The Obama Justice Department announced Friday the Administration would no longer defend a section of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) which prohibits lesbian, gay and bisexual military service members and veterans from extending benefits associated with marriage to their same-sex spouses.
Attorney General Eric Holder addressed Congressional leaders in a letter which determined that a denial of military and veteran benefits to same-sex couples violates an equal protection clause provided by the Fifth Amendment.
“The legislative record of these provisions contains no rationale for providing veterans’ benefits to opposite-sex couples of veterans but not to legally married same-sex spouses of veterans,” Holder wrote. “Neither the Department of Defense nor the Department of Veterans Affairs identified any justifications for that distinction that would warrant treating these provisions differently from Section 3 of DOMA.”
The Attorney General’s letter also added:
“As I explained in my letter of February 23, 2011, the President and I have concluded that classifications based on sexual orientation should be subject to a heightened standard of constitutional scrutiny under equal protection principles, and that Section 3 of DOMA fails such scrutiny as applied to couples who are legally married under state law.”
The action was prompted in part by the lawsuit McLaughlin v. Panetta filed by Servicemember’s Legal Defense Network (SLDN) last year. The lead plaintiff, Maj. Shannon McLauglin, serves as a Judge Advocate in the Massachusetts National Guard and is legally married in that state.
The court case argued the couple were denied benefits guaranteed to married same-sex couples and that the denial of such rights undermines their privileged constitutional rights.
While the Administration will not defend case, it will continue to enforce DOMA laws until it is repealed or a court deems it to be unconstitutional.
