The effect of the just-released Supreme Court decision is to give gays equal rights under the law, effectively undermining DOMA.
They cited the Equal Protection clause, so this wasn't decided on a states rights basis. It has the effect of Federal law.
Now, gays can apply for benefits which had been limited to heterosexual couples under DOMA.
DOMA is gone!
Finally they did something good. Although they did kill a prominent part of the Voting Rights Act.
Well, they killed the prior scrutiny thing for select states in the case of VR. It's still illegal to discriminate. It just means that once a discriminatory law is passed, someone will need to take it to court, which I'm sure will happen.
Somebody post some reaction vids of pissed of homophobes. Let's have a laugh.
Look at the vacant expression on the hateful bastard's face. It's hitting him.
Can't force... religious views... on minority group.... anymore. I'm an arch-conservative... in a changing America... soon I'll be irrelevant... *Upper lip quivers a bit*
Ah! I live for this moment!
Twitter feed for Bryan Fischer.
The comments on it are fucking fantastic.
Thanks, that had me chuckling. Evidently today is not a good day to express your homophobia, Mr Fischer.
It did not take long for the tea baggers and right wingers to go to the microphones and lament the existent of unelected judges. What drivel. The Supreme Court is established in the constitution and on purpose they were made judges for life and were unelected. They have made some mistakes in the past, but for the most part I am glad they are there.
The Court puts a rein on Congress.
The thing is, the Supreme Court is likely to lose at least one judge in what remains of Obama's term and the Republicans will use every tactic possible to keep him from getting a liberal judge into the Court.
It should be noted that the Supremes basically punted on the California Prop 8 (antigay marriage) decision. They did let the lower court ruling invalidating the law stand, but the basis wasn't constitutional. Rather, they decided that the party bringing the appeal had no standing in the Supreme Court.
What does "standing" (actually "legal standing") mean? From Wikipedia:
"In law, standing or locus standi is the term for the ability of a party to demonstrate to the court sufficient connection to and harm from the law or action challenged to support that party's participation in the case. Standing exists from one of three causes:" (more)
In effect, the court asked "Why are you here? Do you have a dog in this fight?" and decided that they were the wrong type of party to bring the suit.
I think the DOMA decision strongly hints what will eventually happen when the right party brings the Prop 8 appeal, but for now the state court ruling stands.
Secton 2 of DoMA stands, which preserves the right of states to not recognize same-sex marriages or unions from other jurisdictions. It seems like the Proposition 8 case would have had broader implications on the states than the DoMA ruling does. Perhaps the hope of the more progressive justices is that individual states will come around through legislation of their own before the Supreme Court is forced to deal with it. I would be ambivalent if I was American.
The part that seems odd to me, and hopefully someone will correct me if I am wrong, is this:
Previously, a same-sex couple could have their marriage recognized in the eyes of their own state, yet not the eyes of the federal government. Now, with a change of address, that same couple could hypothetically have their marriage recognized in the eyes of the federal government, but not in the eyes of their home state.
Sadly, it may take more decisions by the Supremes to settle all the issues.
Marriage equality supporters are understandably ecstatic that the Supreme Court has declared section three of DOMA unconstitutional.
...for a subset of same-sex partners, the ruling won’t truly guarantee them equal treatment under the law.
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. (read a lot more here)