Suit Filed Challeging Defense of Marriage Act

I know that there are some - gay blogger and columnist Andrew Sullivan is one example - who do not believe that winning rights via court suits is as effective as changing minds and winning them at the ballot box. That may be true in some states, but as a number of readers have commented in the past, in states such as Virginia (where the sodomy statute was only abolished by the ruling in Lawrence v. Texas) many of us would not live long enough to gain basic rights if we waited for the bigoted and reactionary populace and General Assembly to act. Indeed, in such states only through court rulings was an end to segregation and bans on interracial marriage achieved and only then in the years subsequent did the public come around to accept the results achieved via the courts. I believe that gay marriage is another such situation. Now, couples in Massachusetts (pictured above) have filed suit challenging the DOMA which bars them from significant federal rights and benefits as legal married couples in Massachusetts. Strategically, the suit only targets portions of DOMA. Needless to say, the Christianist extremists will be having conniption fits in overdrive. Here are some highlights from the Boston Globe:
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Fifteen gay and lesbian residents from Massachusetts who wed after this state legalized same-sex marriages plan to file a discrimination suit today, challenging a federal law that defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman. Six same-sex couples and three men whose husbands have died - one of the deceased was retired congressman Gerry E. Studds - said in the suit that the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act treats them like second-class citizens and is unconstitutional. The complaint is being filed in US District Court in Boston.
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The suit . . . . contends that the statute has deprived the plaintiffs of benefits enjoyed by heterosexual married couples. Those benefits include health insurance for spouses of federal employees, tax deductions for couples who jointly file federal income tax returns, and the ability to use a spouse's last name on a passport.
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Mary L. Bonauto, the civil rights lawyer for Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders who was lead counsel in Goodridge v. Dept. of Public Health - the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court case in 2003 that legalized same-sex marriage in the United States for the first time - said the suit asks the court to strike down the Defense of Marriage Act because it targets gays and lesbians for discrimination.
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If the plaintiffs win, she said, it would not extend same-sex marriage beyond Massachusetts and Connecticut, the two states where it is legal. But it would dismantle a federal statute that affects more than 1,000 marriage-related benefits, and it would be a huge victory on symbolic and practical levels for supporters of same-sex marriage, according to legal specialists.
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"We've got this major federal statute that inflicts really substantial harm on very large numbers of gay people just for being gay people," said Andrew Koppelman, a Northwestern University law professor.
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Kris Mineau, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute and a vocal opponent of same-sex marriage, said the lawsuit represents the latest effort to export gay marriage to other parts of the country.
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Among those who say they have been discriminated against are Nancy Gill and Marcelle Letourneau, a Bridgewater couple who have been together nearly 30 years and married four days after same-sex weddings began. They have two children. Gill, 51, who has worked for the Postal Service since 1987, has repeatedly tried to put Letourneau on her health insurance plan, but her employer has rejected her applications, citing the Defense of Marriage Act.