If you believe that “powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people,” then you have to agree that states control their own legal definitions of marriage, and that such definitions are subject to the state political and judicial processes.
That political process in NY State was ugly at times, but it resulted in passage of a definition of marriage which, while contrary to the historical and religious definitions, likely is acceptable to the majority of people in NY State. The religious protections built into the law held much sway, including the fact that the law by its terms may not be severed (meaning that if the religious protections are stricken by a court the entire bill must be stricken).
The political process is not over, and I would expect those opposed to the law to exercise whatever state legal and state political powers they have. That is their right just as it is the right of those supporting the bill to seek to preserve it, and I reject the analogy to racism which permeated the argument and which was used as a political lever.
My hunch is that the new law will have much more long lasting acceptance because the political process was allowed to work, as opposed to states such as California where gay marriage was imposed by judicial fiat based on strained legal reasoning against the popular will.
I also would suggest that the rise of the Tea Party movement contributed to the process which resulted in passage of the bill, because the Tea Party movement introduced a degree of libertarianism into the conservative movement, such that social issues have taken a back seat to economic issues.
The real challenge will come when those who relied on states’ rights to pass gay marriage in New York State seek to override states’ rights elsewhere.
Here is my take in fewer than 140 characters:
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Comments
You are 100% correct. This is why we have federalism and not a national government. It’s not one size fits all, and it’s not “good for New York is good for the country.”
I have to admit, I really like reading your blog because when it comes down to it, you really are very principled and honest. You don’t find that much.
I know you don’t agree with this law, but you understand why it’s good law, why it’s important, and why it matters that it was done the way it was done. For that, I applaud you.
[…] That political process in NY State was ugly at times, but it resulted in passage of a definition of marriage which, while contrary to the historical and religious definitions, likely is acceptable to the majority of people in NY State. via legalinsurrection.com […]
I hope you are right about the Tea Party professor, because the “members” I have met are under the impression it is about Christian revival rather than sensible libertarianism. When I ignore the partisan rants in this blog, I find it interesting and informative.
This post reflects perfectly my own thoughts about this.
Excellent analysis, Professor! I agree completely.
Thanks, professor. It’s not an outcome I’d prefer but it’s a process I can live with, and you did well mentioning that. Interesting to see where this is going, btw. Because it obviously ain’t over.
Secular libertarians are just going to have to come to terms with the fact that they’re going to have to make common cause with those icky Christian conservatives if they ever want to advance the cause of limited government….there isn’t anyone else that will climb into bed with them. The Left sure as hell isn’t.
Just lie back, close your eyes, and think of England.
Professor, while I seldom disagree with you, I must disagree with the heading of your entry on the recently passed NY law. It is not “gay” marriage as gay marriage is a misnomer. It is same-sex marriage. There is currently no county in the U.S. that prohibits gays from marrying. There is no county in the U.S. that has the question “Are you gay” on the application for a marriage license where if you answer is “yes” you are not allowed to marry even under the same restrictions as all other segments of our society. To claim that gays are not allowed to marry is false. They are allowed to marry, and it is only with the addition of a caveat (the person of their choice) that it becomes a “gay” marriage thing.
Now there are those who will agrue against same-sex marriage based on their religious views, but I am not one of them. I argue against same-sex marriage as the debate is dishonest. It is not based on equality as argued (hence the racism comparison). If that argument was valid, it would have to be assumed that a gay person can be discriminated against because of their physical appearance. To my knowledge, there is no way to tell if a person is gay simply by looking at them, although I can tell if a person is black by simply looking at them.
At one point, the push by the gay lobby was to abolish sodomy laws based on privacy rights. “Keep the goverment out of our bedrooms”, was the cry. So sodomy laws were overturned providing gays with the privacy rights they demanded. But now, gays want traditional laws changed to suit their own political agenda, based not on equality, but what they do in the privacy of their own bedrooms, injecting government into their private lives. Either they want privacy, or the whole argument for same-sex marriage is a ruse.
Had gays argued that ALL restrictions on marriage should be eliminated, allowing ALL to marry anyone of their choice, it would have had some merit. But they didn’t, and their argument is identity driven. Identity politics do not provide equality.
