CNN news 2013-03-30 加文本

cnn news 2013-03-30

We begin, though, tonight at the SupremeCourt with signs that the so-called Defense of Marriage Act is in deepconstitutional trouble. DOMA, you'll recall, is the 1996 federal law definingmarriage as between, being solely between man and a woman. Tell that to an83-year-old widow named Edith Windsor who braved the crowds today and foughtthe fight to get her story and the case that bears her name, "United States v. Windsor," before the highest court inthe land.

Edith Windsor married her wife in Canada. Whenher wife died, Windsorwas forced to pay $360,000 in inheritance tax because her marriage, her legalmarriage, was not recognized by the federal authorities under DOMA. Lowercourts have ruled against DOMA. The Obama administration has refused to defendit. A lawyer for House Republicans speaking for it today drawing some toughquestioning from six of the nine justices.

Well, is what happened in 1996, and I'mgonna quote from the House report here, is that Congress decided to reflect andhonor a collective moral judgment and to express moral disapproval ofhomosexuality? Is that what happened in 1996?

What gives the federal government the rightto be concerned at all at what the definition of marriage is?

When it has 1100 laws, which in our societymeans that the federal government is intertwined with the citizens' daily life,you are at real risk of running in conflict with what has always been thoughtto be the essence of the state police power, which is to regulate marriage,divorce, custody.

As Justice Kennedy said, 1100 statutes, andit affects every area of life. And so you would be really diminishing what thestate has said is marriage. You are saying, no, state said two kinds ofmarriages. The full marriage and then this sort of skim milk marriage.

Well, afterwards, Edith Windsor said itwent beautifully and that her late spouse, Thea Spire, would be pleased.

And I know that the spirit of my latespouse, Thea Spire, OK, is right here who watching andlistening, and would be very proud and happy of where we've come to.

Well, today's case came just a day afteroral arguments on California'sProposition 8, a same-sex marriage ban. Now justices, both liberal andconservative, seemed reluctant yesterday to use it as the basis for sweepingnational change. This case, DOMA, on the other hand, could be just theopposite.

Senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin wasinside the court again today. He joins us tonight from just outside the court.

So I know everything comes with the caveatthat the Supreme Court could surprise us and it's hard to predict. But you sayyou think that DOMA is in trouble, that a majority of justices seem to beinclined to throw it out. What makes you say that?

Because of what Anthony Kennedy said.That's really what it comes down to. Because the four Democratic members of theDemocratic nominees to the Supreme Court were all very clearly hostile to theDefense of Marriage Act. And so where were they going to get the fifth vote?

Well, Anthony Kennedy is the only reallylikely possibility, but repeatedly during the oral argument today, he expressedwhat appeared to be his view that the Defense of Marriage Act violated statesrights. He did not talk about that it violated the rights of gay people. Hesaid that it, it violates the state's ability to regulate and create the lawsof marriage. And he said it over and over again. And that is a winning argumentfor the Defense of Marriage Act. Critics of Edith Windsor and company.

These are all taking place with publicopinion with public sentiment shifting, as you know, in favor of accepting samesex marriage, not everywhere but the national polls. However, there remains somevery high profile and big money bashes of silence on the subject iNPRofessional sports.  A member of openinggay players in pro-baseball, basketball and football now stands at preciselyzero. Now one active player.