DOMA DEAD, California Alive

With two rulings today, the Supreme Court has overturned DOMA and effectively made California the latest state where the affirmation of equal marriage rights is the law of the land.  The ruling against DOMA was sweeping, made on both equal protection and Fifth Amendment grounds.  The court dismissed the Prop 8 case in California on procedural grounds, which had a positive affect on California, but didn't resolve the question of gay marriage nation-wide.  It would have been nice for the issue to be settled sea-to-sea once and for all, but this is still a good day for liberty and love.  The winds are moving in the right direction.  We'll get there.

And I must say that Scalia isn't even trying any more.  His arguments in these gay rights cases were at odds with his arguments from only a day ago in the Shelby County case.   He is an angry, sad man with way, way too much power.

26 June 2013

Addition:  Okay, DOMA isn't dead.  Only Section 3 of DOMA is dead.  From Brian Beutler at TPM:

The nature of the court’s DOMA decision, combined with its decision to punt the California Prop 8 case about whether there’s a constitutional right to gay marriage, will ultimately create a sort of three-tiered status for same-sex partners. 

The first tier is same sex married couples who live in states that allow same sex marriage. They gained the most from today’s decision. The third tier is same sex couples who live in states that do not recognize same sex marriage. They gained very little direct benefit from the court striking down DOMA. The middle tier is where things get complicated: same sex couples who marry in one state but then choose to move (or more likely are forced to, for work, family, or other reasons) to a state that doesn’t allow same sex marriage. 

“Currently, eligibility for some federal benefits turns on whether a marriage was valid where it took place, while eligibility for other federal benefits depends on whether the person’s marriage is respected where the person lives,” Shannon Minter, legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights, wrote in an email to TPM Wednesday. “People who are legally married to same-sex partners in states that permit same-sex couples to marry will be eligible for all federal benefits based on marriage. But people who are legally married to same-sex partners in states that do not respect such marriages will be eligible for some federal benefits, but likely not all. Pending further guidance by the relevant federal agencies, the answer to this question for couples who live in states that do not respect their marriage is uncertain.” 

As Adam Winkler, a constitutional scholar at UCLA, explained in a phone interview after the decision was handed down, “for all the talk that DOMA is dead, the Court did not strike down any provision of DOMA other than Section 3. Section 2 remains good law. Section 2 is the section that says states don’t have to recognize marriages from other states. Long-standing constitutional doctrine has allowed states to decline to recognize marriages from other states.” 

Thus, same-sex partners now find themselves in a legal position that’s similar to the position interracial couples found themselves in decades ago — allowed to wed in some states, but into marriages that won’t be recognized by others.

28 June 2013 Addition:  The New Yorker has unveiled its latest cover.  Pure win!

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