Marriage, Politically speaking anyway

I had the opportunity to read a summary (103 pages!) of the Supreme Court’s opinion that legalized gay marriage on June 26, 2015. I’m not going to lie, it was a long read that took me the better part of a week, during which I was often found asleep with my laptop almost falling off my lap.

You can find that summary here: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/14pdf/14-556_3204.pdf

Marriage was defended by the courts as being a social priority, and rightly so. I am a little bit of a political enthusiastic, certainly not because I believe there is much hope left in our two party system, or that current politicians and lawmakers uphold our Constitution, but because I believe in what our Founding Fathers strived to compile, with the help and recognition of God. They were willing to risk everything they had, and their lives, for this Constitution; putting 55 men in a room together with 39 of them signing the final document is quite an astounding feet. 

Unfortunately, the June 2015 ruling in the Supreme Courts may have changed what the Founders trusted to our care.

I apologize in advance for the many quotes this post will now contain, but in reality, the Justices say it more eloquently and passionately than I ever could.

In 1996 the Defense of Marriage Act proclaimed why marriage was a social issue, “At bottom, civil society has an interest in maintaining and protecting the institution of heterosexual marriage because it has a deep and abiding interest in encouraging responsible procreation and child-rearing. Simply put, government has an interest in marriage because it has an interest in children.”

In the case before the court in 2015, 4 of the 9 Justices filed dissenting remarks, filled with their admonishing and disapproval of the final verdict.

Justice Roberts concluded, “This universal definition of marriage as the union of a man and a woman is no historical coincidence. Marriage did not come about as a result of a political movement, discovery, disease, war, religious doctrine, or any other moving force of world history—and certainly not as a result of a prehistoric decision to exclude gays and lesbians. It arose in the nature of things to meet a vital need: ensuring that children are conceived by a mother and father committed to raising them in the stable conditions of a lifelong relationship (p 5).”

From a physiological point of view, a child that was raised by a gay couple states, “When two adults who cannot procreate want to raise children together, where do those babies come from? Each child is conceived by a mother and a father to whom that child has a natural right. When a child is placed in a same-sex-headed household, she will miss out on at least one critical parental relationship and a vital dual-gender influence. The nature of the adults’ union guarantees this. Whether by adoption, divorce, or third-party reproduction, the adults in this scenario satisfy their heart’s desires, while the child bears the most significant cost: missing out on one or more of her biological parents.”

In studying the case, I was really fascinated by the boundaries this court ruling crossed. “Until the courts put a stop to it, public debate over same-sex marriage displayed American democracy at its best. Individuals on both sides of the issue passionately, but respectfully, attempted to persuade their fellow citizens to accept their views. Americans considered the arguments and put the question to a vote. The electorates of 11 States, either directly or through their representatives, chose to expand the traditional definition of marriage. Many more decided not to (Scalia Dissenting. p 2).”

It is interesting to note here the political process which had already been debated, and decided on by the people. Our government is after all, “by the people and for the people,” is it not?
“Legislatures have repeatedly taken up the matter on behalf of the People, and 35 States have put the question to the People themselves. In 32 of those 35 States, the People have opted to retain the traditional definition of marriage. (Thomas Dissenting. p 14).” Essentially what I am hearing here is that the opinion on the losing side didn’t like losing. Which honestly is OK. The beauty of our system is that people have the right to disagree, and to rally other behind them, having open debates about their different opinions. But the losing side took it to the highest level possible, sidestepping the political processes in place, undermining everything the Founders had envisioned.

“Had the majority allowed the definition of marriage to be left to the political process—as the Constitution requires—the People could have considered the religious liberty implications of deviating from the traditional definition as part of their deliberative process. Instead, the majority’s decision short-circuits that process, with potentially ruinous consequences for religious liberty. (Thomas Dissenting. p 16).”

Perhaps if the Legislative branch would have had more time to compile legislation to correct laws that limited the definition of marriage (such as issues regarding Inheritance Tax, Social Security Benefits, and other tax benefits) and protect the rights of religious interests there would not be reason for concern over this court’s decision. Justice Roberts gives the bad news however, “Hard questions arise when people of faith exercise religion in ways that may be seen to conflict with the new right to same-sex marriage—when, for example, a religious college provides married student housing only to opposite-sex married couples, or a religious adoption agency declines to place children with same-sex married couples. Indeed, the Solicitor General candidly acknowledged that the tax exemptions of some religious institutions would be in question if they opposed same-sex marriage. There is little doubt that these and similar questions will soon be before this Court. Unfortunately, people of faith can take no comfort in the treatment they receive from the majority today (Thomas Dissenting. p 28).”
Religious entities may now be subject to coercion, being forced by the law to act in direct disagreement with their beliefs. The pendulum has been swung too far in the opposite direction.

Another thing that is totally worth the watch (11 minutes) is this clip on what redefining marriage would do for society:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TNmKo5KcMY, where Ryan Anderson gives his researched views from the background of studies at Princeton, at Notre Dame with a doctoral in political philosophy, and his time spent at The Heritage Foundations.

But going back to some closing statements from the 2015 court case, Justice Alito commented, “Here, the States defending their adherence to the traditional understanding of marriage have explained their position using the pragmatic vocabulary that characterizes most American political discourse. Their basic argument is that States formalize and promote marriage, unlike other fulfilling human relationships, in order to encourage potentially procreative conduct to take place within a lasting unit that has long been thought to provide the best atmosphere for raising children. They thus argue that there are reasonable secular grounds for restricting marriage to opposite-sex couples. If this traditional understanding of the purpose of marriage does not ring true to all ears today, that is probably because the tie between marriage and procreation has frayed. Today, for instance, more than 40% of all children in this country are born to unmarried women. This development undoubtedly is both a cause and a result of changes in our society’s understanding of marriage (Alito Dissenting. p 4-5).”

If American society has shifted to more than 40% of children born to unwed parents in the last 50 years since marriage was first redefined, how much more will it change now?