H.R. 3313

[chasenewport]

House OKs Gay Marriage Jurisdiction BillWASHINGTON - Stung by a Senate setback on gay marriage, Republicans passed legislation in the House Thursday to prevent federal courts from ordering states to recognize same-sex unions sanctioned elsewhere

Comments

[beachboyty]

Yeah, I watched the CSPAN live coverage of the debate and vote. It was a great debate and thought for sure the bill would narrowly lose. 17 of the 233 Republicans voted no, and 5 abstained. I was hoping there would be more. But I was really floored that 27 Democrats voted yes. I guess there are a lot more southern dixiecrats in the House than I had presumed.

And you are right. The reason they voted on this is because they are very fearful that federal courts will invoke full faith and credit to force Massachussetts' marriage laws on the rest of the nation.

Of course, now what they have done (if this bill passes the Senate and is signed) is force all 50 state supreme courts to decide the matter for each of their states, meaning you will have several interpretations of the Constitution on this matter that will never be able to be brought before the US Supreme Court to sort out what the final and definitive interpretation is. It will create a Mason-Dixon line kind of reality with "gay states" and "non-gay states", which may have happened anyway, but under the provisions of this bill there can be no federal effort to uniformly address the issue whatsoever.

The homophobes have shot themselves in the foot. If the US Supreme Court had upheld DOMA in terms of Full Faith and Credit, then other state courts could point to that decision as precedent in denying gay marriage suits for that reason in their own states. Now, some of those courts (without that precendent) will undoubtedly interpret it themselves and grant gay marriage as a result.

And in the meantime, the idea of due process will have been permanently damaged and a HUGE precedent will have been set for congress to pass laws and restrict the federal courts from reviewing their constitutionality (gun control, abortion, prayer in schools, are some that come to mind). And that could JUST as easily work against Republicans as for them given a different congressional make-up in a few cycles.

A sad day, even though the Senate Democrats won't allow this to even come up for a vote, and Bush (though supporting it in word) would be in a VERY hard position on the eve of the election to sign it even if it did get to his desk. Still, that a house of congress would be so brazen is extremely sad.

[chasenewport]

What an extreme abuse of power to attempt to cut people off from due process. This doesn't have a prayer of passing in the Senate, does it?

[chasenewport]

I spoke to one of Cox's assistants this morning to urge him to vote against this. She assured me Representative Cox cares what his constituents think and that my voice would be heard. I told her, "I would hope so." He is going on my list of encumbants that need to go back to the private sector. When is he up for reelection?