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DOMA is not gone
Jun. 27th, 2013 11:02 amI've seen a lot of posts here about DOMA being struck down and people being glad about that.
DOMA has not been struck down. I repeat, DOMA has not been struck down. When I mentioned yesterday that there was a ruling, I mentioned Section 3 was struck down. The other parts of DOMA are still in effect.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
dpolicar has some insights you might want to read if you are willing to see a well-written rant.
Article 3 of DOMA disallowed the federal government to recognize a same-sex marriage as a marriage for the purpose of any federal benefit. This is big. This is spousal benefits. This means somebody can have their foreign-born spouse get a green card regardless of gender.
However, there are still a lot of things this ruling did not cover. The Full Faith and Credit clause of the Constitution is still not in force for same-sex marriages, meaning that a same-sex married couple traveling to Texas or Oklahoma would be treated as unmarried in the eyes of the state. Never mind that an opposite-sex couple married in another state under guidelines that would be illegal in Texas or Oklahoma would still be counted as married in all 50 states; same-sex couples still are not.
The ruling overturning California's Prop 8 also was not as sweeping as it could have been. The justices could have stretched a little, if they wanted, and made it illegal to stop a two-person marriage regardless of gender throughout the entire 9th Circuit Court of Appeals territory, which would have made gay marriage legal in 8 states. They kept the ruling to just California, which was a conservative move on the part of the slim majority. I suspect that Justice Kennedy would not have welcomed a wider ruling,and he was both the most conservative member one of the most conservative members of the 5-4 majority and the author of the majority opinion. Ahh, he was author of the opinion in DOMA. Apologies. Roberts authored the opinion in Hollingsworth, and Scalia joined the majority for this ruling. Sotomayor, interestingly, was in the dissent. I need to see if she had an individual one.
There are still many more steps to go. Don't be disheartened. We have moved forward on this, just not as much as we wanted. Just... don't lose sight of the fact that we still have a ways to go. There are more victories on the horizon, and they will move much closer to Main Street soon enough.
DOMA has not been struck down. I repeat, DOMA has not been struck down. When I mentioned yesterday that there was a ruling, I mentioned Section 3 was struck down. The other parts of DOMA are still in effect.
dpolicar has some insights you might want to read if you are willing to see a well-written rant.Article 3 of DOMA disallowed the federal government to recognize a same-sex marriage as a marriage for the purpose of any federal benefit. This is big. This is spousal benefits. This means somebody can have their foreign-born spouse get a green card regardless of gender.
However, there are still a lot of things this ruling did not cover. The Full Faith and Credit clause of the Constitution is still not in force for same-sex marriages, meaning that a same-sex married couple traveling to Texas or Oklahoma would be treated as unmarried in the eyes of the state. Never mind that an opposite-sex couple married in another state under guidelines that would be illegal in Texas or Oklahoma would still be counted as married in all 50 states; same-sex couples still are not.
The ruling overturning California's Prop 8 also was not as sweeping as it could have been. The justices could have stretched a little, if they wanted, and made it illegal to stop a two-person marriage regardless of gender throughout the entire 9th Circuit Court of Appeals territory, which would have made gay marriage legal in 8 states. They kept the ruling to just California, which was a conservative move on the part of the slim majority. I suspect that Justice Kennedy would not have welcomed a wider ruling,
There are still many more steps to go. Don't be disheartened. We have moved forward on this, just not as much as we wanted. Just... don't lose sight of the fact that we still have a ways to go. There are more victories on the horizon, and they will move much closer to Main Street soon enough.
