Senator Ted Cruz has introduced an unconstitutional anti-gay marriage amendment and his rationale for doing so couldn’t be more ass-backwards.
Amid a wave of court decisions striking down anti-gay marriage laws in states, the Texas Republican introduced a bill to the Senate Wednesday to amend U.S. law “with regard to the definition of ‘marriage’ and ‘spouse’ for Federal purposes and to ensure respect for State regulation of marriage.” [...]
“I support traditional marriage. Under President Obama, the federal government has tried to re-define marriage, and to undermine the constitutional authority of each state to define marriage consistent with the values of its citizens,” Cruz said in a statement. “The Obama Administration should not be trying to force gay marriage on all 50 states. We should respect the states, and the definition of marriage should be left to democratically elected legislatures, not dictated from Washington. This bill will safeguard the ability of states to preserve traditional marriage for its residents.”
On the contrary, while the federal government previously defined marriage as being between a man and a woman under the Defense of Marriage Act, the federal government no longer does so.
As it stands, the federal government does not “re-define marriage” because the government doesn’t define it at all. What Ted Cruz is proposing is a federal definition of marriage, and what he’s proposing has been found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.
If a state court finds that their state’s ban on gay marriage is unconstitutional, their decision stands because the federal government, and thus federal law, no longer defines marriage.
Ted Cruz wants to preempt state law with federal law because states are finding that their laws are unjust. To rectify this, he wants to bring back DOMA by altering the language but not altering the meaning of it.
Consider this conclusive proof that “States’ Rights” only applies when the state is thumbing its nose at the federal government.
It Ted Cruz wants to blame someone for the recent spate of state supreme courts finding that their bans on gay marriage are unconstitutional, he should point his finger not at the Obama administration, but at the United States Supreme Court.
Of course the last time Ted Cruz stood in front of the Supreme Court he lost.
