Justices Say They Had 'No Hesitation' in CIRM Case

Today's Court of Appeal ruling in favor of CIRM was no split decision, according to one attorney who read the 58-page judgment and described it as "very thorough."

All three justices ruled in favor of the stem cell agency, said Robert P. Feyer of the San Francisco law firm of Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe. Here are the final lines of the decision:

"After careful consideration of all of appellants' legal objections, we have no hesitation in concluding, in the exercise of our 'solemn duty to jealously guard the precious initiative power' [citation omitted], that Proposition 71 suffers from no constitutional or legal infirmity. Accordingly, we shall affirm the well-reasoned decision of the trial court upholding the validity of the initiative. The judgment is affirmed."

California's new state controller John Chiang, chair of the Financial Accountability Oversight committee for CIRM, moved quickly to herald the action. He said,

"I am pleased that the Court has upheld the will of the voters, and am encouraged that we are one step closer in ending litigation that has tied up the funding for California's historic investment in stem cell research."