Indiana Constitution, principally the Equal Privileges and Immunities Clause (Article 1 § 23). The majority opinion (Barnes, J.) concluded its description of Baker with:

Thus, the Supreme Court, five years after it decided Loving, determined that that case did not support an argument by same-sex couples that precluding them from marrying violated the Fourteenth Amendment. In light of this precedent, the Plaintiffs have not made a Fourteenth Amendment argument in this case.

[edit] Hernandez v. Robles, New York Court of Appeals (2004)

The New York Court of Appeals (the state's highest court) rejected claims by same-sex couples that the state's marriage laws were offensive to the state constitution's Due Process and Equal Protection clauses.[31] New York courts treat the state's Equal Protection Clause interchangeably with its federal counterpart. [32]

Plurality Opinion (Smith, R.S., J.)
We find no inconsistency that is significant in this case between our due process and equal protection decisions and the Supreme Court's. No precedent answers for us the question we face today; we reject defendants' argument that the Supreme Court's ruling without opinion in Baker v Nelson bars us from considering plaintiffs' equal protection claims.

(citations omitted.)[33]
Separate Opinion (Graffeo, J., concurring), footnote 4 ends a survey of the Baker precedent with:
Thus, with respect to the Federal Due Process Clause, we must presume that Loving did not expand the fundamental right to marry in the manner suggested by plaintiffs in the cases before us. This observation does not, however, preclude this Court from interpreting the New York State Due Process Clause more expansively.

(citations omitted.)[34]

