Obama and the justice department - If there is a law existing, does DOJ have to enforce?

[Cant trust em]

I'm asking as a result of this DOMA ruling that I have very little information on. It seems like people are asking the Obama Justice Department to not argue for this law. If the law is on the books, how does the department argue against it? Does Congress have to take action to repeal this law first?

[Thrill]

1. YES. Its their job to defend and enforce the law

.

[readmoreoften]

5. Nice knee-jerk guess. Unfortunately, unsubstantiated by US history. /nt

[Thrill]

6. You need to read the role of the DOJ

[dsc]

2. several things

First, on rare occassion the DOJ refuses to defend a law stating it believes it to be unconstitutional. I admit, Obama would have been stretching to outright refuse to defend it but he could have. Reagan, Clinton and Bush 2 DOJ's all refused to defend at least one law during their Presidencies.

Second, even if you accept the necessity of defending the law the brief was appalling and basicly argued that the 14 amendment is irrelevent to gays.

[jody]

3. No, federal law authorizes restoration of the civil right of convicted felons to keep and bear arms

but DoJ does not have a process to implement that law.

That's just one example and there are many more.

[bicentennial_baby]

4. No, they don't

"In fact, George W. Bush (ACLU et al., v. Norman Y. Mineta - "The U.S. Department of Justice has notified Congress that it will not defend a law prohibiting the display of marijuana policy reform ads in public transit systems."), Bill Clinton (Dickerson v. United States - "Because the Miranda decision is of constitutional dimension, Congress may not legislate a contrary rule unless this Court were to overrule Miranda.... Section 3501 cannot constitutionally authorize the admission of a statement that would be excluded under this Court's Miranda cases."), George HW Bush (Metro Broadcasting v. Federal Communications Commission), and Ronald Reagan (INS v./ Chadha - "Chadha then filed a petition for review of the deportation order in the Court of Appeals, and the INS joined him in arguing that § 244(c)(2) is unconstitutional.") all joined in lawsuits opposing federal laws that they didn't like, laws that they felt were unconstitutional. It is an outright lie to suggest that the DOJ had no choice"

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