Press Releases

Respect for Marriage Coalition Applauds Bill Clinton Op-ed Calling on Supreme Court to Overturn DOMA

 

Respect for Marriage Coalition Applauds Bill Clinton Op-ed Calling on Supreme Court to Overturn DOMA
Washington, DC – The Respect for Marriage Coalition issued the following statements from Coalition co-chairs Chad Griffin and Evan Wolfson applauding former President Bill Clinton for calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the discriminatory Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, which he signed into law in 1996. In a Washington Post oped published Thursday night, the 42nd president added his name to the growing bipartisan majority of Americans who believe that DOMA is unconstitutional and that all people – including gays and lesbians – should have the freedom to marry. Last week, a broad coalition including 212 Members of Congress, 131 top Republicans, more than 300 leading companies, 30 former military and defense officials, and dozens of religious, labor, legal, and family health organizations filed amicus briefs with the U.S. Supreme Court urging the justices to overturn DOMA and support the freedom to marry.
Human Rights Campaign President and Respect for Marriage Coalition Co-Chair Chad Griffin said, “A growing chorus has risen up in opposition to DOMA but the loudest voice is now the man who signed the bill into law calling for it to be overturned.  President Clinton has already voiced his opposition to the Defense of Marriage Act and his emphatic repudiation of this discriminatory law is a reflection of the views of a majority of Americans who don’t understand why loving and committed couples should be ignored by their own government.  As President Clinton eloquently articulated, DOMA is a vestige of another time and now we must turn our back on legally sanctioned discrimination.”
Evan Wolfson, founder and president of Freedom to Marry and Respect for Marriage Coalition Co-Chair said, “In a very different era, Bill Clinton signed discrimination into law.  Today, he adds his voice to the who’s who of America saying that the time has come to overturn that discriminatory law.  His journey is the journey a majority of Americans have made in understanding that marriage discrimination has no place in our country or under our Constitution.”
President Clinton’s oped is below.
Washington Post
It’s time to overturn DOMA
Bill Clinton
Posted March 7, 2013
In 1996, I signed the Defense of Marriage Act. Although that was only 17 years ago, it was a very different time. In no state in the union was same-sex marriage recognized, much less available as a legal right, but some were moving in that direction. Washington, as a result, was swirling with all manner of possible responses, some quite draconian. As a bipartisan group of former senators stated in their March 1 amicus brief to the Supreme Court, many supporters of the bill known as DOMA believed that its passage “would defuse a movement to enact a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, which would have ended the debate for a generation or more.” It was under these circumstances that DOMA came to my desk, opposed by only 81 of the 535 members of Congress.
On March 27, DOMA will come before the Supreme Court, and the justices must decide whether it is consistent with the principles of a nation that honors freedom, equality and justice above all, and is therefore constitutional. As the president who signed the act into law, I have come to believe that DOMA is contrary to those principles and, in fact, incompatible with our Constitution.
Because Section 3 of the act defines marriage as being between a man and a woman, same-sex couples who are legally married in nine states and the District of Columbia are denied the benefits of more than a thousand federal statutes and programs available to other married couples. Among other things, these couples cannot file their taxes jointly, take unpaid leave to care for a sick or injured spouse or receive equal family health and pension benefits as federal civilian employees. Yet they pay taxes, contribute to their communities and, like all couples, aspire to live in committed, loving relationships, recognized and respected by our laws.
When I signed the bill, I included a statement with the admonition that “enactment of this legislation should not, despite the fierce and at times divisive rhetoric surrounding it, be understood to provide an excuse for discrimination.” Reading those words today, I know now that, even worse than providing an excuse for discrimination, the law is itself discriminatory. It should be overturned.
We are still a young country, and many of our landmark civil rights decisions are fresh enough that the voices of their champions still echo, even as the world that preceded them becomes less and less familiar. We have yet to celebrate the centennial of the 19th Amendment, but a society that denied women the vote would seem to us now not unusual or old-fashioned but alien. I believe that in 2013 DOMA and opposition to marriage equality are vestiges of just such an unfamiliar society.
Americans have been at this sort of a crossroads often enough to recognize the right path. We understand that, while our laws may at times lag behind our best natures, in the end they catch up to our core values. One hundred fifty years ago, in the midst of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln concluded a message to Congress by posing the very question we face today: “It is not ‘Can any of us imagine better?’ but ‘Can we all do better?’”
The answer is of course and always yes. In that spirit, I join with the Obama administration, the petitioner Edith Windsor, and the many other dedicated men and women who have engaged in this struggle for decades in urging the Supreme Court to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act.
Editor's note: The writer is the 42nd president of the United States.
 
# # #
 
The Respect for Marriage Coalition is a partnership of more than 100 civil rights, faith, health, labor, business, legal, LGBT, student, and women's organizations working together to end the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and grow support for the freedom to marry.  The Coalition is co-chaired by Freedom to Marry and the Human Rights Campaign.

