Topic: American government and same sex marriage.

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Topic: American government and same sex marriage.

Same sex marriage involves the matrimonial union of people of the same sex. Though not supported by many and most religions, over the years it has been debated on whether to legalize it; some states in the U.S such as California, Iowa, Maryland, New York, Washington and several other states have legalized same sex marriage that constitutes, according to resent records, 15.7 percent of the total population. Several jurisdictions have legalized gay marriage through court rulings, legislative action; however nine states do not allow it by statute, while thirty other states do not allow it in their constitution (Rimmerman, 2007). The Defence of Marriage Act stated in 1996, is an act that was enacted to prohibit states both internally and externally from recognizing same sex marriage. This has been found to be unconstitutional in various states including two federal courts.

Movements in support of gay marriage started in the 1970s and have progressively and aggressively grown over the past few years reaching a climax in 1993, in Hawaii Supreme Court that declared it to be unconstitutional to prohibit same sex marriage. The 21 has been the climax of the movements with a majority of the population coming forward in support of same sex marriage legalisation (Newton 2010). In May 9 2012 president Barrack Obama became the first sitting president to support the legalization of gay marriage in the United States of America.

The defence of marriage act was challenged in the federal court system by the District Court of Massachusetts held the prohibition of marriage rights to gay couples to be unconstitutional under the Tenth Amendment to the U.S constitution. It has found that the act is unconstitutionally counter current to the human rights such as issues that involve bankruptcy, public employee fee and immigration rights. Marriage laws in states are being challenged in court including a case in California, which challenges the validity of proposition 8 under the American constitution. While another in Nevada that challenges its system of marriage for different and same sex couple marriages.

What is the defence of Marriage Act? It is a federal law that restricts benefits that a married couple enjoy after marriage. The law passed by vote of the majority in the congress and was signed in by President Bill Clinton in September 21 1996 ( Stone, 2013). Section three of this act defines the non- recognition of marriage rights to people of the same sex including insurance benefits, social security funds and filing of joint tax returns. According to the acts section 3 definition of marriage is only a legal union between one man and woman as husband and wife. And the word spouse only refers to one of the opposite sex. Later in the years President Clinton made a personal appeal that people should do what they want to and that it was wrong for anyone to stop someone else from marrying someone of his/ her choice; this meant that he too saw that the act needed to be debated and the content be reviewed. He later urged Supreme Court to change DOMA. Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts made an effort to pass the Employment non-discrimination act that stood for hiring and employment protection for the gay and lesbians. The bill moved through congress and received enormous support from both republican –controlled houses. The impact of DOMA persons of the same sex who got married were shut out of many benefits. Religious definition of marriage was another supportive concept that led to the passing of the act. The institution of marriage involved the union of man and woman in order to procreate mad bring up children. United States courts easily adopted the religious doctrine to deal with gay and lesbian cases. The Republican Party said that federal judges should not force states to agree to other forms of marriage if not the religious definition of it. On September 15 2009 three democratic members of the congress introduced legislation to repeal DOMA called Respect for marriage act. Most of the states still do strongly oppose to the repealing of the defence of marriage act. But currently several states still do feel that everyone has right to freedom on who to.............