AG will not defend DOMA lawsuit
Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane today announced that her office will not defend the state against a lawsuit demanding that same-sex couples be permitted to marry here.
“I cannot ethically defend the constitutionality of Pennsylvania’s version of DOMA,” she said, referring to the Defense of Marriage Act. “I believe it to be wholly unconstitutional”
The announcement comes two days after the American Civil Liberties Union and the Philadelphia law firm Hangley Aronchick Segal Pudlin & Schiller sued Gov. Tom Corbett, Ms. Kane and other state and county-level officials on behalf of 10 couples and one widow. The lawsuit in U.S. District Court in the Middle District of Pennsylvania asks a federal judge to declare unconstitutional the state’s Defense of Marriage Act. That act defines marriage as between a man and a woman, and bars the state from recognizing same-sex marriages licensed in other states.
Lawyers with the attorney general’s office typically defend the state when its officials are named as defendants.
The Commonwealth Attorneys Act gives the attorney general the “duty … to uphold and defend the constitutionality of all statutes so as to prevent their suspension or abrogation in the absence of a controlling decision by a court of competent jurisdiction.”
It also says that the attorney general “may, upon determining that it is more efficient or otherwise is in the best interest of the Commonwealth, authorize the General Counsel or the counsel for an independent agency to initiate, conduct or defend any particular litigation or category of litigation in his stead.”
The spokesman for the Officer of the General Counsel indicated in an email that he may issue a statement later in the day.