Senate vote tonight passes gay marriage bill to Band-Aid

Is the current gay marriage bill a beacon of brighter days? Of, as more optimistic gays say, things “getting better”?

Or is this bill a terrible compromise rooted in our collective desperation?

We’ll soon find out as, on Tuesday, the Senate voted to pass the “Respect for Marriage Act.” The legislation now goes back to the Democratic-controlled House, where it is expected to pass, and then placed on President Joe Biden’s desk for his signature.

At face value, this act seems like a step forward by codifying federal same-sex and interracial marriage rights. At best, it is a preemptive Band-Aid should the Supreme Court try to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges, which cited the Fourteenth Amendment to legalize same-sex marriage. If Obergefell falls, bans in 35 states would go back into effect. But already married same-sex couples would not lose their benefits, and same-sex couples could continue to get married in states where it remained legal, traveling to another state if necessary.

But in no way does this act federally legalize “marriage equality” across the United States. It is mostly insurance for existing marriages. As Cornell University Law School professor Michael C. Dorf explained, “Same-sex couples residing in states that do not of their own accord recognize the legality of their marriages would have to go to the trouble and expense of traveling to a state that does in order to receive full recognition in their home state.”

Even John Cornyn, the conservative Republican senator from Texas, agreed that the act “does not move the needle on same-sex marriage.”

Dig a bit deeper, and what this act really represents is the inflexibility of our nation’s institutions and the national entrenchment — despite constitutional assurances to the contrary — of religion.

At its worst, the legislation is a Trojan horse ushering in protections that allow religious institutions — from churches to mosques, religious nonprofits to religious schools — the right to refuse services, facilities and goods for any marriage ceremony or celebration. Effectively, this act codifies discrimination.

The protections to religious liberty were late additions to the bill, in order to secure the support of Senate Republicans like Utah’s Mitt Romney. Romney released a statement in mid-November applauding the legislation for providing “important protections for…