For Immediate Release

March 7, 2013

Contact: Respect For Marriage Coalition Office / 202-567-5720 

[email protected] for Marriage Coalition Applauds Bill Clinton Op-ed Calling on Supreme Court to Overturn DOMA

Washington, DC – The Respect for Marriage Coalition issued the following statements from Coalition co-chairs Chad Griffin and Evan Wolfson applauding former President Bill Clinton for calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the discriminatory Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, which he signed into law in 1996. In a Washington Post oped published Thursday night, the 42nd president added his name to the growing bipartisan majority of Americans who believe that DOMA is unconstitutional and that all people – including gays and lesbians – should have the freedom to marry. Last week, a broad coalition including 212 Members of Congress, 131 top Republicans, more than 300 leading companies, 30 former military and defense officials, and dozens of religious, labor, legal, and family health organizations filed amicus briefs with the U.S. Supreme Court urging the justices to overturn DOMA and support the freedom to marry.

Human Rights Campaign President and Respect for Marriage Coalition Co-Chair Chad Griffin said, “A growing chorus has risen up in opposition to DOMA but the loudest voice is now the man who signed the bill into law calling for it to be overturned.  President Clinton has already voiced his opposition to the Defense of Marriage Act and his emphatic repudiation of this discriminatory law is a reflection of the views of a majority of Americans who don’t understand why loving and committed couples should be ignored by their own government.  As President Clinton eloquently articulated, DOMA is a vestige of another time and now we must turn our back on legally sanctioned discrimination.”

Evan Wolfson, founder and president of Freedom to Marry and Respect for Marriage Coalition Co-Chair said, “In a very different era, Bill Clinton signed discrimination into law.  Today, he adds his voice to the who’s who of America saying that the time has come to overturn that discriminatory law.  His journey is the journey a majority of Americans have made in understanding that marriage discrimination has no place in our country or under our Constitution.”

President Clinton’s oped is below.

Washington Post

It’s time to overturn DOMA

Bill Clinton

Posted March 7, 2013

In 1996, I signed the Defense of Marriage Act. Although that was only 17 years ago, it was a very different time. In no state in the union was same-sex marriage recognized, much less available as a legal right, but some were moving in that direction. Washington, as a result, was swirling with all manner of possible responses, some quite draconian. As a bipartisan group of former senators stated in their March 1 amicus brief to the Supreme Court, many supporters of the bill known as DOMA believed that its passage “would defuse a movement to enact a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, which would have ended the debate for a generation or more.” It was under these circumstances that DOMA came to my desk, opposed by only 81 of the 535 members of Congress.

On March 27, DOMA will come before the Supreme Court, and the justices must decide whether it is consistent with the principles of a nation that honors freedom, equality and justice above all, and is therefore constitutional. As the president who signed the act into law, I have come to believe that DOMA is contrary to those principles and, in fact, incompatible with our Constitution.

Because Section 3 of the act defines marriage as being between a man and a woman, same-sex couples who are legally married in nine states and the District of Columbia are denied the benefits of more than a thousand federal statutes and programs available to other married couples. Among other things, these couples cannot file their taxes jointly, take unpaid leave to care for a sick or injured spouse or receive equal family health and pension benefits as federal civilian employees. Yet they pay taxes, contribute to their communities and, like all couples, aspire to live in committed, loving relationships, recognized and respected by our laws.

When I signed the bill, I included a statement with the admonition that “enactment of this legislation should not, despite the fierce and at times divisive rhetoric surrounding it, be understood to provide an excuse for discrimination.” Reading those words today, I know now that, even worse than providing an excuse for discrimination, the law is itself discriminatory. It should be overturned.

We are still a young country, and many of our landmark civil rights decisions are fresh enough that the voices of their champions still echo, even as the world that preceded them becomes less and less familiar. We have yet to celebrate the centennial of the 19th Amendment, but a society that denied women the vote would seem to us now not unusual or old-fashioned but alien. I believe that in 2013 DOMA and opposition to marriage equality are vestiges of just such an unfamiliar society.

Americans have been at this sort of a crossroads often enough to recognize the right path. We understand that, while our laws may at times lag behind our best natures, in the end they catch up to our core values. One hundred fifty years ago, in the midst of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln concluded a message to Congress by posing the very question we face today: “It is not ‘Can any of us imagine better?’ but ‘Can we all do better?’”

The answer is of course and always yes. In that spirit, I join with the Obama administration, the petitioner Edith Windsor, and the many other dedicated men and women who have engaged in this struggle for decades in urging the Supreme Court to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act.

Editor's note: The writer is the 42nd president of the United States.

# # #

The Respect for Marriage Coalition is a partnership of more than 100 civil rights, faith, health, labor, business, legal, LGBT, student, and women's organizations working together to end the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and grow support for the freedom to marry.  The Coalition is co-chaired by Freedom to Marry and the Human Rights Campaign.