Tracking the Defense of Marriage Act Of 1996: A Feminist Look Into the Congressional Debates
Location
CSU
Student's Major
Gender and Women's Studies
Student's College
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Mentor's Name
Carol Perkins
Mentor's Department
Gender and Women's Studies
Mentor's College
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Description
The question guiding my research was; What arguments were used in the passage of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)? My methodology in completing this research included qualitative and quantitative analyses of the arguments derived from all House and Senate transcriptions of the DOMA debates. To narrow the size and scope of the research, I focused on six major lines of congressional debate: political, moral, definitional, economic, legal, and behavioral. I discovered that a congress person's party affiliation, the state they were representing, their gender, and their sexual orientation were key factors in the types of debates they used. Based on these discoveries, I discussed effective ways to refine and present arguments in favor of same-sex marriage than those presented to Congress in order to fail DOMA in 1996.1 argue that rather than gays/ lesbians proceeding with efforts to legalize same-sex marriage, there are other avenues which could prove more fruitful, such as seeking inclusion of same-sex relationships in the federal definition of "family" to enable gays/lesbians to partake of benefits afforded to currently defined families.
Tracking the Defense of Marriage Act Of 1996: A Feminist Look Into the Congressional Debates
CSU
The question guiding my research was; What arguments were used in the passage of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)? My methodology in completing this research included qualitative and quantitative analyses of the arguments derived from all House and Senate transcriptions of the DOMA debates. To narrow the size and scope of the research, I focused on six major lines of congressional debate: political, moral, definitional, economic, legal, and behavioral. I discovered that a congress person's party affiliation, the state they were representing, their gender, and their sexual orientation were key factors in the types of debates they used. Based on these discoveries, I discussed effective ways to refine and present arguments in favor of same-sex marriage than those presented to Congress in order to fail DOMA in 1996.1 argue that rather than gays/ lesbians proceeding with efforts to legalize same-sex marriage, there are other avenues which could prove more fruitful, such as seeking inclusion of same-sex relationships in the federal definition of "family" to enable gays/lesbians to partake of benefits afforded to currently defined families.