So here is my question: if gays, by their very nature, are allowed to marry the “person of their choice” should that not apply to everyone? If a woman wants to marry her brother, and they are consenting adults and he is the person of her choice, why it that not allowable? What right does the state have to say she cannot marry HER choice of a partner?
Oh, but it’s about the offspring of a sibling relationship, one can say. But if it is about the children, what about people who are passed child bearing years? Are they not being discriminated against by not allowing them to marry their siblings?
And then we get back to “equality”; does it not serve equality to have children taught that homosexuality is the norm, not the exception? At what age do we teach that? Can we continue to support the philosophy that children who are raised in single parent households suffer due the lack of two, opposite sex parents while the children who are raised by by two, opposite sex parents generally turn out to be more productive citizens than their single parent counterparts? And what about affirmative action? If homosexuals are a recognized minority, will there be requirements placed on companies to have a quota on gays in their workforce? Will gays get preference over straights when applying for entrance into a university?
I am open to arguments of dissenting view points. I am not open to arguments based on falsehoods and stealth goals.
To follow up on your point, listen to this clip of a presentation by U. Chicago Prof. (and ex-wife of Cass Sunstein) Martha Nussbaum, a strong proponent of same-sex marriage, applying the arguments in favor of same-sex marriage to argue that polygamy and even certain levels of marriage now defined as incestuous, have no or a weak rational basis, http://www.cornell.edu/video/ccast.cfm?videoID=534&startSecs=4817&endSecs=5157
Professor, how does her argument differ from the goals of the Frankfort School which supported Marxism that were:
the creation of racial offences (including homosexuality)
the teaching of sex and homosexuality to children (via Gramsci styled indoctrination)
the discouragement of religious practices and church attendance
encouraging, and striving to acheive, the brakedown of the traditional family.
You see, I believe that same-sex marriage cloaks the 800 pound gorilla in the room. It is a ruse used for the creation of a more Socialist form of government, which history proves has never worked. But in order to fundamentally change a society, you have to first tear down what exists in order to rebuild.
Again, my object is less to SSM than it is to the dishonest goals of the movement.
I’m not gladdened by the out-come but, yes, I can live with the process. However, cynic about this as I am, I don’t think the religious exemptions will stand. I guarantee you that some SSM advocates are diligently researching their lawsuit options as we speak.
And the exemptions don’t protect individuals at all.
The first time a kosher caterer turns down a SSM ceremony, count on a lawsuit.
The NY Legislature has contributed to the continuing diminution and mocking of marriage. The existence of divorce amongst heterosexuals is not an argument for the marriage of homosexuals; neither is the disposition of benefits which can be handled legally without marriage; for, the imperfection of heterosexuals is not a rationale for homosexuals to marry.
The question is what is marriage, and whence its source. That the West has been willing to shed its Judaeo-Christian heritage in a quest for some atheistic nihilist future does not alter the nature and source of marriage. Even if heterosexuals are childless or marry for selfish reasons, marriage still remains rooted in our J-C heritage. It is a holy state, sacred, ordained by God for the continuation and proper rearing of the human species.
Like freedom, marriage is God’s gift to man, meant to unite one man and one woman. It’s genesis and intentions are heterosexual, monogamous, and procreative.
The marriage of a man and a woman mirrors the relationship between God and His people/Christ and His Church. Even if we are not faithful, God always is, and He always hears and forgives, though we deal with the consequences of infidelity. Divorce comes when we refuse to deal with infidelity of any kind, or adapt to change in the relationship or in ourselves. Divorce, then, is an indication of the hardness of our hearts, of our refusal to bend and forgive.
That marriage is God’s gift to clearly specified recipients means that, even though the state has intruded itself in the marriage rite, the gift cannot be conferred on anyone else but the intended recipients. Just as the state cannot make us free, it cannot make marriage be anything other than it is. For the state to assert a new set of intended recipients is an act of civil overreach in a realm in which the state lacks authority.
There is and can be no valid reason for the marriage of two men/two women/polygamy, no matter how many the homosexual lobby invent. The desire and quest for homosexual marriage is not only a-theistic, it is also idolatrous and against the divine order.
