The Obama administration will file a
brief this week with the Supreme Court urging it strike down state
laws and amendments which exclude gay couples from marriage.
Currently, gay couples can marry in 37
states, plus the District of Columbia. On Monday, a
federal judge struck down Nebraska's ban.
The nation's highest court will hear
arguments next month in a case challenging bans in four states: Ohio,
Tennessee, Michigan and Kentucky.
In an op-ed published Monday, Attorney
General Eric Holder wrote that his office's brief in the case will
argue that such bans “violate the fundamental constitutional
guarantee of 'equal protection of the laws.'”
“It is clear that the time has come
to recognize that gay and lesbian people deserve robust protection
from discrimination,” Holder wrote.
“Nothing justifies excluding same-sex
couples from the institution of marriage. Denying them the right to
marry serves only to demean them and their children, to degrade the
dignity of their families and to deny them the full, free and equal
participation in American life to which every citizen is entitled.”
Such bans, he
added, “inflict concrete harms that touch nearly every aspect
of daily life for gay and lesbian couples.”