• DOMA Florida StyleFlorida state contour with Capital City against blurred USA flag image by Stasys Eidiejus from Fotolia.com
  
  The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was born in the United States Congress in 1996 and at its inception was a federal law. Under its terms, same-sex marriages are not recognized nationally, but the Act allows voters in individual states to decide for themselves whether or not such unions are honored within their own jurisdictions.
  
  

1997 Legislation

• In 1997, a year after Congress gave Florida the right to decide for itself whether or not same-sex marriages would be legal, the state's legislature resoundingly said no. Three paragraphs were added to the statutes under Section 741.212 and were called the Florida Defense of Marriage Act. These paragraphs specifically outlawed "marriages between persons of the same sex" and refused to recognize any such marriages even if they were entered into in another state or even another country. This meant that the state courts would not hear a divorce of any same-sex couple either
  
  

2008 Amendment

• Eleven years after the first Florida Defense of Marriage Act was entered into law, voters upheld the Act . They affirmed that same-sex marriages were illegal. This update has been titled the Marriage Protection Amendment and is more casually known as Amendment 2. It has the distinction of being the only statute on Florida's books initiated by a petition by citizens.
  
  

Meaning of Amendment 2

• The 2008 Marriage Protection Amendment specifically reads that "in as much as marriage is the legal union of only one man and one woman as husband and wife, no other legal union that is treated as marriage or the substantial equivalent thereof shall be valid or recognized." This is only marginally different from the language of the third paragraph of the 1997 DOMA law. But the 1997 DOMA law was simply that---a law. Amendment 2 successfully added the Act to the Florida Constitution.
  
  

Controversy over Amendment 2

• When Amendment 2 was first proposed, controversy swirled when opponents alleged that it would also disfranchise domestic partnerships between opposite-sex couples who preferred to live together but not actually marry. Just News, a website supported by WPLG, an ABC television affiliate in Miami, charged at the time that the amendment would prevent any couple who was "not a married man and woman" from sharing health and other financial rights and benefits within the state. Florida4Marriage, a political advocacy group that was in on the ground floor of launching the amendment, has consistently argued that this is not true.
  
  

Other Statutes

• In other efforts to protect and preserve marriage, under Section 741.0305 of its statutes, Florida also offers discounts on marriage license fees if a couple completes a state-sanctioned premarital counseling course before applying for a marriage license.