Prop 8 judge speaks at Maurer

Of all the cases he has seen, Vaughn Walker, former U.S. district chief judge of California’s northern district, is most known for Perry v. Schwarzenegger, in which he ruled a same-sex marriage ban unconstitutional.

Although his decision in the high-profile Proposition 8 case caused both praise and criticism — he said New York Times columnist Linda Greenhouse offered “fulsome praise” while Rush Limbaugh expressed “outrage” on his radio show.

But he didn’t come to IU to discuss Proposition 8.

“I’m not going to discuss the case,” Walker said. “The decision I made is on appeal.
What I have to say about the case I said in the decision that led to the order in that case.”

Instead, Walker discussed the topic of relating a judge’s decision to his personal beliefs and values in a lecture titled “On the Bench and In the Game” on Thursday at the Maurer School of Law.

After his ruling in August 2010, he made public his long-term relationship with another male, making him the first known gay person to serve as a federal judge.

Walker retired from the bench in February 2011.

“Plessy was decided only 33 years after the Emancipation Proclamation,” he said, referring to the case that required private businesses to racially segregate.

“In hindsight, this seems exceedingly short-sighted, but it would be a mistake to describe this view as entirely ill-will toward African Americans. It should probably be seen as simply reflecting a viewpoint of the times in which these justices lived.”

Walker’s talk was sponsored by the Maurer School of Law, its LGBT Alumni Board, the IU Center for Law, Society, and Culture and others.

Steve Sanders, a founding member of the Maurer School of Law LGBT Alumni Advisory Board who led a panel discussion following Walker’s lecture, said it was a topic that could apply to Proposition 8, although not exclusively.

“A judge or justice should interpret the Constitution through its text, its structure and its history,” Walker said. “A judge or justice should set aside his own vision of the good of society.”

It was Walker’s first visit to Bloomington, and it gave him a chance to reconnect with Fred Aman, now a professor at the Maurer School of Law.

Walker was Aman’s roommate during their first year at the University of Chicago Law School.

“Judge Walker decided to leave Chicago after that first year and head to sunny California,” Aman said as he introduced his former law school friend.

“Now, all of us who got to know him in that first year missed him, to be sure, and we all wondered what would ever become of him. Well, it turns out, a lot.”