Federal Appeals Court Rules Defense of Marriage Act Unconstitutional
LOS ANGELES TIMES: WASHINGTON -- The U.S. appeals court in Boston became the first such court to strike down as unconstitutional the federal Defense of Marriage Act, ruling Thursday that it unfairly denies equal benefits to legally married same-sex couples.
The ruling is a victory for gay-rights advocates and the Obama administration, which had refused to defend that part of the 1996 law.
The decision sets the stage for a ruling next year by the Supreme Court on the constitutionality of the law that limits federal recognition of marriage to the union of a man and a woman.
The Boston-based judges stressed their decision did not establish a national right to gay marriage. That issue remains a matter for the states, they said.
But in states such as Massachusetts, where gays and lesbians can legally marry, the federal government cannot deny these couples the right to file a joint federal tax return or to receive a survivor's benefit under the Social Security Act, the appeals court said.
The court's opinion said there are more than 100,000 legally married gay and lesbian couples in the half-dozen states that have legalized same-sex marriages.
Congress passed the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996 to prevent same-sex marriages in one state from being legally recognized by all states. Usually, a couple's marriage in one state is recognized as valid in all states. However, the federal law said no state "shall be required to give effect" to a "relationship between persons of the same sex." Moreover, it said that under federal law, a marriage "means only the legal union between one man and one woman."
The case decided Thursday dealt only with this latter provision involving federal law and benefits.
» | David G. Savage | Thursday, May 31, 2012
