Posted on 07/09/2014 9:12:23 PM PDT by Steelfish
My one reservation concerning Section 3 is the following. When the Supreme Court decided against the Mormon practice of polygamy when they decided Reynolds v. United States, 1878, since the 10th Amendment did not apply because Utah was still a territory, not a state, the Court applied English common law which which evidently defined marriage as a one man, one woman union. Given that common law is referenced in the Constitution's 7th Amendment, I think that the federal government should still be bound by that precedent today with respect to federal marriage policy.
Also, note that DOMA Section 2 is reasonably based on Congress's Full Faith and Credit power (Section 1 of Article IV), power delegated by the states to the feds to regulate the effect of one states records in another.
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