U.S. JUSTICE DEPT ADMITS “REGRETTABLE ROLE” IN DISCRIMINATING AGAINST LGBT WORKERS

Washington, D.C. -- A legal brief filed last week by the Department of Justice is being hailed by LGBT advocates as a historic document in the legal fight for equality for America’s LGBT workforce.

The brief cites the unconstitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act in arguing that a federal employee's lawsuit over partner benefits should not be dismissed, and lays out a history of discrimination against LGBT people in the U.S.

The Obama administration had earlier announced it would no longer defend DOMA, but this is the first time it has sought to convince a federal court that the law is unconstitutional.

"This brief represents the concrete manifestation of a complete paradigm shift in the federal government's position on anti-gay discrimination and the constitutional rights of married same-sex couples," said Tobias Barrington Wolff, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania.

The Department of Justice's July 1 "Defendants' Brief in Opposition to Motion to Dismiss" in Karen Golinski's lawsuit seeking equal benefits at work in the federal courts so that she can insure her wife is a must-read legal filing that became a historic document almost immediately upon its submission.

In opposing the House Republicans, who filed a brief in June seeking to have Golinski's case dismissed, the Department of Justice went much further than Attorney General Eric Holder did in the Feb. 23 letter he sent to House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio). The letter detailed his and President Barack Obama's decision that Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional and that they would no longer defend it in court.

What's more, this brief was being researched and written as Obama himself was taking some pretty hard hits-- and repeated questions-- about his commitment to equality due in large part to his ''evolving'' status and unwillingness to publicly embrace marriage equality. By not trotting out the brief in the midst of that criticism and waiting until after the White House LGBT Pride Month Reception to file, however, the administration made a strong statement that this brief was just that-- a legal filing removed from and independent of the political debate.

The brief, filed in the Northern District of California, is the single-most persuasive legal argument ever advanced by the United States government in support of equality for lesbian, gay and bisexual people. Moreover, although the case did not include transgender issues, the government's previously described position that the same legal standard should apply to gender identity classifications could prove helpful for court cases looking at gender identity-based discrimination.

What's more, the DOJ took a hard line against state and local discrimination, citing more than 20 different instances of state or local discriminatory practices-- from laws and judicial opinions making adoption and teaching more difficult or impossible for gay and lesbian people, to police raids of gay bars, including notations of raids over the past years in Atlanta and Fort Worth, Texas.

Immediately after describing Romer v. Evans, the Supreme Court case striking down Colorado's anti-gay constitutional amendment because the court found it to be based on "animus," the Justice Department highlights the fact that earlier this year, "the Tennessee legislature enacted a law stripping counties and municipalities of their ability to pass local non-discrimination ordinances that would prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and repealing the ordinances that had recently been passed by Nashville and other localities."