On behalf of the Ethics and Public Policy Center—the think tank I head—I filed today an amicus brief in the Ninth Circuit appeal of Judge Vaughn Walker’s wild ruling against Proposition 8.  Here’s the opening of my brief:

It must be rare, if not unprecedented, that a federal district judge has had his rulings in a case reversed three times before his final judgment is even presented for appellate review.  But the occurrence of that rarity in this case barely begins to convey the breadth and depth of the judicial errors below.  The purpose of this brief is to provide a survey of the district judge’s remarkable course of misconduct in this case. 

My brief concludes that the inescapable explanation for Walker’s remarkable pattern of misconduct is that Walker “harbors a deep-seated animus against traditional marriage and that he has been unwilling or unable to contain his animus.”  (As I’ve previously highlighted, the lead brief of Proposition 8’s proponents is available here.)