Last Tuesday, the Queer Policy Alliance sponsored a question-and-answer session with Jonathan Miller, the head of the civil rights division of the office of the attorney general of Massachusetts. Prof. Michael Willrich (HIST) moderated the session. Miller spoke about his role in advancing equality in the state for low-income families, racial minorities, people with disabilities and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer populations.

Miller said his office fights cases of discrimination wherever they appear. For example, he spoke about how his office has fought housing discrimination for children who are legally entitled to a lead-free environment, loan discrimination for minorities who were given lower rates than they deserved and websites inaccessible to the blind. He said his office also tries to fight for equal rights for transgender individuals. "We look at how to make Massachusetts as tolerant as possible," Miller said. "It's meaningful to try to level the playing field to remove barriers and make opportunities for people."

In addition to fighting discrimination, Miller's office played a key role in the U.S. Supreme Court's striking down Section Three of the Defense of Marriage Act, a law that prohibited the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages
.
According to Miller, his office and the Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, a legal rights organization, filed a case in 2009 in order to add the voice of a state to the issue. The Massachusetts court declared section three of the law was unconstitutional.

Before this section of the law was struck down, members of a same-sex union could be married in Massachusetts but federally categorized as single, and therefore qualify for certain benefits but not others, he said.

"DOMA added a weird legal fiction that just didn't make sense," Miller said. "We were forced to treat some married couples differently than others."

Miller said marriage should be up to the states as long as it is constitutional, but he said he thinks there will be a national marriage equality ruling within 10 years. "Loving v. Virginia in 1967, a sweeping decision that legalized interracial marriage, is the most comparable case," he said. "Maybe 10 years is too bold, but I don't think so because there is an incredible race to legalize it right now."

Queer Policy Alliance member Alex Thomson '15, who helped plan the event, said in an interview with the Justice that the purpose of the event was to have a conversation with the Brandeis community on marriage equality. "Massachusetts has always been a leader in the marriage equality fight, and it's important to learn about that," he said. "For me personally as a member of the LGBT community, and someone interested in politics and law, the issue is close to my heart."
*