A state juvenile court judge on Tuesday rejected the request of a Christian convert's Muslim parents to order their daughter to continue chemotherapy for uterine cancer.

The request from the parents of Rifqa Bary does not meet the legal requirement of a medical emergency needing immediate treatment, Franklin County Juvenile Court Magistrate Mary Goodrich said during a hearing.

Goodrich made the ruling at the beginning of what's expected to be the final court appearances by Bary, who remains in foster care in state custody until she turns 18 next week.

Bary wants Goodrich to determine that reconciliation with her parents is impossible. The stakes are higher than a family reunion. If the judge agrees with Rifqa Bary, an undocumented immigrant from Sri Lanka, the girl could also receive a special status allowing her to stay in the country.

Bary underwent successful cancer surgery in May and then was scheduled for 45 weeks of chemotherapy , which would give her an "80 to 90 percent chance" she'd be fine, Omar Tarazi, an attorney for Bary's parents, told the judge.

Instead, Bary stopped the chemotherapy after two or three rounds, deciding she'd been healed, Tarazi said. In a court filing last week, the girl's parents claimed she stopped after visiting a faith healer.

The first word on whether California's same-sex marriage ban passes scrutiny under the U.S. Constitution is scheduled to come down Wednesday when a federal judge issues his ruling in a landmark case.

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker has reached a decision on whether to uphold or overturn the voter-approved ban known as Proposition 8 and plans to publish his opinion in the afternoon, court spokeswoman Lynn Fuller said.

His verdict comes in response to a lawsuit brought by two same-sex couples and the city of San Francisco seeking to invalidate the law as an unlawful infringement on the civil rights of gay men and lesbians.

Proposition 8, which outlawed gay marriages in California five months after the state Supreme Court legalized them, passed with 52 percent of the vote in November 2008 following the most expensive campaign on a social issue in U.S. history.

Attorneys on both sides have said an appeal was certain if Walker did not rule in their favor. The case would go first to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals then the Supreme Court if the high court justices agree to review it.

Anticipating such a scenario, lawyers for the coalition of religious and conservative groups that sponsored Proposition 8 in 2008 filed a legal brief Tuesday asking Walker to stay his decision if he overturns the ban so same-sex couples could not marry while an appeal was pending.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg says the prospect of three women on the Supreme Court is exhilarating, and she intends to stay around and enjoy it.

After the death of her husband and her own treatment for cancer, there was speculation that the 77-year-old justice would step down. But she told The Associated Press on Tuesday that she plans to remain on the court for the foreseeable future and still wants to match Justice Louis Brandeis, who retired at age 82.

Ginsburg talked with the AP as the Senate began debate on the all-but-assured confirmation of high court nominee Elena Kagan, chosen by President Barack Obama to replace John Paul Stevens. Last year, Justice Sonia Sotomayor joined the court after David Souter retired.

A new law firm, Walters & Wasylyna, LLC, is opening in Dayton, which will focus on intellectual property cases, according to an Aug. 2 statement by the legal group.

The new firm is a joint endeavor by attorneys Lindsay M. Walters and Victor J. Wasylyna, who both earned their law degrees from Case Western Reserve University School of Law.

Walters is a litigation attorney who specializes in business and trademark disputes in both federal courts and before the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Wasylyna, who has practiced both in the U.S. and internationally, has experience in numerous aspects of intellectual property law, including patents, trademarks, copyrights and trade secrets. Before joining forces with Walters, Wasylyna studied chemical engineering and practiced with Thompson Hine LLP.

Federal regulators say a company shut down a Michigan pipeline for planned maintenance hours before 911 calls about odors in the area where a massive oil spill was reported the next day.

National Transportation Safety Board officials told reporters Monday that Enbridge Inc. shut down its Calhoun County oil pipeline about 6 p.m. July 25. About three hours later, calls started coming in about gas odors in the Marshall area.

But NTSB officials say they can't link the shutdown to the pipeline rupture that dumped hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil into a Kalamazoo River tributary. It hasn't found the cause.

Federal officials say a Consumers Energy worker found oil on the ground on the morning of July 26. Enbridge says it detected the leak that day.

California's high court on Monday upheld the state's 14-year-old law barring preferential treatment of women and minorities in public school admissions, government hiring and contracting.

In a 6-1 ruling, the state Supreme Court rejected arguments from the city of San Francisco and Attorney General Jerry Brown that the law, known as Proposition 209, violates federal equality protections.

Opponents of the ban say it creates barriers for minorities and women that don't exist for other groups, such as veterans seeking preference.

The ruling written by Justice Kathryn Werdegar came in response to lawsuits filed by white contractors challenging San Francisco's affirmative action program, which was suspended in 2003.

"As the court recognized, Proposition 209 is a civil rights measure that protects everyone, regardless of background," said Sharon Browne, a lawyer for the Pacific Legal Foundation, which represented the contractors. "Under Proposition 209, no one can be victimized by unfair government policies that discriminate or grant preferences based on sex or skin color."

If San Francisco wants to resurrect the program, the Supreme Court said it must show compelling evidence the city "purposefully or intentionally discriminated against" minority and women contractors and that such a law was the only way to fix the problem.