BLANKENHORN TESTIMONY IN PROP 8 TRIAL -- THE MEDIA STORY VS. THE STORY

Last week my colleague David Blankenhorn was an expert witness for the defense in the Perry vs. Schwarzenegger trial, in which the plaintiffs seek to overturn Proposition 8. It is widely expected that, whatever the outcome, the case will be appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and then the U.S. Supreme Court. Not surprisingly, there was widespread media coverage of his testimony.

One theme that emerged from those critical of Blankenhorn’s testimony was that plaintiff attorneys under cross-examination had maneuvered him into “admitting” or “conceding” that gay marriage could be good for children, or that he was “forced to” admit that he had made positive statements about gay marriage in the past.

Examples include the Los Angeles Times, the Keen News Service, and notably Howard Mintz of the San Jose Mercury News, whose running blog commentary was widely cited and who posted approximately every 45 minutes during Blankenhorn’s two days of testimony (on the 11th and 12th days of the trial).

In fact, Blankenhorn has been making the argument that there are “goods in conflict” in the same sex marriage debate – and that there might be some good reasons for gay marriage – since at least 2004, and developed the argument at length in his 2007 book, The Future of Marriage.

On a more reflective note, Margaret Talbot, who authored a New Yorker piece on the trial before it began, posted twice on the New Yorker blog about Blankenhorn’s testimony and was one of the few mainstream journalists to note his longstanding concerns out of which his position on same sex marriage grows. She writes that he has a “record of genuine concern for the well-being of children, and he has been eloquent for a long time about a very real social problem—the decline of marriage, especially among poor and less-educated Americans, and the harms, economic and emotional, this entails for children.”

She wrote again about his testimony, here.

As coverage continues, this week dawned with the news that a group of Hollywood actors have come together to reenact the trial in a video series posted at www.marriagetrial.com. The Wall Street Journal Law Blog announced that “star defense witness David Blankenhorn” will be played by Gregory Itzin, an actor who plays the president in the hit television series “24.”

Stay tuned.
posted by Elizabeth Marquardt at 3:40 PM EMAIL SHARE PRINT

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