Let's say Lucy and Linda, a lesbian couple, live together in Los Angeles, CA. We don't know them, have never seen them, and for all practical purposes, they don't exist to us.
Now, if Proposition 8 had been upheld, meaning the state of California would license only heterosexual marriages, Lucy and Linda would continue living together in peace, remaining completely unknown to us. Nothing in society would change.
On the flip side, the overturning of Proposition 8 won't stop Bill and Suzy in San Diego (2 other people who for all practical purposes don't exist to us), from getting married at their church next weekend either. In fact, the bride is happy as can be!
Either way, the state licensure of marriage changes nothing. So as far as I'm concerned, both sides are delusional!
Everything sacred and holy about marriage is a matter of religion, not government. In secular terms, marriage is nothing more than a contract. A state issued marriage license is no different than a state issued cosmetology license. Does anyone consider a cosmetologist "sanctified?" I didn't think so.
Because the religious aspect of marriage is both separate and apart from (secular) government involvement, there is no reason for the state to be involved.
Likewise, advocates of gay marriage who believe a state issued marriage license will somehow "authorize" homosexuality and force society at large to accept it as "normal" and "legitimate," have rocks in their head. Right or wrong, it's not gonna happen.
In a free and civil society though, law must apply equally to everyone. For if it doesn't, we are not free. Therefore, the contractual aspects of a gay couple's relationship – medical visitation and decision, inheritance, property co-ownership, etc. - should be protected and enforced like anyone else. Gay marriage however, is unnecessary for this. So once again, there's no need for state involvement.
Protecting Traditional Marriage
Using history as our guide, including both marriage rulings in California, it's obvious bureaucratic dictate cannot (or will not) protect traditional marriage. Even if Proposition 8 remained law, it wouldn't be long before some busybody social engineer came along and turned it on its head - the risk of making the state sole arbiter of marriage - and vice versa.
Whether you like it or not, that's how "real world" government works. Therefore the only workable solution is to take marriage licensing away from the state.
Allowing the state to license marriage (as it does plumber) too, risks opening a Pandora's box of illegitimate welfare rights, while removing the last obstacle to making homosexuality a “protected minority class,” that “needs” affirmative action and anti-discrimination "rights." All of which runs contrary to a free and civil society. After all, they require law to be applied unequally.
In a free and civil society, gay couples are afforded the same contractual protections as anyone else. But you don't need a state marriage license to do so. State licensure of marriage literally offers nothing of substance. It can no more "legitimize" homosexuality, than it can "sanctify" traditional marriage. Believing otherwise, is a fallacy.
Are you really worried about marriage?
Then worry about high divorce rates, struggling single mothers, and the strain on families perpetuated by war. Worry about our culture which increasingly denies the importance of marriage, puts career over family, and considers relationships as nothing more than booty calls.
Morality comes from the heart, not law, meaning you - as in YOU the individual - must start taking action. Teach, learn, share, and offer compassion. If you wonder why, despite amazing growth in productivity over the years, career dominates family and both parents are required to work, learn everything you can about the Federal Reserve, then start advocating against that, instead of hanging your hopes on bureaucratic dictate.
There are indeed a lot of moral and legal problems facing America today, but gay marriage isn't one of them. Money being a major cause of divorce, should clue you in to what the most imminent threat facing traditional marriage is ... There will be no economic recovery, not for a very long time ... it's gonna tear good families apart.
P.S. - Feel free to rail away at me all you want. Comments are open.
Marriage is between a man and a woman and God. The state has no right to be in the marriage business. In fact, until the mid 1800's, there was no such thing as a marriage license. The state instituted marriage licenses to keep Whites from marrying Blacks or other races. Just another "benefit" of those doggone Jim Crow laws.
Mike
I wholeheartedly agree with you. When I was married the first time, the State of West Virginia required that we both take a blood test. I learned many years later that the test was for syphilis, which explains why the doctor gave me a funny look when I asked “well, Doc, did I pass?” The second time I got married, in Alabama, the minister, who was a family friend from another state, was fixated on whether we had obtained a license. Of course, it would have been illegal for him to pronounce us man and wife had we not obtained the license. As a lover of liberty I find it absurd that we, a free people, will tolerate the condition that no one can marry without permission from the state.
When you say 'traditional marriage', that would be according to whom?
In looking at marriage as being a matter of religion and not government, we mustn't forget that not all religions equally recognize marriage as sacred, such as Buddhism (coincidentally, my wife is a Buddhist) where it is considered a personal and individual concern. And instead of divorce, some religions or clan cultures recognized polygyny as a viable 'solution' to concrete issues such as infertility or providing means of support to widows in the absence of a welfare state, among other things. In our welfare state, it became convenient to just 'throw' an infertile woman away or even an over-fertile woman where the children become too much of a burden to support, so dump them on the state.
In fact, it was an act of Congress with the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act that struck the first blow at that level in furthering the persecutions of Mormons by attacking their practice of polygany, but did that law account for support of widows? Perhaps indirectly to some extent in that it also limited church holdings in territories to $50k which may have freed up monetary support for charity. But the fact remains, it was an act of Congress to subject the practitioners of one religion to the views and 'traditional' practices of others, which some may argue is in violation of the Constitution. The SCOTUS used a slippery slope argument in that if they allowed Mormons to practice polygyny, then would that prevent them from preventing other religions from practicing human sacrifice. Well, I would think that's aptly covered under murder laws, and are we to say because they have authority to legislate there that they can also legislate rules of marriage in the traditional sense of one religious group over that of another? Are they even on the same level?
I can't see taking licensing away from the state. Does it really matter who the individual states certify as 'legal' co-habitants in their licensing scheme? Arguably, that's all it really is (outside the sacrament of religion), a contract and a legal vehicle (in both secular and religious societies) to determine division of assets upon dissolvement of the union for whatever reason or establishing rights of inheritance should one pass without a will, among other things which are under the jurisdiction of the state vs that of the church. If anything, it helps keep lawyers from stealing a good portion of one's estate from the immediate family, and the more crap we can keep out of the courts and away from lawyers to me is a damn good thing.