The Justice Department’s announcement last week that it will no longer defend the constitutionality of Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act in two cases within the Second Circuit challenging the law sent shock waves throughout the legal and political world. Section 3 of DOMA, which was signed into law in 1996, defines marriage to be “a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife.”
Roberta A. Kaplan, a litigation partner at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, in an interview last week talked about the impact and consequences of the Obama administration’s decision. Ms. Kaplan represents plaintiff Edith Windsor in Windsor v. United States, one of two cases in recent months to challenge the constitutionality of DOMA.
