Just hours after President Barack Obama publicly backed gay marriage, the House struck back and passed a measure aimed at reinforcing the Defense of Marriage Act.
With a 245-171 vote, the House voted to stop the Justice Department from using taxpayer funds to actively oppose DOMA — the Clinton-era law defining marriage as between a man and a woman that the Obama administration stopped enforcing in February 2011.
“It is not President Obama’s prerogative to decide which laws matter and which do not, nor his right to challenge constitutional amendments duly passed by the various states,” said the measure’s sponsor, Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-Kan.). “The Justice Department is duty-bound to enforce DOMA and to not do so is a flagrant disregard for the Constitution and for the rule of law.”
22 Comments
BAM!
Heating up nicely now......
Now just wait till November when the GOP takes back the Senate and Mitt Romney becomes President.
Sweet.
BAM? Sorry, Emeril. It may have been intended as an efyou to gay Americans but it's symbolic at best and ultimately meaningless. Federal courts have already ruled the obvious: DOMA is unconstitutional and the DOJ won't defend it for that reason. It's an indefensible piece of trash rooted soley in anti-gay animus. I do have to wonder where all the conservative voices are criticizing the House for focussing on this while people need jobs etc., etc., etc.
Wholly meaningless, proposed by s disaster in the house who's duties have been reduced to nothing. And after the Teabaggers wrecked our credit rating, and rate one of the hated groups in the US, don't count on them coming back.
I'm glad the GOP politicians are spending their time showing symbolic support of an unconstitutional law! Shows how focused they are on job creation, eh? A once great political party, reduced to nothingness because of religious extremists. Very sad.
Way to go GOP!!!!!! This is what we call leadership. Excellent vote. The President is duty bound to defend DOMA through the Justice Dept. What he is doing is an impeachable offense.
Show the American people you are ready to lead on this issue. Thanks to the Dems support for marriage corruption you have a chance to expand your majority in the House and retake the Senate.
I live in MA so all of the MA reps probably voted with the 171. I am so glad thanks to the last Census that this state is losing Congress people and electoral votes. This means a Congressman from a red state now takes the place of the MA rep.
You ignore Paul Clement's defense of DOMA which is very strong.
http://www.nylj.com/nylawyer/adgifs/decisions/080311blagmemo.pdf
OBAMA should be IMPEACHED
WOO HOO! God bless the Republicans (and the few Democrats) who reinforced Congressional support for DOMA, which will be defended by the Justice Department again when President Romney takes the White House.
Since marriage is becoming a prominent issue in this election, Republicans should not neglect to emphasize Obama’s dereliction of duty with regards to DOMA. They have to make clear to the American people that the president has not only abdicated his responsibility to defend a law of Congress in order to appease the gay lobby, but he went a step further and used taxpayer dollars to attack this law in court. For Americans who are turned off by his stance on ssm, this revelation should fire them up even more.
Although the controversy has subsided, towards the election, Republicans need to reignite the furor over the Obamacare-DOMA hypocrisy. The president was aghast at the idea of Obamacare—which he claims passed Congress with “strong majorities”—being found unconstitutional, while simultaneously adjudicating from his executive position on the constitutionality of DOMA—which actually did pass Congress with strong majorities.
An Obamacare-DOMA ad would make an effective one, exposing the president’s hypocrisy, and helping to destroy the narrative Obama is trying to create about him supporting ssm but favoring states’ rights. Americans would know beyond any doubt that another Obama term means full-force ramming of ssm down everyone’s throat.
“He is defending his federal healthcare law in court, even though there have been two federal judges that have ruled it unconstitutional. And yet DOMA has been upheld four times in federal court, and yet he’s decided it doesn’t deserve to be defended.” Congresswoman Vickie Hartzler
Leo, go read a government textbook. One that ISN'T supplied by some neocon.
Obama lost millions of votes yesterday for the support of a special interest group he already had in the bag. But he realized that it didn't matter because his internal polling has told him that he won't be reelected anyway.
Byrd, I wouldn't count your chickens until they hatch. Romney is at best a weasel with no spine. I for one will be voting for obam regardles of his stance on gay marriage..
DOMA is not extreme; it was passed by lopsided majorities.
Binding Supreme Court precedent strongly supports DOMA, as explained below.
Davis v. Beason, 133 U.S. 333 at 344, 345 (1890), quoting Murphy v. Ramsey, 114 U.S. 15 at 45 (1885)
Byrd:
Bingo!
Carol: it's about to get lonely
Excellent. The House gets that marriage between a man & woman is the most basic form of representative govt. that we have. DOMA protects that. Good call House!
byrd
Folks like NOM are REALLY not going to vote for Obama now (as IF they were going to vote for him before). It's the independents that matter and they are for same sex marriage.
Byrd, you read my mind. I really think that Obama knows he will lose and is trying to go out with a bang. Republicans feel that he is trying to distract from the economy with the ssm issue, but that's not a prime issue to choose as a distraction if you want to win an election!
I think it's more of a "he wants to make history" thing...before he's kicked out of office. I said on previous threads that the reason SSMers have pressured him to give an endorsement before the election HAS to be because they don't think he will win, but want the symbolism of having the first sitting president endorse ssm. Why, if you think this president has a good chance of winning, and you KNOW he will push for ssm upon a second term, would you force him to take a politically risky position NOW??? That doesn't make sense, apart from the need for symbolism.
A few months ago, some conservatives theorized that Obama is trying to "live it up" as president because he knows he will lose. And that's what he's doing. Raking in cash from gays, and partying with George Clooney. He feels he'll get his place in the history books. He'll go down as the first president to endorse ssm...and he'll lose.
MarkOH -
You're crazy if you don't think that conservatives aren't going to come out in droves to vote against the President because of his stance on so-called same-sex "marriage."
The Independents will vote based on the crappy economy; I wouldn't expect anyone but the homosexuals to be energized to vote for Obama based on his stance on marriage.
Independents are for same sex "marriage".
This lunacy is the basis upon which Obama campaigns?
Cool.
He loses
I wasn't going to vote at all, but my vote will be AGAINST Obama, now that he has finally evolved. To me, he still looks like a monkey.
First, he was for same-sex marriage, then he changed his mind (evolved), then became US President thanks to that evolution; and now has evolved again. Anyway, we are tired of all the secretive evolving and drama in the White House, as if the affront to DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act) didn't already inform us of the second flip-flop. He's has evolved into a transistor. But we have terrible problems cooking up internationally; yet Obama is partying.
Don't know if it is trivial, but i read the word 'defense' in the title of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which Obama's admininstration will enforce, but not defend (as if he was doing a good job at it). If Obama's administration is saying they will ENFORCE DOMA, they must therefore DEFEND it, since that's the letter of the law - a defense. To enforce it is to defend it. Is that why they picked that title?
Lawyers, please advice. Thanks so much.
DOMA is the law of the l;and.
It is true that the enemies of this law seek to subvert it.
So what?
All this proves is that the enemies of the law of this land oppose the law of this land.
'
Simple as that.