The Uniformed Services Former Spouses' Protection Act, passed in 1982 to supersede the Supreme Court's ruling in McCarty v. McCarty, became the subject of litigation in 2004 when a group of divorced, retired veterans filed suit in Virginia to challenge its constitutionality. The Act specifically granted courts the authority to treat military retired pay as the property of both service member and spouse upon divorce. The Adkins v. Rumsfeld veterans argued that the USFSPA discriminates against women in the Armed Forces and in favor of men because former husbands are more likely than former wives to have sources of income other than the divided military retirement pay. The presence of women in the military in numbers much more substantial than when the Congress passed the Act in 1982 - women who often have non-service member husbands with private jobs and private pensions - essentially reverses the polarity of the gender assumptions that Congress employed in legislating the statute. On appeal, the Fourth Circuit rejected this claim. This Essay examines the Adkins equal-protection claim through the lens of the gender assumptions behind the legislative history of the USFSPA. Part I critiques the legislative history's notions of gender, family, and work in the military, finding substantial evidence that Congress construed the target of its actions to be military families with a service-member husband and a homemaker wife. Part II applies equal-protection jurisprudence and concludes that the court was right to dismiss the claim, but should have further engaged the issue of gender discrimination. Part III then lays out the framework for deciding, constitutional claims aside, whether the USFSPA accomplishes its policy goals, both explicit and implicit. Ultimately, the question of whether the USFSPA is sound policy depends on one's values regarding family, work, and women's autonomy.