It matters not what reasons homosexuals offer; what matters is their deep rooted desire to spit in the face and history of Judaeo-Christian tradition and to mock His gifts to man for the companionship, pleasure, and continuation of the species. What matters is their God-hatred that is expressed in their quest to overset the created and social order.
In the end, we will be as they were in Judges, in which in those days there was utter lawlessness and “every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” Show me a society that has benefitted from homosexual marriage and I will show you a declining and disordered society.
As reported over at NRO it sounds like this bill was rammed through the NY legislature much like Obamacare was on the rest of us?
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Whether it is termed ‘gay’ marriage or ‘same-sex’ marriage the initial fallcy of the entire legal argument is that Heterosexuals were not and are not allowed to enter the contract of marriage with a member of the same-sex.
The argument that Homosexual’s wanted equal rights same as Heterosexual already existed-Homosexuals were never denied the right to enter the contract of marriage.
How is it possible that the American legal system-from professors to Lawyers to judges came to this point of making legal arguments for rights which already existed?
Are they applying Law and Justice based upon feelings?
IMO Law in America is lost-there is no Justice, too many in the Legal world dismantled truth and purpose however the greatest destruction is the elimination of meaning.
And if there is no meaning the world cannot function rationally.
I was thinking the same thing about the Tea Party. The left leaning media has completely misinterpreted the movement. The Tea Party has challenged the GOP to focus on fiscal sanity above all else. As far as the law goes, I am comfortable with it with the ammendment. One challenge of the future will be to get sex ed out of public schools completely or make school taxes optional for those who disagree with whichever viewpoint is being taught .
I consider myself a conservative, likely more of a libertarian. But I can not understand the controversy over marriage. I always thought that marriage was a sacriment of the church. If a church said you could marry then that was the end of the discussion. The only time the state became involved was to establish a contract between the two individuals to assure respective financial care and care of children. So why does anyone give a flip as to gays getting married? If your church does not condone it, then that is the end of your concern.
But this and other social issue are what make me feel that Republicans and not any better than Democrats/liberals/progressives/communist. The Republicans want to control your life just as much, if not more than the Democrats. In fact, from observing the voting pattern of those elected, the only thing seperating the two parties is gay marriage and abortion. The Republicans seem a little less reluctant to increase taxes, though they are big on eliminating deductions. Both parties have contributed to the economic destruction of our country, just Obama has acclerated the process.
So shouldn’t we quit being concerned over minor social issues and start working to preserve our country, wealth, economy and the light bulb?
particularly the light bulb
Yes please the light bulb and large family sized vehicles.
The Republicans want to control your life just as much, if not more than the Democrats
Really? Let’s see – who advocates for laws: Enforce speech codes on college campuses, outlaws lightbulbs, outlaws wood burning fireplaces, demands that businesses cannot discipline or fire cross-dressing men, penalizes colleges until the dollars spent on women’s sports is exactly the same as men’s sports (and it is the same people who demand, with no sense of irony, that marriage be “gender-neutral”), that sue to keep religious words out of graduations, sports events or on signs honoring 9/11 victims …
Don’t get me wrong, I have to vote Republican, but then we have inconvient little errosions on liberty like the Patriot act, I think they came up with SWAT some years ago, or at least advocated for the SWAT style entrance, then their are the drug laws and the war on drugs (this really ticks me off as I am a physician and will get into trouble for treating adequately treating patients with pain–something most folks don’t know). Then we have Republicans trying to push creationism down our throats. I could go on, but it is my perception that their is little difference in the two parties. As you can tell, I like the Pauls.
Professor, much as I admire your work, you’re dead wrong on this item.
Neither New York State, nor anyone else, can license or “make normal” what is neither moral nor natural. They cannot make the rain fall up; they cannot make abortion moral.
And you are far more credulous than you should be as a Law Prof when you postulate that “churches will retain their rights….” because that will last about as long as it takes the first case to get to SCOTUS.
By the way, will florists and venues get to preserve their “rights” by declining to serve such unions?
“will florists and venues get to preserve their “rights” by declining to serve such unions?:
NO, this was already decided several years ago when a photographer in ABQ NM was sued for discrimination in rejecting a request by a same-sex couple to take their ‘wedding’ photographs. She was fined as a result.
