3 States Say Feds Can't 'Unmarry' Gay Couples

Gays just want equal rights, should they finally be able to have it?

Three states where members of the clergy and justices of the peace today marry gay couples argued on Friday that it’s a violation of states’ rights for the federal government to then “unmarry” those people under the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

In a brief to a New York case involving a lesbian widow, Vermont, Connecticut, and New York argue that the federal government had no right, despite the federal designation of marriage as being between a man and a woman, to demand $350,000 in estate taxes when Edie Windsor’s partner died. That would not have happened under a marital tax deduction that lets other married couples pass their assets to their spouse without penalty.

The three states who filed amicus briefs argue that states regulate marriage and family relationships and that Congress doesn’t have constitutional authority to interfere with that license at any level.

The problem, he wrote in the Washington Post, is that it created “one-way federalism” since DOMA “protects only those states that don’t want to accept a same-sex marriage granted by another state.”

The National Conference of State Legislatures says 38 states have passed legislation barring same-sex marriages while six states, including the three involved in the New York case, currently allow such unions. Washington and Maryland also passed gay marriage laws, but they have not yet taken effect.

As arguments in the Second Circuit Court are expected to begin Sept. 27, pressure is rising on the US Supreme Court to settle the issue.

Some say this is exactly why DOMA and ALL state laws/constitutional amendments must be declared unconstitutional by the SCOTUS. ALL 1400+ laws relating to marriage on federal, state, and local levels MUST be revised to read “civil union,” as that is exactly what those licenses are, they are a CIVIL contract between two individuals, and such contracts cannot be discriminatory based on lifestyle, per the US Constitution… equal protection under the law.

They used to try the same isht with interracial marriages. You know how that went. Should gays be allowed to legally marry too?

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