By Joe Harris
President Barack Obama’s endorsement last week for marriage equality is only the most recent sign of a major shift in attitudes towards same-sex marriage more than 15 years ago, when the first indications appeared that American attitudes were changing towards gay marriage.
In 1996, the year President Bill Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), barely a quarter of Americans—27 percent— said that same-sex matrimony should be legalized, a far cry from last year, when 53 percent voiced support for marriage equality. In the 2008 presidential election, Obama won 17 states which have passed laws that define marriage as the union of a man and a woman— including Colorado, Nevada, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida, with a combined 82 electoral votes, nearly a third of the 270 needed to win the presidency; the Sunshine State alone bring over 10 percent of that total, with 29 electoral votes). Another 21 states have similar laws—including North Carolina, which Obama won in 2008 and which last week enshrined that law in the state constitution.
Unlike the presidential election years 2004 and 2008, when several states created laws or amendments to their state constitutions that banned all but male-female marriages, the issue is not likely to define statewide races or to motivate voters to cast their ballots for one party or another because of personal bias about marriage equality. Meanwhile, the fight over DOMA continues to work its way through the federal courts.
Under the law— passed by a Republican-majority Congress and signed reluctantly into law by Clinton, who faced reelection that year—no state or other U.S. political subdivision (overseas territory, possession, etc.) is required to recognize a same-sex marriage performed in another state. DOMA also codifies nonrecognition of gay marriages for federal purposes, which includes survivor benefits under Social Security, the filing of joint tax returns, as well as insurance and other benefits for federal employees.
In two Massachusetts court decisions and a California bankruptcy court ruling, Section 3 of DOMA, which deals with such matter, has been ruled unconstitutional. All three cases are currently under appeal. Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney raised the ire of LGBT advocates in February when he told attendants at the conservative CPAC convention, “When I am president,” Romney continued, “I will preserve the Defense of Marriage Act and I will fight for a federal amendment defining marriage as a relationship between one man and one woman.”
Romney is toeing a difficult line, trying hard to energize the GOP’s conservative base to support him in November while still attempting the political legerdemain necessary to hold onto centrist and independent voters, who are more concerned with bread and butter issues than denying a right of citizenship to their fellow countrymen and –women.
With the nod from Obama, the Democrat mandarins are rushing to voice their support for marriage equality. Although some of the party’s most eminent names—including former presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, as well as Al Gore, John Kerry, Andrew Cuomo, and Howard Dean—have previously endorsed marriage equality, some earlier holdouts have begun to sing a different tune. Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), the Senate Majority Leader and the highestranking Latter Day Saint (Mormon) in U.S. government, said last week, “My personal belief is that marriage is between a man and a woman.
But in a civil society, I believe that people should be able to marry whomever they want, and it’s no business of mine if two men or two women want to get married.” And Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-HI), the President Pro Tempore of the Senate and, under the Constitution, third in line for the presidency, announced his own support last week for same-sex marriage .
