Bookeristas weigh in on U.S. President Barack Obama's recent announcement that his administration will no longer defend the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which limits marriage to one man and one woman:
Project 21: Obama Defends Gay Marriage Over Rule Of Law"
Assert members of the black conservative group, in a statement emailed to Booker Rising
Mychal Massie, conservative Republican and Project 21 chairman: "The pure arrogance of this man is incredible. We see a sitting American president functioning as a monarch juxtaposed to an elected representative of the people. Obama privately decided that he didn't like DOMA and — on the authority of his conscience and opinion alone — saw fit to disregard legislation that was drafted, passed overwhelmingly and signed into law by a preceding president of his own party."
Jerome Hudson, conservative in Florida: "At no time in the history of this nation has a president so openly shown such unabashed contempt for the Constitution and the rule of law. President Obama's decision to have the Justice Department ignore the Defense of Marriage Act removes all doubt that he has nothing less than a lack of respect and understanding for the founding principles of our nation. We are a nation of laws and not men."
Lisa Fritsch, conservative Republican in Texas: "If President Obama is concerned about the constitutionality of laws, he should start with his own health care plan which has been determined to be unconstitutional by 26 state attorneys general and ruled unconstitutional by two judges. President Obama — though he acts as God — does not have the judicial authority to make his opinion and political agenda lawful. His political agenda supersedes any regard for constitutional law, American values and recognition of true discrimination."
Alan Keyes: "Granting Homosexuals The Right To Marry Is Like Granting Plantation Owners The Right To Own Slaves"
The conservative activist and America's Independent Party member opines: "Government doesn't endow people with the ability to procreate the species. The Creator takes care of that. Like all unalienable rights, those associated with the natural family exist in consequence of this endowment. A couple that cannot, by nature, procreate has no claim to those rights. Nor can government grant them a semblance of it without impairing the claims of one or both of the parents biologically implicated in the physical conception of the child. The DOMA simply makes more explicit the government's obligation to secure the Creator-endowed unalienable rights of the natural family. This obligation precludes government from fabricating other rights that impair them. In this respect, granting homosexuals the right to marry is like granting plantation owners the right to own slaves."
Harry Jackson Jr.: "Obama: The Anti-Marriage President"
The conservative pastor argues that the president is ignoring his constitutional responsibility to enforce America's laws and is interfering with due process: "Marriage, at its root, is not an individual civil right to be enjoyed by all. It is, however, an ancient institution which must be preserved and promoted. The president’s claim that the DOMA legislation is unconstitutional is no more than a crass political move to garner the support of his ardent followers in the radical gay community. What the president has obviously not taken into consideration is: 1.) the impact that legalizing same-sex marriage nationally will have on the education and socialization of primary schoolchildren, 2.) the impact of the legalization of same-sex marriage upon the [marital] unions in the black and Hispanic communities, and 3.) the long term, political consequences to his 2012 campaign of showing the hypocrisy of the pro-marriage statement he made in the 2008 race."
Obama & Gay Marriage: Bookerista Perspectives
