It was good to read that former Georgia Congressman Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party’s candidate for president last year, has come out against the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Mr. Barr wrote the legislation for it back in 1996 and President Clinton signed it into law.

Mr. Barr has come to believe that, as he put it in a Los Angeles Times essay, that the law “protects only those states that don’t want to accept a same-sex marriage granted by another state.” In other words, it violates the spirit of the Constitution in protecting the prerogatives of states in such things as domestic law.

Mr. Barr argues that, on the basis of proper states’ rights, the law should be repealed, and President-elect Obama agrees. This year would be a good time to do it.