Marriage: A
relationship unlike any other
Townhall.com
– Kellie Fiedorek – 2/13/2013
Marriage is
the unique relationship between a man and a woman—a relationship recognized
throughout human history and by diverse cultures and faiths. Marriage
distinguishes itself from any other because it unites the distinct and uniquely
wonderful differences of men and women to bring forth and nurture society’s
next generation.
While many
relationships exist, the union of a man and a woman is unlike any other as no
other relationship joins its participants as one united whole to create a new
person. No other relationship is similarly situated in this special way.
To define
the marital relationship as just like any other would be to deny its specific
purpose: creating, nurturing, and raising children with their mom and dad.
Because of
this purpose, society seeks to safeguard marriage. Simply put, the government
has an interest in marriage because it has an interest in children. Indeed, in
the words of the famous philosopher Bertrand Russell, a self-described atheist:
“But for children, there would be no need of any institution concerned with
sex.” “[I]t is through children alone that sexual relations become of
importance to society, and worthy to be taken cognizance of by a legal
institution.”
Recognizing
the good of marriage in no way implies an animus toward other types of
relationships. On the contrary, the government’s interest in protecting and
enhancing marriage simply recognizes the natural reality that children result
from sexual relationships between men and women and that children benefit from
knowing both their mother and father in a stable home.
And while
not every couple has a biological child, every child has a mother and a father.
It is this powerful fact that defines what marriage is all about.
When a man
and a woman commit to marry, even if their relationship does not produce
children, their presumed sexual exclusivity limits the odds that either of them
will bring a child into this world that is raised without his mother or father.
Admittedly,
we live in an imperfect society, and we have all witnessed or experienced the
devastating and painful impact that divorce, infidelity, and out-of-wedlock
births have wreaked on our marriages and families. But if marriage is weak, we
should support, enhance, and strengthen it, not change it. Redefining marriage
to include relationships incongruous to its very purpose will not rescue and
fortify its purpose.
Usher in a
redefinition of marriage, usher out Religious Liberty
Townhall –
Jim Campbell – 2/13/2013
Disagreements
and projections abound in the dialogue about marriage and its redefinition to
include same-sex couples. But both sides agree on one issue: redefining
marriage significantly jeopardizes religious freedom—the first liberty upon
which our nation was founded.
if the
government declares that same-sex unions and opposite-sex unions equally
constitute marriages, the law punishes and stigmatizes as “discriminatory” and
“irrational” those who publicly espouse a view or conduct themselves in a
manner that adheres to the traditional understanding of marriage.
History
illustrates the persecution of, and an absence of tolerance for, those who
engage in what the law has proclaimed to be irrational discrimination. The
freedom of the religious faithful—particularly their freedom to participate in
the public square—will thus be sacrificed in a society whose laws embrace a
redefined view of marriage.
There are
numerous real-world examples where defining homosexual relationships as
equivalent to heterosexual relationships resulted in the loss of freedom of
religious liberty and First Amendment Rights.
Laws
redefining marriage have forced religious organizations to shutter their foster
and adoptive ministries because they are unable to place children with same-sex
couples. Among other examples, this senseless religious intolerance occurred
immediately following the redefinition of marriage in the District of Columbia, even though many other
foster and adoption agencies were willing and able to place children with
same-sex couples.
After a
court redefined marriage in Massachusetts,
public schools began teaching young elementary-school students that same-sex
marriage is worthy of celebration. Parents who objected for religious reasons
asked to excuse their children from these lessons. Yet a court denied parents
even this modest religious protection, stating that because “Massachusetts has recognized gay marriage
under its state constitution, it is entirely rational for its schools to
educate their students regarding that recognition.”
these
examples, which are but a few of the many that could be cited, illustrate the
bleak prospects for conscience rights and religious tolerance in a culture that
embraces genderless marriage.
Sound
logic, scholarly consensus, and recent experience all demonstrate that
redefining marriage presents a significant threat to religious liberty. We as a
society thus face a crossroads and must decide whether to change marriage to
satisfy the demands of a few despite sacrificing the religious freedom of many.
We should collectively choose to affirm marriage, decline to deviate our
course, and continue along the road where religious liberty—a bedrock of our
civilization—may flourish.
The
Goodness of Marriage
Townhall.com
– Ken Connelly – 2/13/2013
The Supreme
Court itself has repeatedly noted that marriage and the family are necessary
foundations of a free and properly functioning democratic republic. This is why
the state, although it did not create marriage, has consistently supported and
encouraged its flourishing.
In
contrast, until very recently, no government in human history has ever
officially recognized same-sex relationships as marriages, precisely because
they do not further society’s important interest in the natural procreation of
the next generation of citizens.
Same-sex
marriage does not provide the same benefits or solve the problems that marriage
does. In fact, at a time when our marriage culture is already in severe
distress, a redefinition of marriage offers only uncertainty and consequences
that will not be fully known for some time.
The reason
for this uncertainty is not difficult to divine. State-created substitutes for
marriage propose to replace an institution defined by sacrificial nurturing
with an unproven construct of self-fulfillment which will exist only to serve the
emotional needs of adults at the cost of society at large.
