Box Turtle Bulletin
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobby“Now you must raise your children up in a world where that union of man and box turtle is on the same legal footing as man and wife…”
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobbyJuly 7th, 2011
After the judges in Los Angeles branch of the Federal Bankruptcy Court nearly unanimously signed on to a ruling finding that DOMA Section 3 was unconstitutional, the US Trustee appealed. The Trustee’s Office seemed to be under the impression that the President’s direction to federal departments to abide by the law until it was overturned required them to appeal the decision.
Now the confusion seems to have lifted. The Department of Justice declined interest in defending the DOMA in this case and passed the Trustee along to John Boehner’s House defense. (MetroWeekly)
Following consultation with the House Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group (BLAG), the U.S. Trustee asked to withdraw its appeal in its challenge to the attempted joint bankruptcy petition filed by Gene Douglas Balas and Carlos Morales, a married gay couple who live in California — a move a Department of Justice spokeswoman says represents the DOJ’s new policy on all such bankruptcy filings.
So as no one intends to take up the case and the US Trustee has better things to do with his time and budget, same-sex married couples in California (and, based on the DOJ statement, presumably other states in which marriage is recognized) are henceforth recognized by the Federal Government as married. Broke, but married.
It’s an odd milestone, but an important one nonetheless. For the first time, albeit in a very limited situation, the United States Federal Government has officially recognized a same-sex marriage.
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Tony
July 7th, 2011
Don’t get me wrong, I am happy about all of this. I have a question though: why does it seem like it’s all out of nowhere? I can’t believe nobody sued in the 90’s when DOMA passed. Were the lawsuits not covered in the news or did they just not exist?
andrewdb
July 7th, 2011
This actually seems to be a rather unique situation. What is really at stake is the filing fee – one or two? Under California law the SS couple has the same community property rights in their community assets as a hetero couple would have.
Federal BK law usually looks to state law to determine who owns what (the BK court is worried about how gets paid first, and at what %, from the assets available).
Community property is usually based on the old Spanish legal codes, and so usually shows up in Western states that used to be Spanish territories (Cal, Az, NM, etc).
Question for any East coast lawyers – what rights to SS or hetero couples have to joint property in CT, NY, MA, etc?
Tony
July 7th, 2011
Can you not use abbreviations like everyone knows what you’re talking about? That shit is so annoying, and it ruins the entire sentence.
Timothy Kincaid
July 7th, 2011
Actually there is quite a bit of difference between a single and a joint filing in bankruptcy in California.
MattNYC
July 8th, 2011
@Tony
There was no such thing as a legally married SS couple in the 90s.
RWG
July 8th, 2011
@Tony:
Also, in the 90s, most people were focused on stemming the AIDS crisis. Our friends were dying by the thousands. It took most of our attention at the time.
jpeckjr
July 8th, 2011
I am wonder if BLAG is going to file an appeal. When the Obama Administration made its decision not to defend DOMA, House Spkr Boehner made a major public fuss over the House taking over the defense. At least in the GLBT media, Paul Clements’ taking on the case was widely reported. Haven’t heard anything from BLAG / Boehner / Clements since. I’d think they’d be filing appeals in every case in the country involving same-sex couples / DOMA, including this one. Perhaps we will see something. We need to stay alert for it.
Dave H
July 8th, 2011
The fact that the federal government will now recognize that a same-sex couple is legally married for the purposes of a bankruptcy settlement is a tiny step forward, but I think it will do very little to advance our case for federal marriage equality.
Several states with anti-marriage amendments have ruled that they can grant a divorce to a same-sex couple who were legally married elsewhere, without having to permit same-sex marriage in their state.
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