I Am Not a Lawyer

(That title mangles a phrase from author Anthony Burgess.)

The California Blog of Appeal just caught my eye with a post on a new Ninth Circuit decision on “don’t ask, don’t tell” in Witt v. Dept. of the Air Force, case no. 06-35644 (9th Cir. May 21, 2008). I shan’t try to repeat his analysis, as I have neither the time nor the expertise, but one interesting bit to me is that the Ninth Circuit applied Lawrence v. Texas to “don’t ask, don’t tell.” In my head, that decision affected state law only, but of course anything affecting constitutional rights should apply across the board. (If that’s the case, though, wouldn’t laws like the Defense of Marriage Act be void?)

This decision is bound to get heavy scrutiny, which I’m sure the court anticipated, so I suspect it’s not as activist as some will surely make it out to be. I do not need a crystal ball to predict en banc rehearing and possible cert.