Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/558bv.pdf
Page Number: 345

184 

HOLLINGSWORTH  v.  PERRY 

Per Curiam 

Per Curiam. 
We  are  asked  to  stay  the  broadcast  of  a  federal  trial. 
We  resolve  that  question  without  expressing  any  view  on 
whether such trials should be broadcast.  We instead deter­
mine that the broadcast in this case should be stayed because 
it  appears  the  courts  below  did  not  follow  the  appropriate 
procedures  set  forth  in  federal  law  before  changing  their 
rules  to  allow  such  broadcasting.  Courts  enforce  the  re­
quirement  of  procedural  regularity  on  others,  and  must  fol­
low those requirements themselves. 

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This lawsuit, still in a preliminary stage, involves an action 
challenging what the parties refer to as Proposition 8, a Cali­
fornia ballot proposition adopted by the electorate.  Proposi­
tion  8  amended  the  State  Constitution  by  adding  a  new 
section  providing  that  “[o]nly  marriage  between  a  man  and 
a  woman  is  valid  or  recognized  in  California.”  Cal.  Const. 
Art.  I,  § 7.5.  The  plaintiffs  contend  that  Proposition  8  vio­
lates  the  United  States  Constitution.  A  bench  trial  in  the 
case began on Monday, January 11, 2010, in the United States 
District Court for the Northern District of California. 

The District Court has issued an order permitting the trial 
to be broadcast live via streaming audio and video to a num­
ber  of  federal  courthouses  around  the  country.  The  order 
was  issued  pursuant  to  a  purported  amendment  to  a  local 
Rule  of  the  District  Court.  That  Rule  had  previously  for­
bidden  the  broadcasting  of  trials  outside  the  courthouse  in 
which  a  trial  takes  place.  The  District  Court  effected  its 
amendment via several postings on the District Court’s Web 
site in the days immediately before the trial in this case was 
to begin. 

Applicants  here  are  defendant-intervenors  in  the  lawsuit. 
They  object  to  the  District  Court’s  order,  arguing  that  the 
District Court violated a federal statute by promulgating the 
amendment  to  its  local  Rule  without  sufﬁcient  opportunity