Those in the American Legal system have their titles, their credentials, their degrees, their networks and their money however the Legal system is void of funtion and purpose.
The greatest violators of Law and Justice are the very Judges, Lawyers and Law Professors who have forsaken Truth and Reason for the sake of satisfying Emotion and Feelings.
There is no Law, Justice is dead America.
Professor, Texas just passed a law ruling that the incandescent bulb law will not apply to those bulbs made in Texas and sold in Texas.
With a market of 25 million people, can Jeffrey Immelt be calling Rick Perry soon to make arrangements for a bulb factory (LOL)?
[…] My Take On NY Gay Marriage Bill If you believe that “powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people,” then you have to agree that states control their own legal definitions of marriage, and that such definitions are subject to the state political and judicial processes. […]
“The Republicans want to control your life just as much, if not more than the Democrats.”
Funniest thing I’ve read all month. Being forced into government controlled healthcare? Meh. Confiscatory taxation and regulation? Double meh. Speech codes and affirmative action? Yawn. Firearm prohibitions? Zzzzz. Preserving marriage as its been understood for all of recorded history? Quit trying to control our lives!
If being a libertarian means jettisoning all historic understanding of the world’s oldest human institution and the universal cornerstone of every civilization’s development, they y’all can keep it.
AS I commented above, the Republicans are just as guilty of freedom errosion. The difference is that Obama as really stuck it to everyone and thus increased the tempo. AS an example, I don’t think tsa, patriot act, homeland insecurity are in our best interest. I don’t think swat teams help. I don’t like the drug control (not because I want to use street drugs, but with a chronic back condition, I would like to get pain meds without a court order). These are all Rep inventions.I could go on with the list, but you get the idea.
The takeaway from the Professor seems to be that whatever a state legislature decides to enact is alright by him because of 10th amendment. That and Gays can thank the Tea Party for diverting conservative attention from those annoying “social issues” — like whether 34 mopes who comprise a majority of the NY State Senate at one moment in time should be able to radically alter a social institution that preceded the existence of the State of New York, the British colony of New York or for that matter the English monarchy and every form of civilized government that came before William I.
Somehow I doubt that the Professor would be quite so cavalier about the state legislature doing something really awful…like, say, raising income tax rates by one percent.
The issue here is not whether the state or its legislature or its judicuary or for that matter its citizens via referendum have the power to decide something but whether their decision is one that promotes and sustains the general good.
If the only thing at stake truly were “gay marriage” — that is, the ability of two men to publicly pledge their troth to each other while some representative of the state sprinkled them with the civil version of holy water — it would be no big deal.
What makes it a big deal is that it represents a giant step toward the total deligitimization of marriage as a social institution, the universally recognized building block of our civilization known as a family. There have already been many other, smaller but cumulatively important steps in my lifetime in the same direction, of course. Casual sex, serial divorce, 40 percent of all babies born to “single mothers” (a demographic category that is now virtually lionized), and of course that essential underpinning of all the rest, “choice.”
Marriage has been weakened — but it is resilent and survives. Now, however, we are faced with accepting that it is not a basic social construct but just one of a menu of options that everyone — two men, two women, soon enough other groupings — can choose in expressing their current, if transitory, emotional “commitment.”
One would think that if the word, conservative, means anything at all, it must mean a deep aversion to so radical a change in the order of society as the debasement of marriage. To be sure, people can call themselves what they will — just as they can choose gay “marriage” now if it makes them feel good — but it most certainly does not make it so.
I ALWAYS find it interesting to watch supposed representatives of the People commit political suicide by voting against their constituents on an issue which DOES drive people to the voting booth. The four Republican State Senators, being James S. Alesi, Mark Grisanti, Roy J. McDonald, and Stephen M. Saland, have done this, and they WILL pay the price for it in the next election cycle.
Maybe I missed something in the last 8 months or so, but the last time I checked, NO Republican has won ANY state-wide office in New York without the Conservative Party Endorsement since 1973. Not a single one. So these four “Republicans” can kiss their seats goodbye in the next election as the Conservative Party backlash hits. The Conservatives would rather have a Democrat in the seat than a RINO who will stab them in the back.
