Wintry mix spreads across Minnesota

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

President Joe Biden will sign into law Tuesday a bipartisan bill that will codify same-sex and interracial marriages with a large celebration on the South Lawn of the White House.

"Today, Congress took a critical step to ensure that Americans have the right to marry the person they love," Biden said in a statement Thursday after the House passed the Respect for Marriage Act, which would recognize marriages federally and across state lines. The Senate passed it earlier.

"While we are one step closer on our long journey to build a more perfect union," Biden added, "we must never stop fighting for full equality for LGBTQI+ Americans and all Americans."

That long journey is one Biden and the country have been on together. In 2004, just 42 percent of Americans said they were in support of same-sex marriage, according to 

. Today, it's 68 percent, according to an NPR/PBS 

A dozen Republican senators (out of 50) and 39 Republican House members (out of 208) voted in favor of the legislation. That's far from a majority of Republicans, and it's reflective of the fact that rank-and-file Republican voters have lagged in support of same-sex marriage.

, just 19 percent of Republicans were in favor. This week's NPR/PBS 

/Marist poll found now that number has more than doubled to 43 percent, but is still shy of a majority.

A massive cultural shift on interracial marriage

When it comes to interracial marriage, the country has seen a wholesale change in public opinion and societal acceptance since 1967 when the Supreme Court ruled in Loving v. Virginia that prohibitions on interracial marriages were unconstitutional.

first asked the question, just 4 percent said they approved of marriage between Black people and white people. Through the mid-90s, Americans were still split on the subject.

But by the late-90s and early 2000s, support for interracial marriage soared and, by 2021, approval hit a sky-high 94 percent.

Back in 1967, just 3 percent of Americans were in interracial marriages, and that's up to at least 19 percent, as of last year, according to the 

Biden's evolution on gay rights and same-sex marriage

On almost no other issue has American public opinion shifted so dramatically so quickly. Biden, 

who has a grandchild who identifies as LGBTQ

In 1973, as a young senator, a gay rights activist confronted Biden about discriminatory federal regulations. Biden was taken aback.

"My gut reaction is they are security risks," 

 of people who were gay in the military and Civil Service, "but I'll admit, I haven't given this much thought."

In the 1990s, like many other senators, Biden cast a series of votes that hurt the push for gay rights — from cutting off funding from public schools that were "

encouraging or supporting homosexuality as a positive lifestyle alternative

" to the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996. DOMA defined marriage as between a man and a woman and blocked federal recognition of same-sex marriages.

Florida law that constrains teachers talking about sexual orientation or gender identity

" and vowed to "continue to fight for the protections and safety you deserve."

And he is about to sign the Respect for Marriage Act, which repeals DOMA.

It's been quite the turnabout — and really it's come in the last 10 years.

During the 2008 campaign, Biden, as former President Obama's running mate 

, "No. Barack Obama nor I support redefining from a civil side what constitutes marriage."

It was a delicate line the Democrats were walking then. In 2004, the issue of same-sex marriage was a lightning rod. Anti-same-sex marriage amendments were put on various state ballots. Then-President George W. Bush backed a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage, and white Christian evangelicals helped Bush win reelection.

Democrats had moved toward the half-measure of civil unions — giving legal rights to gay couples, but, largely because of the politics, were not ready to come out fully in support of "marriage."

As vice president, Biden got out ahead of President Obama in advocating for same-sex marriage — on national television.

Marriage is about "who do you love?" Biden 

. "And will you be loyal to the person you love? ... whether they're marriages of lesbians or gay men or heterosexuals."

He continued: "Look, I am vice president of the United States of America. The president sets the policy. I am absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women, and heterosexual men and women marrying another are entitled to the same exact rights, all the civil rights, all the civil liberties. And quite frankly, I don't see much of a distinction beyond that."

With that, Biden endeared himself to the LGBTQI+ community and pushed Obama to publicly embrace the position.

Days later, Obama went on ABC's Good Morning America, saying Biden's "probably got a little bit over his skis, but out of generosity of spirit."

"Would I have preferred to have done this in my own way, in my own terms, without there being a lot of notice to everybody?" Obama 

Biden's appearance came at something of an inflection point. This was in an election year and at a time when the country was still split on acceptance of same-sex marriage. Three days before he went on Meet the Press, Gallup found 50 percent of Americans approved of same-sex marriage.

Afterward, support continued to rise. In June 2015, the Supreme Court ruled in the Obergefell case that same-sex marriage is constitutionally protected by the 14th Amendment.

For advocates of the Respect for Marriage Act and the White House, Tuesday is a big day. But the bill's potential impact is limited.

"No, I am not celebrating," Jim Obergefell, of the 

case that won the right to same-sex marriage, said on 

This bill does not guarantee the right to marry. It makes it so that other states have to recognize same-sex marriages across state lines and that same-sex couples are entitled to the same federal benefits of any other married couple, like 

"I will say I'm happy that at least something has been done, something that we will have to fall back on should the Supreme Court overturn Obergefell in the future, but this act, I find it curious that it's called the Respect for Marriage Act because this act does not respect LGBTQ+ community, our marriages, our relationships or our families."

That's because, though the bill attempts to buttress key Supreme Court decisions, it does nothing to prevent same-sex marriages from becoming illegal again in states that might oppose them if the Supreme Court decides to overturn Obergefell.

The potential for its overturning was the impetus for passing the Respect for Marriage Act in the first place. In the 

 decision, which overturned the right to an abortion earlier this year, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the court "

" decisions that legalized same-sex marriage and even protected the rights of married people to have access to contraception.

But others see this as an important step to be celebrated.

"We saw after the Dobbs decision, that in so many ways, too many of our rights are just one Supreme Court decision from being lost," Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign, 

 Monday. "As a queer woman, as a queer woman of color in this country, who's married, I was worried that at some point that the courts would also invalidate my marriage. Now, I'm relieved because that's not the case. Congress has taken action to ensure that our marriages are valid, that our love will be respected."  

Politics and Government News

Domenico Montanaro

Author

The bill signing comes after months of work on Capitol Hill and years of changed attitudes — even as the threat looms that the conservative Supreme Court could roll back same-sex marriage rights.

Biden to sign Respect for Marriage Act, reflecting his and the country's evolution

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox