The Defense of Marriage Act Will be Seen as the Dred Scott Decision of Our Time

by Michael Jones · 2009-08-13 08:11:00 UTC
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Dred ScottTalk about a powerful comparison.  Several of us at change.org are at Netroots Nation this week for the annual progressive/bloggers conference.  This morning's opening session featured a panel with some of the leading LGBT bloggers, organizations and allies, focused on fighting for marriage equality and LGBT rights across America.  Pretty broad topic, but pretty solid conclusions reached by the panelists.

One of the panelists, Michael Wilson from Americans for Democratic Action, put it pretty bluntly when talking about marriage equality, and specifically the Defense of Marriage Act, which currently prevents the federal government from recognizing any of the same-sex marriages on the books in states like Massachusetts, Maine, Connecticut, Iowa, New Hampshire or Vermont.  Oh, Mr. Wilson:

LGBT people can't win the battle for marriage equality alone.  You'll need allies.  Americans for Democratic Action will be taking up marriage equality.  The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) will be seen as the Dred Scott decision of our time.

Dred Scott, of course, was the legendary (and unjust) Supreme Court decision that essentially said that slaves were the property of their masters, even if they traveled to a state where slavery was illegal.  Comparisons to marriage equality?  Sure seems that way, given that a married couple in Iowa can't travel to neighboring Minnesota and be treated as two husbands or two wives.

Wilson's assessment was just one piece of an otherwise substantive panel that dealt with whether California should wait until 2010 or 2012 to try and repeal Prop 8, and what was being done on the ground in Maine to make sure marriage equality stays on the books despite a conservative ballot initiative up this November that could take away the civil rights of gays and lesbians to get married in the state.

More on Maine will come tomorrow, after a luncheon event.  But suffice it to say, everyone here thinks that Maine is ground zero for marriage equality.  As Monique Hoeflinger, a consultant working on efforts to defeat Maine's anti-LGBT ballot measure, said, "As Maine goes (on marriage equality), so goes the nation.  Maine will be the turning point among the public at large."

Michael Jones is a Change.org Editor. He has worked in the field of human rights communications for a decade, most recently for Harvard Law School.
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