A Personal Reflection on Supreme Court's Same-Sex Marriage Decision

When the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act, it was of more than professional interest to Sarah R. Boonin, an assistant clinical professor at Suffolk University Law School.

"For me and my family, this week's Supreme Court opinion in U.S. v. Windsor, striking down the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and mandating federal recognition of same-sex marriages like mine, was a game-changer," writes Boonin in a first-person reflection published on the Huffington Post.

Boonin got right on the phone to tell her wife, a federal employee, about the decision as soon as it was released.

Of even more importance to Boonin than the protections the ruling brings to her family is its impact on their status as Americans:

"In declaring an equal protection interest in same-sex marriages, the Court accomplished what it could not have had it relied on mere federalism principles. The Court openly affirmed the dignity of the hundreds of thousands of same-sex families in the U.S. and weighed in on the side of our common humanity. The Court got it right here. In my world, the Court's opinion in Windsor was about far more than my taxes, my health insurance, and my financial rights in marriage. The Court's opinion was about feeling a little safer getting on a plane and leaving Massachusetts with my family. It was about how my wife and I will answer our daughter's questions about our family. It was about, for the first time, feeling equal in the eyes of my government.:

See the full text of Sarah Boonin's narrative in the Huffington Post.