A Quote by Barack Obama

I support ensuring that committed gay couples have the same rights and responsibilities afforded to any married couple in this country. I believe strongly in stopping laws designed to take rights away and passing laws that extend equal rights to gay couples. I've required all agencies in the federal government to extend as many federal benefits as possible to LGBT families as the current law allows. And I've called on Congress to repeal the so-called Defense of Marriage Act and to pass the Domestic Partners Benefits and Obligations Act.

Barack Obama

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Barack Obama
American - President
Born: August 4, 1961

If the court strikes down the Defense of Marriage Act, is that a 'liberal' result enabling gay couples married in states where gay marriage is legal to enjoy the same economic advantages that federal laws now grant to straight couples? Or is it a 'conservative' ruling, limiting the federal government's ability to override state power?

Jeff Greenfield

[Before the Civil Rights Act of 1964], many governments in southern states forced people to segregate by race. Civil rights advocates fought to repeal these state laws, but failed. So they appealed to the federal government, which responded with the Civil Rights Act of 1964. But this federal law didn't simply repeal state laws compelling segregation. It also prohibited voluntary segregation. What had been mandatory became forbidden. Neither before nor after the Civil Rights Act were people free to make their own decisions about who they associated with.

Harry Browne

It's only fair that stable gay relationships of long standing should have the same rights and responsibilities as married couples. I know the image of gay marriage is to some people horrific and ludicrous.

Ian Mckellen

It is at least a small comfort to me, as a gay rights and marriage equality advocate, to know that like any marriage, gay and lesbian couples are subject to the same complications and hardships that afflict marriages between heterosexual couples.

Gene Robinson

Parts of the Voting Rights Act are due to expire next year if Congress doesn't extend them, including the section that guarantees that voting rights will be protected by the federal government.

Marty Meehan

I've called on Congress to repeal the so-called Defense of Marriage Act to help end discrimination to help end discrimination against same-sex couples in this country. Now, I want to add we have a duty to uphold existing law, but I believe we must do so in a way that does not exacerbate old divides. And fulfilling this duty in upholding the law in no way lessens my commitment to reversing this law. I've made that clear.

Barack Obama

I don't support gay marriage, but I also don't support a constitutional amendment banning it. However, I do support same sex unions that would give gay couples all the rights, privileges and protections of marriage.

Bob Casey, Jr.

In every community in Illinois, same-sex couples have chosen to join together and, in many instances, to raise families of their own. These couples are our relatives and friends, our neighbors, co-workers and parents of our children's classmates. They deserve the same rights and responsibilities that civil marriage offers straight couples.

Lisa Madigan

The government has to treat all citizens equally. I am a strong supporter not of a weak version of civil unions, but of a strong version, in which the rights that are conferred at the federal level to persons who are part of the same-sex union are compatible. When it comes to federal rights, the over 1,100 rights that right now are not being given to same-sex couples, I think that's unacceptable.

Barack Obama

I extend that to the abortion issue, I extend that to the so-called gay rights issue, I think this is a freedom principle and consistent with the analysis in the economic area as well.

William Weld

I applaud the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down the Defense of Marriage Act. This was discrimination enshrined in law. It treated loving, committed gay and lesbian couples as a separate and lesser class of people. The Supreme Court has righted that wrong, and our country is better off for it. We are a people who declared that we are all created equal - and the love we commit to one another must be equal as well.

Barack Obama

Under the Constitution, federal law trumps both state and city law. But antitrust law allows states some exceptional leeway to adopt anticompetitive business regulations, out of respect for states' rights to regulate business. This federal respect for states' rights does not extend to cities.

Marvin Ammori

Fundamentalists tell us to fear the specter of special rights for gay citizens, though of course gay Americans aren't after special rights - merely equal rights. The irony is that special rights actually do exist in this country-for religious groups.

Sean Faircloth

If you believe in equal rights, then what do “women’s rights,” “gay rights,” etc., mean? Either they are redundant or they are violations of the principle of equal rights for all.

Thomas Sowell

The first thing to say is that the ordinary criminal law in this country, the Human Rights Act, the Children's Act, all of the laws of the country take precedence, but what I'm also saying is that within the context of a secular country, which Britain now kind of is, or at least a country which purports to be relatively equal between religions, there should be some scope for allowing faith communities to govern themselves - subject to it being consensual and subject to everyone's human rights being observed.

Sadakat Kadri

The rights [to religious freedom] are of the natural rights of mankind, and ... if any act shall be ... passed to repeal [an act granting those rights] or to narrow its operation, such act will be an infringement of natural right.

Thomas Jefferson

A Quote by Barack Obama

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