Today, yet another court ruled that the Defense Of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional, this time finding that Section 3 of the law, which prevents the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages in states where they are legal, fails the “rational basis test” as applied to laws that deny equal protection and harm a group long subject to discrimination. The unanimous ruling by the three judge panel of the First Circuit Court of Appeals, including two Republican nominees, found no “connection between DOMA’s treatment of same-sex couples and its asserted goal of strengthening the bonds and benefits to society of heterosexual marriage.”
Bruce Hausknecht of Focus on the Family’s CitizenLink criticized the court’s “unfortunate exercise of judicial tampering with the rules by which constitutional cases are decided,” and the Alliance Defense Fund’s Dale Schowengerdt said the decision permits states to “hold the federal government, and potentially other states, hostage to redefine marriage.”
Remarkably, Massachusetts Family Institute president Kris Mineau claimed that the First Circuit Court of Appeals shouldn’t have any federal power to rule on the case as “a Massachusetts-based court “…seemingly unaware that it is a federal court!
Kris Mineau, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute, argued Thursday that the ruling is "bizarre" for requiring the federal government to accept Massachusetts' definition of marriage, and violates the federal government's right to determine the application of federal benefits.
"For a Massachusetts-based court to just audaciously proclaim that the federal government is wrong and has to recognize a unique social experiment in Massachusetts for the purpose of providing benefits is bizarre and a violation of the principles of our federalist system," Mineau said, according to Reuters.
Judson Phillips of Tea Party Nation told members today that marriage equality for gays and lesbians is part of the “east coast liberal freak show” bent on ruining America:
Whether we like it or not, because the liberal states have enacted homosexual marriage, sooner or later the Supreme Court is going to say those marriages must be recognized by all fifty states.
While there are many religious and moral arguments that can be made about this, the simple fact is for the last sixty years or so; the left has been attacking the basic family unit. The end result of this has been the creation of poverty where none existed before. It has been the creation of an under class, born and raised in poverty, unlikely to escape poverty and encouraged to engage in the same behaviors that landed their parents in poverty.
Given the left’s track record in this area, they should not even be allowed to offer an opinion much less pass laws as they are doing in some of the east coast liberal freak show states.
