In a historic decision for marriage equality, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and decided that the supporters of California’s Prop 8 gay marriage ban did not have standing to appeal the U.S. District Court’s ruling of unconstitutionality.
In a nutshell, the DOMA decision means that married gay couples in the 13 states that allow gay marriage will now be entitled to federal marriage benefits, and the Prop 8 decision makes gay marriage legal again in California. The Prop 8 decision does not, however, undo any gay marriage bans in the 36 states that have them, including Tennessee. The court would have had to rule Prop 8 to be unconstitutional for that to have happened.
Michelle Bliss of the Tennessee Equality Project (TEP) will break the decisions down further tonight in a lecture (and likely a celebration) at TEP’s monthly meeting tonight at the Memphis Gay & Lesbian Community Center at 6:30 p.m.