You just KNOW that the SSM folks who pushed this through are examining the law and planning their first lawsuit to try to strip the “protections” that were granted from the bill. They will try, they WILL find a sympathetic judge, and then it WILL end up in front of the NY Court of Appeals where they will twist the law like a pretzel in order to say that the facially discriminatory aspects of the religious exemption are unnecessary and dismissed from the legislation, along with the non-severablility clause as something like “beyond the legislator’s purview.”
You have that right
Excellent post professor. I am a staunch const. conservative, but pretty centerist when it comes to social issues. I support civil unions, if NY and MA wants to have gay marriage, as a state, and goes thruough their state legislature, then I’m fine with it.
And in states like MT and SD, WV, gay marriage will never be passed, and as a staunch supporter of the 10th amend., I expect the federal govt to respect the state’s rights and not have it shoved down their throats.
If a constitutional amend. is to be passed at the federal level, then fine, but then it requires states to ratify it, which means the states have to approve it.
What I don’t want is the fed shoving it down american’s throats. This is how abortion should have been handled, and I’m pro-choice, but don’t support federal monies going to it. It should have been done as an amend., with respect for state’s rights.
Ah, but that’s the professor’s final point. The very vehicle for passing this legislation (states rights) will be over-ruled, steam-rolled, and trashed should states use the same process to legislate against gay marriage (or to simply not pass such a law). The gay crusade won’t accept states rights . . . unless they go in their favor.
“The gay crusade won’t accept states rights . . . unless they go in their favor.”
Maybe in the past, the thing is now though, there has been a bit of an awakening in this country. Honestly, I never used to pay attention to the Consitution, 10th amendent or anything.
And I imagine if an average like me is paying attendtion, so are millions others.
and gay crusade can whine all they want when SD, ND, WV bans gay marriage, they can’t force any state to accept gay marriage unless it goes through at a federal level, and how are they going to enforce??? I’d like to see how the heck they force states like UT to force them to accept gay marraige. Not going to happen.
(Just like Obamacare, they can’t force people to buy anything, and IRS is supposed to arrest people who dont? the local authorities are usually the one who do this, when a state says hell no, and will protect its citizens from the federal govt, the authority comes from the state itself)
This actually is a step back for the whole gay marriage issue, because now you’ll have states ban gay marriage, they will legislate it, opposite of what NY did.
My 2¢ for the day on “gay marriage,” worth every devalued penny.
Some time back, I heard Eddie Huff on KFAQ, Tulsa, talking about a Black friend of his who said, even if the Republicans were a bunch of racists, he’d vote for them because they’re better on defending America. Something like that. I’m often the same way with my Christian Republican spiritual and political kin. I stand nearly indistinguishably with them when contrasted with the Obamanation, but not so close comparing with each other.
It’s not easy to think it all through because of how one set of bad laws compounds another. Implementing true liberty gets complicated by socialist systems which even good right-wing folk support. What really makes it a problem to happily issue a work visa to anyone coming over the border is not the liberty to travel but laws like minimum wage and welfare. Prayer in public school is a bogus issue because the church-state conflict does not exist without public school in the first place. (Am I getting too Milton Friedman for you yet?)
So the problem here is the state permission or disallowance of the personal contracts which entail the legal issues of “marriage.” The state cannot actually define “marriage” for me or my beliefs! It can enforce legal sanctions against homosexuals entering into civil unions, and worse force folks, landlords, say, to take in a gay couple even over the building owner’s moral or religious objections. (Better watch out. I’m about to sound like Rand Paul.)
I’ll spare this site my longer arguments and, with uncharacteristic chutzpah, just link to where I, with uncharacteristic temerity, challenged Ann Coulter’s June 15 column on gay marriage (and, minorly, drug legalization).
Back upthread, david7134 asked, (much as Coulter complained), “shouldn’t we quit being concerned over minor social issues and start working to preserve our country, wealth, economy and the light bulb?” (Liked the “light” ending on that one, Dave!) As if any issue of human right was minor! While I think david7134 needs to think it through a bit better (the left and right are much further apart than he thinks — see my first paragraph), he seems on the right track in recognizing the liberty of individuals to contract in a free society.
