null / lazyllama/ShutterstockOn Tuesday, the House of Representatives approved a bill that would legalise interracial unions and nationally recognise same-sex marriage.
The plan would prevent states from “denying out-of-state marriage licences and benefits on the basis of sex, race, ethnicity or national origin,” according to the AP.
74 Republicans joined the Democrats in supporting the Respect for Marriage Act at the vote on July 19.
Prior to the November midterm elections and following the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, which overruled Roe v. Wade, the vote was taken.
The Defense of Marriage Act, enacted in 1996 and signed by President Bill Clinton, allowed states to refuse to recognise same-sex marriages that occurred in other states and defined marriage legally as the union of a man and a woman.
The Supreme Court’s rulings in United States v. Windsor from 2013 and Obergefell v. Hodges from 2015 effectively void DOMA.
The bill won’t be voted on, according to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat from New York.
Democrats have raised the prospect that other recent rulings, such Obergefell v. Hodges, may be overturned, even though the majority opinion in Dobbs stated that “this case involves the constitutional right to abortion and no other right.”
Justice Clarence Thomas did state in his concurring opinion on Dobbs that “I join the Court’s opinion because the Court properly applies our substantive due process precedents to reject the fabrication of a constitutional right to abortion, and because this case does not present the opportunity to reject substantive due process entirely.
We should, however, “follow the language of the Constitution, which sets forth some substantive rights that cannot be taken away, and adds, beyond that, a right to due process when life, liberty, or property is to be taken away” in future cases.
That linguistic command is incompatible with substantive due process, which has harmed our nation in several ways.
Therefore, we ought to do away with it from our legal system as soon as possible.