[edit] Sotomayor Nomination

Sen. Charles Grassley (R - Iowa) questioned Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor on whether she would treat Baker v. Nelson as precedent were relevant cases to come before the Court. Judge Sotomayor responded that she had not studied the case for a long time, perhaps since she was in law school, and would need to review the case before she made further comment.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ 291 Minn. 310 (Minn. 1971), 409 U.S. 810 (1972).
  2. ^ Project, Developments in the Law: The Constitution and the Family, 93 Harv. L. Rev. 1156, 1274 (1980) (discussing Baker's posture as precedent); see, e.g. Pamela R. Winnick, Comment, The Precedential Weight of a Dismissal by the Supreme Court for Want of a Substantial Federal Question: Some Implications of Hicks v. Miranda, 76 Colum. L. Rev. 508, 511 (1976) ("a dismissal by the Supreme Court is an adjudication on the merits. . . a lower federal court must consider itself bound by the dismissal when a similar challenge comes before it").
  3. ^ Appellant's Jurisdictional Statement, Baker v. Nelson, Supreme Court docket no. 71-1027, at 3-4 (statement of the case); Court Won't Let Men Wed, N.Y. Times, Jan. 10, 1971 at 65.
  4. ^ Appellant's Jurisdictional Statement, Baker v. Nelson at 6 (how the federal questions were raised); Baker v. Nelson, 191 N.W.2d 185, 185-86 (Minn. 1971); The Legality of Homosexual Marriage, 82 Yale L.J. 573, 573-74 (1973).
  5. ^ Baker, 191 N.W.2d at 185.
  6. ^ Baker, 191 N.W.2d at 185-86; Rhonda R. Rivera, Our Straight-Laced Judges, 30 Hastings L.J. 799, 874-75 (1979).
  7. ^ Baker, 191 N.W.2d at 186-87; Rivera at 875; The Legality of Homosexual Marriage at 579 n.27.
  8. ^ Baker, 191 N.W.2d at 187; Rivera at 875.
  9. ^ Baker, 191 N.W.2d at 186-87; The Legality of Homosexual Marriage at 573-74 n.3.
  10. ^ Baker, 191 N.W.2d at 186 n.2.
  11. ^ Appellant's Jurisdictional Statement, Baker v. Nelson, Supreme Court docket no. 71-1027, at 3, available at DOMAwatch.org (accessed Oct. 28, 2009) (questions presented).
  12. ^ Baker v. Nelson, 409 U.S. 810 (1972).
  13. ^ See, e.g. Briefing Glossary, Office of the Solicitor General website (see "Appellate jurisdiction" and "Certiorari"; accessed Oct. 25, 2009).
  14. ^ Project, Developments in the Law: The Constitution and the Family, 93 Harv. L. Rev. 1156, 1274 (1980) (discussing Baker's posture as precedent); see, e.g. Pamela R. Winnick, Comment, The Precedential Weight of a Dismissal by the Supreme Court for Want of a Substantial Federal Question: Some Implications of Hicks v. Miranda, 76 Colum. L. Rev. 508, 511 (1976) ("a dismissal by the Supreme Court is an adjudication on the merits. . . a lower federal court must consider itself bound by the dismissal when a similar challenge comes before it").
  15. ^ See, e.g. Mandel v. Bradley, 432 U.S. 173, 176 (1977) ("[D]ismissals for want of a substantial federal question without doubt reject the specific challenges presented in the statement of jurisdiction. . . . They do prevent lower courts from coming to opposite conclusions on the precise issues presented and necessarily decided by those actions."); see generally Note, The Precedential Effect of Summary Affirmances and Dismissals for Want of a Substantial Federal Question by the Supreme Court after Hicks v. Miranda and Mandel v. Bradley, 61 Va. L. Rev. 117, 118 (1978).
  16. ^ E.g. In re Kandu, 315 B.R. 123, 137 (Bkrtcy. W.D. Wash 2004) (determining whether Baker controls "is anything but a clear and certain task."); Colorado Springs Amusement Ltd. v. Rizzo, 428 U.S. 913, 919 (1976) (Brennan, J., dissenting from denial of cert.) ("When presented with the contention that our unexplained dispositions are conclusively binding, puzzled state and lower court judges are left to guess as to the meaning and scope of our unexplained dispositions." [citations omitted]); Robert L. Stern, et al., Supreme Court Practice 296 (6th ed. 1986) ("the Court has become increasingly concerned that these summary dispositions on the merits are uncertain guides to the lower courts bound to follow them and not infrequently create more confusion than certainty in the development of the law").
  17. ^ E.g. William J. Schneier, Note, The Do's and Don'ts of Determining the Precedential Value of Supreme Court Summary Dispositions, 51 Brook. L. R. 945 (1985) (surveying the application of summary judgments before and after Hicks v. Miranda, 422 U.S. 332 [1975]); Robert L. Stern, et al., Supreme Court Practice, 250 (6th ed. 1986) (setting out four criteria with which a lower court could proceed with confidence, largely quoted from Mandel v. Bradley, 423 U.S. 173, 176 [1977]).
  18. ^ E.g. Mandel v. Bradley, 423 U.S. at 177 ("The precedential significance of the summary action in Salera, however, is to be assessed in the light of all of the facts in that case;"); Schneier at 957 (the Court has "limited the precedential value of summary dispositions to cases with legally indistinguishable facts."); Stern at § 4.30.
  19. ^ E.g. Illinois Bd. of Elections v. Socialist Workers Party, 440 U.S. 173, 182-83 (1979) ("A summary disposition affirms only the judgment of the court below, and no more may be read into our action than was essential to sustain that judgment." [citations omitted]); Mandel v. Bradley, 432 U.S. at 180 ("before deciding a case on the authority of a summary disposition by this Court in another case, [lower courts] must (a) examine the jurisdictional statement in the earlier case to be certain that the constitutional questions presented were the same..."); Schneier at 960 ("a court must... examine the jurisdictional statement to determine which issues were directly presented to the Supreme Court..."); Stern at § 4.30.
  20. ^ E.g. Anderson v. Celebrezze, 460 U.S. 780, 785 n5 (1983) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting) ("the precedential effect of a summary affirmance extends no further than 'the precise issues presented and necessarily decided by those actions.' A summary disposition affirms only the judgment of the court below, and no more may be read into our action than was essential to sustain that judgment."); Schneier at 961 ("which of the issues presented to the Court were necessarily decided by the summary disposition...").
  21. ^ E.g. Hicks v. Miranda, 422 U.S. at 344 ("'if the Court has branded a question as unsubstantial, it remains so except when doctrinal developments indicate otherwise.'" quoting Port Authority Bondholders Protective Committee v. Port of New York Authority, 387 F.2d 259, 263 n.3 [2nd Cir. 1967]); Tenafly Eruv Ass'n v. Borough of Tenafly, 309 F.3d 144, 173, n.33 (3d Cir. 2002) (cert. denied 539 U.S. 942 [2002]); Schneier at 961 ("determine whether there have been doctrinal developments that supersede the summarily adjudicated case"); but, c.f. Rodriguez de Quijas v. Shearson/American Express, Inc., 490 U.S. 477 (1989) (holding that lower courts should respect [full] opinions of the Court that are directly on point even when later opinions cast doubt on their validity).
  22. ^ Citizens for Equal Protection v. Bruning, 455 F.3d 859, 863 (8th Cir. 2006) (other claims were unlawful bill of attainder [art. 1 sect. 10] and the lower court, sua sponte, found violations of the First Amendment).
  23. ^ Citizens for Equal Protection at 870-71.
  24. ^ The Fourteenth Amendment binds states, but the Fifth Amendment governs federal actions. The couple raised claims under only the former provision, but the court construed the DOMA claims under the Fifth Amendment. Wilson v. Akins, 354 F.Supp.2d 1298, 1305 n.9, 1307 n.11 (M.D. Fla. 2005).
  25. ^ Wilson v. Akins, 354 F.Supp.2d at 1305.
  26. ^ In re Kandu, 315 B.R. 123, 130-31 (Bkrtcy. W.D. Wash 2004).
  27. ^ In re Kandu, 315 B.R. at 136-37 ("Given the enumerated statutory differences between Baker and DOMA, subsequent Congressional history related to DOMA, the limited scope of precedential value of summary affirmations and dismissals, and the possible impact of recent Supreme Court decisions, particularly as articulated in Lawrence, this Court concludes that Baker is not binding precedent on the issues presented by the Debtors."); William C. Duncan, Avoidance Strategy: Same-Sex Marriage Litigation and the Federal Courts, 29 Campbell L. Rev. 29, 34 (2006).
  28. ^ E.g., William J. Brennan, Jr., State Constitutions and the Protection of Individual Rights, 90 Harv. L. Rev. 489, 491-93 (1977); G. Alan Tarr, Understanding State Constitutions p.167 (1998).
  29. ^ E.g., Earl M. Maltz, Lockstep Analysis and the Concept of Federalism, 496 Annals of American Academy of Political and Social Sciences 98, 99-102 (1988).
  30. ^ E.g. 1 Jennifer Friesen, State Constitutional Law § 3.01 (4th ed. 2006); see also, e.g. Timothy P. O'Neill, "Stop Me Before I get Reversed Again", 36 Loyola University Chicago Law Journal 893, 897 (2005).
  31. ^ Hernandez v. Robles, 855 N.E.2d 356 (2006).
  32. ^ Under 21 v City of New York, 65 N.Y.2d 344, 360 n.6 (1985) ("We have held that the State constitutional equal protection clause (NY Const, art I, §11) is no broader in coverage than the Federal provision... Accordingly, we need only analyze the equal protection issue under the framework of the 14th Amendment.")
  33. ^ Hernandez, 855 N.E.2d at 362.
  34. ^ Hernandez, 855 N.E.2d at 372 n.4.

[edit] External links

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baker_v._Nelson"