Why shouldn’t gays get to experience the joys of divorce court?
1. Way I see it. The Bill passed….thanks to two Republicans who were the deciding votes. This helps NYC gay republicans in their voter outreach effort to gay (indie and some democrat) voters.
2. I don’t know who ‘Cass Sunstein’ is…until today when Jacobson mentioned it in passing in a reply to a comment. And what I’ve just learned about this particularly Obama-appointee is more alarming than all of BO’s other mischief-makers.
Most gays I know (high income earners, the entrepreneurs and businness owners) will switch sides once they realized the Party that purports to be their champion on this single ‘right’ is also working to destroy their individual and property rights through Marxists like Cass Sunstein.
Social-cons (and gays) need to calibrate and focus their political anger at the real danger at hand. The common destruction of our constitutional and economic freedom.
Look, this is just another way for the alphabet networks and lefty news reporters to attempt to equate conservatives as space aliens or worse.
We saw bible-clutching Ruben Diaz quoting hateful bisops, democrats all, spewing nothing but bile. The senator was clearly not fulfilling his oath to represent the liberal bronx distruct that sent him to albany.
The 4 Republicans acted like representatives, voting the wishes of their constituents. Good job!
What did we learn. On both sides religion can lead a liberal and a republican off message. There are plenty of republicans and conservatives who know the multitute of benefits to society when kids are raised by 2 parents of any sex. The poverty stricken (though generally supported by us) single mother household is so needy (of another parent) that this family is always broke, sends their kids to the most expensive lousy school there is. Conservatives and republicans can be BOTH fiscal conservatives and Ok with gay marriage, which helps children and keeps family units intact.
Married couples get to keep the other spouses social security, inherit their pension without gift tax, get to deduct the whole $500,000 on the house they sell, etc.
hetero marriages fail at a 50% rate and often in the poor community the man leaves, doesn’t rase the kid but gets all the perks of marriage separation- his own place, his own money, etc. The republicans who supported this used their conscience and let the will of the voters trump religious fears.It was a good day in NY, politics for once worked as designed.
I suppose what bothers me about this is the assumption that a rejection of gay marriage must be a religious precept, and could not have any basis in any other view of the world.
Are the non-religious permitted to disapprove of homosexuality? Do I have the right to view it as destructive behavior if I am not a church-goer? Or has my right to my own opinion been removed?
The state may have any authority not expressly delegated to the federal government, but neither has the authority to take away inalienable rights.
Thank you, Professor Jacobson. Posts like this are why I read your blog.
Chicklet, you point out that hetero marriages fail at 50%. How many gay marriages will fail? I warrent that number will be higher due to the very nature of gays. If monogamy was the norm among the gay community, the spread of HIV/AIDs would not have been as rampant as it was.
Single parent households are not desirable, but same sex households are also not desirable since it takes two parents, of the opposite sex, to help develope a child into a fully rounded adult.
But the bottom line is NOT just same-sex marriage. The bottom line is the goal of the movers and shakers in the gay community. People like Kevin Jennings, who wants to teach gay sexual acts to elementary school children. You see, when you convince people that dying your hair purple is normal, you will have more people dying their hair purple and you won’t be alone. Purple hair will become accepted. And what better group to teach that purple hair is normal than to impressionable young children? Gramsci knew this. Why don’t you?
So let’s just tear down all social norms. Attack those of faith, demean the traditional sense of marriage, encourage out of wedlock childbirth. And with any luck at all, within one generation you will have a Marxist society that is doomed to fail.
Saw nothing in chicklet’s comments that “…Attack those of faith, demean the traditional sense of marriage, encourage out of wedlock childbirth.”
As a former evangelical, I can certainly ‘appreciate’ the revulsion that social-conservatives have towards gay marriage. But what I find amusing are the few who rely on their peculiar expertise on the “…nature of gays…” and the “…transient nature of gay relationships…” to support their position.
