| abstract | - Gill et al. v. Office of Personnel Management, 682 F.3d 1 (1st Cir. 2012) is a United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit decision that affirmed the judgment of the District Court for the District of Massachusetts in a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), the section that defines the terms "marriage" as "a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife" and "spouse" as "a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife." The trial began on May 6, 2010, and was heard by District Judge Joseph Louis Tauro. On July 8, Tauro ruled section 3 of DOMA unconstitutional in a summary judgment. He later stayed the implementation of his decision pending appeal, and the Department of Justice (DOJ) filed an appeal on October 12, 2010. In May 2012, the First Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously affirmed Tauro's ruling that section 3 of DOMA is unconstitutional. On June 29, the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group (BLAG), an arm of the U.S. House of Representatives that is defending the suit, asked the Supreme Court to review the case. The DOJ did so on July 3 and the plaintiffs' attorneys did so on August 2. The petition for a writ of certiorari is currently pending before the United States Supreme Court.
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