What was the court case United States v. Windsor about?
Q: What was the court case United States v. Windsor about?
A: The court case United States v. Windsor was about whether defining "marriage" as a union between one man and one woman (as husband and wife) was unconstitutional (against the Constitution). Specifically, it related to Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which defined "marriage" for federal law in the United States as being between one man and one woman.
Q: What did the Supreme Court decide in this case?
A: The Supreme Court decided that defining marriage as only between one man and one woman was against the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment, meaning that no individual law can take away citizens' rights protected by the Constitution.
Q: Who were Edith Windsor and Thea Spyer?
A: Edith Windsor and Thea Spyer were a same-sex couple living in New York who were married in Canada in 2007.
Q: Why did they become involved with this court case?
A: They became involved with this court case because when Spyer died in 2009, leaving everything she owned to Windsor, she tried to claim an exemption from inheritance taxes but was barred from doing so by Section 3 of DOMA which said that the word "spouse" only applies to a marriage between a man and woman.
Q: How much money did Edith Windsor have to pay if she lost her case?
A: If Edith Windsor had lost her case, she would have had to pay $363,053 in inheritance taxes.
Q: What happened after Edith won her case?
A: After Edith won her case, Time magazine named her third most influential person of 2013.