I just love the cynicism of your tweet. Bahaha
Given the transient nature of “gay” relationships the divorce lawyers will now have a renewed income stream. Lot’s of new victims to be made. I’m one of those who believe that much of the rise of homosexuality is driven by the hateful behavior of selfish spouses, whether that be male or female which ends up in divorce. The victims of divorce are the children who having seen the hatefulness of the spouse and the PC nonsense of the courts vilifying one gender in support of the hateful spouse have set in their minds the unjustness of marriage relationships.
Now we have come full circle, the stereotypes of gender now broken down by same sex marriage will now vilify whom? In 20 or 30 years from now, this little social experiment will end in flames by the 90+% divorce rate among same sex marriages. In the process it will break the courts once and for all of their own hateful discriminatory gender practices. In the end the results will strengthen traditional marriage between males and females because all will see the failure of PC social engineering. One of the great strengths of humanity is learning from mistakes, especially that of others. Take the long view.
“Awing1” wrote: I hope you are right about the Tea Party professor, because the “members” I have met are under the impression it is about Christian revival rather than sensible libertarianism.
I don’t believe you. Not for one moment. You’ve probably never met anyone involved in the Tea Party movement, and are just making this up out of your hate-filled imagination.
I’m making it up out of my hate-filled imagination? First of all, I grew up in a small town called Ontario in Upstate New York where 7 of our 9 elected officials are Republican (Page 9 http://www.co.wayne.ny.us/departments/elections/documents/2011ElectedOfficials.pdf ). In fact, I still volunteer at the ambulance corps there (I’m Alex Wingate http://ontarioves.com/members.php ). The majority of the people in our town claim to be members of the TEA Party. While it’s somewhat an amorphous movement, the majority of the people I have met from my town that support and claim to be members of the TEA Party truly believe it is about Christian revival. Why would I make that up? And how is saying that at all hate-filled? I’m not saying that Christian revival is what the TEA Party is truly about, hence I hope the professor is right, just that in my experience people who claim to be members of the TEA Party that I’ve met do believe that. Even if I said that is what the TEA Party is all about, I don’t see how that’s hate filled.
And I don’t believe you. Everyone knows what the TEA party movement is about; out-of-control government spending, the resultant precipitous rise in the public debt, and the fear that this will eventually have to lead to higher taxes. The name says it all: Taxed Enough Already. There have been well over a thousand TEA party rallies over the past two years; when has any of them ever been about social issues? When has any of them ever raised the concerns of some particular religion? How could any honest person form the impression that the first genuine broad grassroots movement in recent political history is really about some sort of religious takeover?
I’m aware of what the TEA Party officially supports, my comment was what members that I have met seem to think its about. Stories like this http://www.nypost.com/p/blogs/brooklyn/brooklyn_tea_party_rallies_against_PufOppdJalmYsPigd6z2AK and this http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/08/us/08mosque.html don’t strike me as being about proponents of limited government. I suggest you go out and as a larger variety of those who support the TEA Party what it is they believe the movement is about before you try to publicly disparage me again. Regardless of what you believe, these people do exist and I have met them, in fact I grew up with them and worked with them fairly regularly.
I support the TEA Party’s stated objectives, I merely fear a fair number of the members don’t actually know what those objectives really are, or understand their full implications. Also, you still haven’t explained to me how my original comment suggested I had a “hate-filled imagination”, was that just an attempt to use an ad-hominem attack to make your accusation sound like it had more credibility then it really does?
So, if my State does not honor a marriage… what would be the status of a couple who came here?
And, what would prevent them from another marriage in my State? And if they then proceeded back to New York…all four of them…
The same as if your state chooses not to recognise a marriage between first cousins, or whatever. As far as your state is concerned, they’re not married, and are free to marry other people. If they return to New York, that’s NY’s problem; presumably NY will not recognise the second marriage. Or perhaps it will accept polygamy, at least post facto, and recognise both marriages. Either way, it’s none of your state’s business, or of yours.
I haven’t yet managed to wrap my brain around the notion that expanding the role of government in interpersonal relationships is necessarily a libertarian proposition. Can someone help me?
“Or perhaps it will accept polygamy, at least post facto, and recognise both marriages. Either way, it’s none of your state’s business, or of yours.”
I read some time ago that NY is allowing benefits for additional wives of migrants by including them as dependents.