After being asked [JURIST report] by the Ninth Circuit to weigh in, the Supreme Court of California [official website] announced last month that it will decide whether supporters of Proposition 8 have standing [JURIST report] to defend the measure when state officials have refused to do so. When Judge Vaughn Walker of the US District Court for the Northern District of California [official website] struck down Proposition 8 [JURIST report], then-governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and former attorney general and current Governor Jerry Brown [official website], who were originally defendants in the lawsuit, refused to continue defending the measure on appeal [JURIST report], leaving defendant-intervenors Project Marriage [advocacy website] and other groups to defend the law. In January, the Ninth Circuit also upheld [opinion, PDF] a lower court decision refusing to allow officials from Imperial County, California [JURIST report] to intervene, and Judge Stephen Reinhardt issued a memorandum opinion [text, PDF] on his decision not to recuse himself [JURIST report]. The Ninth Circuit heard oral arguments [video; JURIST report] in the case, Perry v. Schwarzenegger [case materials] in December. The hearing was divided into two one-hour sessions, with the first section focusing on the issue of standing and the second on Proposition 8's constitutionality.