Quote Originally Posted by Punish_her View Post
right, either i misread it, or she said "there was a time when states allowed blacks and whites to marry, but the federal government stepped in and said they couldn't" but i am quite sure im just misunderstanding
Yes, you misunderstood. There were some states (North Carolina was one, up until 1971) that made mixed-race marriages ILLEGAL. The feds declared these laws to be discriminatory and stepped in to force states to accept such marriages. The situation is exactly analogous to the rights for gays to marry. I would think that the feds would require ALL states to recognize gay marriages which were performed legally in another state. It might be possible for a state to prohibit such marriages from occurring in their state, but I cannot see them ignoring legal marriages from other states. Not without causing serious legal, and moral, issues.