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Rand is actually right about this -- and I said exactly the same thing back in the 1990s when the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was first passed into law.

Anyone with an objective view of the U.S. Constitution would come to this same conclusion, and I'm kind of disappointed that so many Freepers missed this point all along. There is simply nothing that gives the Federal government any role in establishing a legal (or other) definition of marriage.

Contrary to a lot of conventional wisdom on this matter and on the Supreme Court decision, the next logical step in this process is not the complete transformation of the legal definition of marriage across the country. Rather, it will be the complete eradication of anything remotely resembling "marriage" under any Federal law -- followed by the same process in many states.

Keep in mind that the plaintiff in the original case brought before the Supreme Court was an elderly lesbian who claimed that she deserved the same legal status under Federal estate tax law as a married heterosexual couple. The Supreme Court agreed with her. I say good for her, and then I say I should be next up to the plate in the same legal challenge against the estate tax. If an octogenarian lesbian can leave a tax-free estate to her "spouse," then the same tax exemption should be given to anyone who gets "married" -- to his cousin, his drinking buddy, or a business partner -- for the sole purpose of circumventing the Federal estate tax.

I can guarantee everyone here that there are hundreds of CPAs and tax lawyers hard at work right now trying to figure out how to work this ruling in their clients' favor -- in ways that nobody in Washington, D.C. ever even imagined.

There is simply nothing that gives the Federal government any role in establishing a legal (or other) definition of marriage.

Isn't that what they just did. I think you miss the obvious. Your line is reasoning is severely flawed. Here is an example of where your opinion must necessarily lead one. IF today the issue as regards God came to be debated THEN how on Earth could the Feds, the States or the People claim that we are endowed inalienable rights? How could the 'decide' as you suggest such an issue; a FUNDAMENTAL issue such as God's existence and the rights endowed all?

I would suggest that DOMA was neither a political conclusion imposed nor a determination alleged and codified BUT RATHER simply an acknowledgement proclaimed much as the acknowledgement proclaimed as to God. The government did not create God nor did it create Marriage. DOMA was no more an imposition imposed upon the States that inalienable rights are an imposition imposed upon government.

Part of Paul’s statements make no sense. Putting aside the merits of the case and the questions about federalism, Paul says that Kennedy averted a Culture War. How? By issuing a decision applauded by the Left? He seems to be endorsing the absurd notion that to use the courts to advance a liberal policy goal is somehow being neutral in the Culture War.

And the Sup Court has not reaffirmed the right of the states to define marriage. The statements by Roberts that the decision goes no further is meaningless. As Scalia pointed out, the reasoning used by Kennedy leaves virtually no room to allow traditional state marriage laws to persist. It’s just a matter of time before this Court or another takes Kennedy’s thinking to its logical conclusion and imposes gay marriage nationwide.