A group of Congressmembers introduced a bill this week in the U. S. House that seeks to repeal the federal ban on same-sex marriage.
U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) introduced the Respect for Marriage Act in the U.S. House Sept. 15 along with 91 cosponsors, including openly gay lead sponsors Reps. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.) and Jared Polis (D-Colo.), making this the first time legislation has been introduced to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act since its 1996 passage.
Among the local Congressmembers cosponsoring the bill are Reps. Bob Brady (D-1st Dist.), Chaka Fattah (D-2nd Dist.), Joe Sestak (D-7th Dist.) and Michael Doyle (D-14th Dist.).
Notably absent from the list of cosponsors is the other and longest-serving openly gay Congressmember, Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), who told PGN this week that he couldn’t support the legislation right now because he doesn’t think it will be able to move forward this session.
DOMA, signed into law by then-president Bill Clinton, prohibits the federal government from bestowing some 1,100 federal marriage rights to same-sex couples, even those who have wed in states where such unions are legal, and also allows states that don’t offer same-sex marriage to refuse to recognize legal marriages of such couples.
Nadler noted that when DOMA was passed, same-sex marriage was not legal anywhere in the country, but it has since been approved by six states.
“In 2009, we have tens of thousands of married same-sex couples in this country, living openly, raising families and paying taxes in states that have granted them the right to marry, and it has become abundantly clear that, while the sky has not fallen on the institution of marriage, as DOMA supporters had claimed, DOMA is causing these couples concrete and lasting harm,” Nadler said. “Discrimination against committed couples and stable families is terrible federal policy. But, with a president who is committed to repealing DOMA and a broad, diverse coalition of Americans on our side, we now have a real opportunity to remove from the books this obnoxious and ugly law.”
One Congressmember, Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.), a cosponsor of the Respect for Marriage Act, issued a statement this week saying that he originally voted for DOMA in 1996 — what he now calls the “worst vote of my political career” — but in the past 16 years has changed his position and is eager to overturn the law.
During a press conference to announce the legislation Tuesday, Nadler read a statement from Clinton, in which the former president also recognized that same-sex marriage was not a reality when he signed the bill, but that “13 years later, the fabric of our country has changed, and so should this policy.”
Lynn Zeitlin, executive director of Equality Advocates Pennsylvania, said the repeal of DOMA is “long overdue” and will “finally end the discrimination of same-sex couples from the federal government in states where same-sex marriage is legal.”
Human Rights Campaign president Joe Solmonese called DOMA a “hurtful and cynical law enacted to discriminate against loving, committed same-sex couples.”
“It does real harm by denying thousands of lawfully married same-sex couples the federal rights and benefits that only flow through marriage,” Solmonese said. “Today’s introduction of legislation to repeal DOMA is a welcome step and, as more states recognize the commitment of loving same-sex couples and their families, it’s time for this law to go into the history books where it belongs.”
The legislation introduced this week would return the power to define marriage to each individual state, and allow same-sex couples who are legally wed to obtain the federal marriage rights given to heterosexual couples, such as Social Security benefits and medical leave for a sick partner.
Frank, however, said he thinks debate on the bill will be halted by a “certainty provision” within it that would allow same-sex couples who are legally married in a state that sanctions those unions to retain their federal benefits, no matter where they live in the country. He told PGN this week that he would have cosponsored the bill without this clause, which he said he relayed to Nadler.
“This is a provision that will be interpreted as exporting [marriage] and that, I think, is problematic in trying to get the legislation passed,” Frank said.
He added that Congress should be focusing on passing the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, granting of domestic-partner benefits and repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” instead of the DOMA repeal, noting the issue should wait until “more states have had marriage and more experience with it.”
“Experience is what we need to defeat prejudice,” he said. “We’re getting there and actually moving more quickly than we thought. And it’s not just that we don’t have the votes to repeal DOMA. I believe we can eventually have the votes to pass it forward, but there are these other issues that I’m afraid of people diverting their attention from if they try and work on this.”
In a statement released last week, however, Nadler criticized Frank for not backing the bill.
“Mr. Frank knows better than anyone that our opponents will falsely claim that any DOMA repeal bill ‘exports marriage’ in an effort to generate fear and misunderstanding,” Nadler said. “But the dishonest tactics of our opponents should not stop us from aggressively pushing to end this horrific discrimination now.”
Nadler is the chair of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights & Civil Liberties, to which the legislation will eventually be assigned, but Nadler said during the press conference that it was too soon to announce when the bill could come up for debate.
President Obama has made several statements in recent months urging the repeal of the law but noted that, until such an action is taken, his Justice Department is required to defend it against legal challenges.
The department submitted two briefs this summer urging a court to dismiss a suit against DOMA brought by a gay couple from California. The first brief drew harsh criticism from the LGBT community for its strong support of DOMA and its comparison of same-sex marriage to incest, while the second, which still pressed for the dismissal of the suit, contained a statement that expressed the administration’s opposition to the law.
A U.S. District judge dismissed the DOMA suit last month on procedural grounds.
Jen Colletta can be reached at [email protected].