Geez——another disappointment.
You didn’t realize he’s a libertarian? His dad was their presidential candidate.
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.
Straight up states rights issue.