Those
seeking to redefine marriage trumpet self-serving notions of equality and
justice for a small coterie of adults but ignore that marriage has always been
uniquely suited to the generation and care of new life. This is not hyperbole,
but apparently the very point of the endeavor.
The erosion
of marriage and the breakdown of the family in America have unleashed social
problems that are all too real and must be remedied. But the remedy will not
come by accepting same-sex marriage as valid, necessary, or constitutionally
required.
Marriage
does not need redefinition, but rededication to its core meaning, the union of
one man and one woman, and to its core purpose, uniting children to their own
mother and father. In a few short months, the U.S. Supreme Court will have a
chance to preserve the institution we call marriage, the anchor of the family
and society. Let us pray it judges wisely.
Democratic Debate
on Marriage Better than judicial commands
Townhall.com
– Caleb Dalton – 2/8/2013
Marriage is
the only institution that is essential to the future of humanity. Both men and
women are necessary to propagate the human race—providing the economic base
with which to further society. This is why marriage is society’s time-tested
way to bless as many children as possible with both a mom and a dad in a stable
environment. When children are deprived of mothers or fathers, not only do
children suffer, society suffers as well.
Affirming
marriage in our laws is not only reasonable, it is the right of the people. As
we have from the beginning of our country, Americans can determine what unique
relationships most benefit our society and celebrate the one we have cherished
the most—marriage. By asking our courts to mandate a marriage policy for us
all, marriage opponents are attempting to substitute their views, or the views
of judges, for those of millions of Americans.
Americans
have been engaged in that most American of activities—voting. While the public
square is by no means a perfect solution for all of our societal issues, it is
working within the realm of marriage. Americans are vigorously engaged in
debating and understanding the meaning of marriage, and the legislative actions
in almost every state confirm this.
While the
obvious role of our courts is to address legitimate constitutional issues,
whether marriage should be redefined to include relationships that cannot offer
the same societal benefits as relationships between a man and a woman is not
one of them. No other relationship joins together the two opposite halves of
humanity into an enduring, procreative union for the benefit of all of society.
And, while not every couple has a child, every child has a mother and a father.
The
opposite of the Civil Rights Movement
Townhall.com
– Byron Babione – 2/7/2013
Adam Cohen
observed in a 2005 New York
Times piece: “Intentionally misleading comparisons are becoming the
dominant mode of public discourse. The ability to tell true analogies from
false ones has never been more important.” But judging from the current
political rhetoric used by advocates seeking to redefine marriage for the
culture, misleading comparisons predominate the discourse.
President
Obama’s second
inaugural address: The president
said, “We the people declare today that the most evident of truths that all of
us are created equal—is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our
forebears through Seneca Falls and Selma and Stonewall…. Our journey is not
complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under
the law, for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to
one another must be equal, as well.”
Two false
analogies into his recipe in an attempt to flavor same-sex marriage as a civil
rights matter.
First, he
compared African Americans who struggled for racial equality with the current
activists running the political campaign to redefine marriage. That comparison
reveals a photo-shopped picture of history to an America the president was elected
to lead, not mislead.
Civil
rights marchers were met with batons, fire hoses, tear gas, and nooses;
so-called pride parades are met with Fortune 500 corporate sponsorship. African
Americans were systematically dehumanized and isolated; homosexual activists,
in contrast, are lionized by every powerful cultural institution and center of
wealth in America.
The civil rights battle was a move up from under, won with blood; the campaign
to redefine marriage is a product of the elites in entertainment, government,
and the Ivory Tower.
In his
second false analogy, . . . it fails
because it ignores that the two relationships drastically differ concerning the
most important civil purpose of marriage: promoting the creation and raising of
children by their natural mother and father—a social good without equal.
The mature
truth that men and women procreate and same-sex couples don’t is not a
mean-spirited criticism; it’s a fact rooted in biology that doesn’t violate any
principle of equality known to human reasoning or American law. EQUALITY MEANS
THAT YOU MUST TREAT THINGS THAT ARE THE SAME THE SAME. BUT WHEN YOU TREAT TWO
THINGS THAT ARE DIFFERENT DIFFERENTLY, YOU BEHAVE RATIONALLY. NO PRINCIPLE OF
EQUALITY IS OFFENDED.
Ah, but the
false analogy is so useful to those who wield it. For the purpose of redefining
marriage by judicial fiat, it is indispensible. Without the false analogy,
attackers of marriage protection laws
Government
has recognized marriage for the entire history of Western Civilization for two
reasons:
The first
is to acknowledge the blessing of children and increase each future child’s
likelihood that he or she will be brought up in a home legally bound to his or
her mother and father.
The second
is to reduce the threat of epidemic-level, taxpayer-crushing, out-of-wedlock
births. Same-sex relationships have no bearing on these well-known reasons for
preserving marriage, humanity’s only reliable life-giving and
society-sustaining union.
The shade
of someone’s skin is irrelevant to marriage, but the sex of the partners is
essential to the definition and the societal function of marriage.
At the
Supreme Court, we should hope that the proper analogy prevails—that men and
women are as indispensable to marriage as logic is to sound public policy
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