Massachusetts AG Challenges Defense of Marriage Act

Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a federal law defining marriage as a union between one man and one woman, which denies same-sex couples married in Massachusetts access to certain federal benefits. The suit claims that Section 3 of the federal Defense of Marriage Act interferes with the state's "sovereign authority to define and regulate marriage." Massachusetts, the first state to allow same-sex marriages, is the first to challenge the law.