In February, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Obama Administration no longer believed that the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, passed under President Clinton, was constitutional, because it discriminates against gay people. Social conservatives were shocked, but some President Obama watchers were even more surprised. Previously, he had expressed only mild distaste for DOMA and tepid support for legalized gay unions. This signal that the federal government would no longer oppose same-sex marriage cleared the way for several states to pass laws to allow it, including the one I talk about in the next item.