Monthly Archives: June 2012

In 1987 Ronald Reagan challenged Mikhail Gorbachev, then the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, to tear down the Berlin wall.

Eastern Bloc propaganda claimed the wall had been erected to protect its population from elements conspiring to prevent the “will of the people” in building a socialist state in Eastern Germany. For decades the wall divided Berliners giving rise to a widespread sense of desperation and oppression.

In the speech at the Brandenburg Gate, Reagan said, “We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together,” concluding his speech saying, “if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity ……. tear down this wall.”

Many believe these words uttered by the “leader of the free world,” the President of the United States of America, the country “conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all are created equal” signaled the beginning of the end of the Eastern Bloc. In the months and years following Reagan’s declaration, the wall came tumbling down.

In 1996, a wall was figuratively erected across America. The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) defines marriage as the legal union of one man and one woman. Under the law, no U.S. state or political subdivision is required to recognize a same-sex marriage treated as a marriage in another state and codifies the non-recognition of same-sex marriage for all federal purposes, including insurance benefits for government employees, Social Security survivors’ benefits, and the filing of joint tax returns.

DOMA was discriminatory and divisive but to many of its proponents as necessary as the Berlin wall to protect the American population from elements conspiring to prevent the will of the fundamentalist far right in building a “Christian” state in the United States of America.

Despite challenges in Massachusetts and California, which found Section 3 of DOMA unconstitutional, changes in public opinion on marriage equality and legalization of same sex marriage or civil unions in a handful of states and the District of Colombia, DOMA remained the elephant in the room.

But then the walls of DOMA started crumbling down in 2011when the Obama administration announced that although it would continue to enforce the law, the Department of Justice would no longer defend it in court.

Like a weeble, DOMA wobbled but it wouldn’t fall down – propped up in part by the House of Representatives, which undertook the defense of the law on behalf of the federal government in place of the Department of Justice .
But once again the President of the United States, Barack Obama, took a verbal sledgehammer to a wall of discrimination and oppression dividing our country saying: “it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married.” And the dismantling of the wall against gay Americans began crumbling, tumbling down.

Then at last the word we’ve been waiting for. In a unanimous decision, the three-judge panel of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston said the 1996 law deprives gay couples of the rights and privileges granted to heterosexual couples was unconstitutional. This ruling will more than likely send the battle over DOMA to the Supreme Court.

With over 30 states having constitutional amendments or laws prohibiting same-sex marriage on the books, does repeal of DOMA matter? Oh yes it does!

DOMA deprives same-sex couples of over 1,100 federal rights, benefits, and responsibilities of marriage. It has created a patchwork of confusing laws and rights across the country that denies same-sex couples and their families the basic rights and stability that comes with the federal recognition of their marriages. The law’s impact is far-reaching, affecting Social Security survivor benefits after a spouse passes away and the filing of joint federal income taxes, and prohibiting couples from taking unpaid leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act. It also impacts immigration issues for same-sex couples, sometimes forcing the deportation of a non-citizen spouse.

It discriminates against same-sex couples by saying that state governments do not need to recognize marriages from other states, and the federal government does not recognize marriages unless they are between one man and one woman.

The 1st Circuit, which only has Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Maine and New Hampshire and Puerto Rico in its jurisdiction, said its ruling would not be enforced until the Supreme Court decides the case, meaning that same-sex married couples will not be eligible to receive the economic benefits denied by the law until the high court rules.

Since Congress seems unable and unwilling to repeal DOMA and President Obama has no plans to pursue a formal appeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, we will just have to wait for our day in court – the Supreme Court that is.

Until that day I’ll keep singing John Mellencamp’s refrain:

“When the walls come tumblin’ down.

When the walls come crumblin’ crumblin’.

When the walls come tumblin’, tumblin’ down.”forcing the deportation of a non-citizen spouse.

It discriminates against same-sex couples by saying that state governments do not need to recognize marriages from other states, and the federal government does not recognize marriages unless they are between one man and one woman.

The 1st Circuit, which only has Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Maine and New Hampshire and Puerto Rico in its jurisdiction, said its ruling would not be enforced until the Supreme Court decides the case, meaning that same-sex married couples will not be eligible to receive the economic benefits denied by the law until the high court rules.

Since Congress seems unable and unwilling to repeal DOMA and President Obama has no plans to pursue a formal appeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, we will just have to wait for our day in court – the Supreme Court that is.

Until that day I’ll keep singing John Mellencamp’s refrain:

“When the walls come tumblin’ down.

When the walls come crumblin’ crumblin’.

When the walls come tumblin’, tumblin’ down.”
Because they are!!