Following Edwards's garbling of the Defense of Marriage Act, Al Sharpton took the first opportunity to push back:

Well, let me say something about the Defense of Marriage Act. I am unilaterally opposed to any civil or human right being left to states' rights. That is a dangerous precedent.

How can candidates think they will succeed with fuzzed-up federalism, when the first thing many people think of when told that a matter ought to be left to the states is segregation and resistance to civil rights?