When viewed in the context of the laws of the United States, going back before the Revolution, going back to the colonies, going even all the way back to the Puritans - marriage was ALWAYS a civil contract. Documents are very, very clear on that. Yes, religious figures could marry people - but you were not officially married unless a) you had filed with the government or b) the government determined that you had lived together in a marital relationship for a defined period of time. This was an absolute, since the government felt they should be able to dissolve marriages where need be, and the church felt the same. Where marriages have been prohibited (the miscegenation laws carried a hundred years after the founding of the colonies, polygamy outlawed as a condition of Utah slavery, disallowing slave marriages, and gays not being allowed to marry), it's been the state - not religious groups - having the authority to do so, and it's been the state using various reasons - economic necessity, property lines, voting imbalances - having non-religious reasons to do so. Marriage, in the whole character of the United States and the American Colonies, is a civil contract which no religion can tear asunder.
To suggest that religion has any business telling people who they can and cannot marry over and above governmental mandates and rulings (like, oh, the Supreme Court)... is, simply put, anti-American and runs against the values of every single group that had anything to do with founding this country. If you're going to outlaw gay marriage, find a better reason than "God told me it was bad." But when you consider the higher tax dollars brought in, filing fees, decreased burden on the health insurance system, and pooled resources, there is no economic reason to disallow gay marriage - and plenty of economic reasons to alow it. Inheritance laws are virtually unaffected. They can't cast any more votes per household than a straight marriage. And they aren't property. Those are the big reasons why marriages of any kind have been disallowed in the government - and gay marriage fits none of these.
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Date: 2004-02-15 08:49 am (UTC)To suggest that religion has any business telling people who they can and cannot marry over and above governmental mandates and rulings (like, oh, the Supreme Court)... is, simply put, anti-American and runs against the values of every single group that had anything to do with founding this country. If you're going to outlaw gay marriage, find a better reason than "God told me it was bad." But when you consider the higher tax dollars brought in, filing fees, decreased burden on the health insurance system, and pooled resources, there is no economic reason to disallow gay marriage - and plenty of economic reasons to alow it. Inheritance laws are virtually unaffected. They can't cast any more votes per household than a straight marriage. And they aren't property. Those are the big reasons why marriages of any kind have been disallowed in the government - and gay marriage fits none of these.