A Day After DOMA Was Canned, This GOPer Was Already Trying to Bring It Back

Culture

So on Wednesday, Article 3 of DOMA was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. The case attempting to reinstate Proposition 8 was thrown out. And in response, a Republican congressman began drafting a constitutional amendment that would define marriage as between a man and a woman. Just another normal day in 'Murrica.

This week Representative Tim Huelskamp (R-Kansas) plans to reveal his version of the Federal Marriage Amendment. So far no other congressman has endorsed his bill. But don’t be surprised if a few do. In 2006, Congress voted on the very same constitutional amendment. It didn’t gain the 290 votes needed, losing at 236–187. But a few major legislators voted for the bill: current Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), current Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), and P90X Would-Be-VP Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.).

In a Wednesday press conference, Huelskamp explained he’s anti-marriage equality because he is pro-America’s youth.

“Decades of social science research and centuries of American history has shown that every child deserves a mom and a dad. And with this ruling today, they have further redefined marriage. And I think in the end children will be hurt.”

Yet the research of Benjamin Seigal, a Boston University School of Medicine professor of pediatrics, directly refutes that accusation. In March he co-authored and published a report in the American Academy of Pediatrics arguing “three decades of research concur that kids of gay parents are doing just fine."

“Many studies have demonstrated that children’s well-being is affected much more by their relationship with their parents, their parents’ sense of competence and security, and the presence of social and economic support for the family than by the gender or the sexual orientation of their parents,” Seigal wrote.

Passing a constitutional amendment will be much more difficult than passing a bill in Kansas. But amendment is also more difficult to repeal. Huelskamp wants that challenge.

Huelskamp told the Huffington Post, “This would trump the Supreme Court.”

No matter what Huelskamp attempts, it is very likely that gay marriage will become legal in most states by 2020. America’s favorite statistician Nate Silver collected data on the issue earlier this year. He predicted that all states but six — South Carolina, Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, and Louisiana — will have majority support for gay marriage. If what Silver predicts is true, even these last six will support marriage equality in the near future.

 

A May 2013 Gallup poll showed that at 53%, most Americans now favor gay marriage.

So there may be naysayers, but after the Supreme Court’s Wednesday ruling its seems that marriage equality will someday be the law of the land. You may have doubts or reservations, but to mimic Nancy Pelosi's brilliant remark about Michele Bachmann, I say, “Who cares?” You’re on the wrong side of history.

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