Crossposted at Motley Moose

It is not a liberal who's saying this. It is the author of DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act), former Congressman Bob Barr saying so. First he admits that DOMA was indeed designed to pre-empt the judicial process.

DOMA was indeed designed to thwart the then-nascent move in a few state courts and legislatures to afford partial or full recognition to same-sex couples. The Hawaii court case Baehr vs. Lewin, still active while DOMA was being considered by Congress in mid-1996, provided the immediate impetus.

Barr explains in his column in LATimes that there are two parts to DOMA and their explicit aims.

The Hawaii court was clearly leaning toward legalizing same-sex marriages. So the first part of DOMA was crafted to prevent the U.S. Constitution's "full faith and credit" clause -- which normally would require State B to recognize any lawful marriage performed in State A -- from being used to extend one state's recognition of same-sex marriage to other states whose citizens chose not to recognize such a union....

However, we did incorporate into DOMA's second part a definition of marriage that comported with the historic -- and, at the time, widely accepted -- view of the institution as being between a man and a woman only. But this definition was to be used solely to interpret provisions of federal law related to spouses....

Barr wrestled with the unconstitutionality of the DOMA like President-elect Obama. Today he concludes that DOMA actually had become a 'club' to prevent the ability of a State to recognize same-sex unions.

In effect, DOMA's language reflects one-way federalism: It protects only those states that don't want to accept a same-sex marriage granted by another state. Moreover, the heterosexual definition of marriage for purposes of federal laws -- including, immigration, Social Security survivor rights and veteran's benefits -- has become a de facto club used to limit, if not thwart, the ability of a state to choose to recognize same-sex unions.

Then it seems that Barr's libertarian side is winning over his conservative religious side. He wrote "It truly is time to get the federal government out of the marriage business. In law and policy, such decisions should be left to the people themselves." Can't say it any better....

Even more so now than in 1996, I believe we need to reduce federal power over the lives of the citizenry and over the prerogatives of the states. It truly is time to get the federal government out of the marriage business. In law and policy, such decisions should be left to the people themselves.

And he agrees with our famed Constitutional Scholar President elect Obama....

In 2006, when then-Sen. Obama voted against the Federal Marriage Amendment, he said, "Decisions about marriage should be left to the states." He was right then; and as I have come to realize, he is right now in concluding that DOMA has to go. If one truly believes in federalism and the primacy of state government over the federal, DOMA is simply incompatible with those notions.

Thirteen years ago, this man was the architect of a highly discriminatory law. He is still not admitting that DOMA is plain and simple legitimized discrimination practised by Government against the same sex couples. But from the State's rights perspective, he is coming to the same conclusion as Obama and rest of us that DOMA needs to go. And it seems, he is moving towards a position that Government should not be in business of denying marriage status to folks based on sexual orientation.

Congressman, I don't think I liked your politics in 90s, but today your column opened the door for dialog on this important issue a little bit..For that, a big Thank you.

Read Bob Barr's full column at Los Angeles Times.

Link to Bob Barr's column at LATimes