Ken Mehlman, former chairman of the GOP, is trying to sway independent-minded Republicans in New Hampshire to support gay marriage:
I will be in New Hampshire this week — to urge legislative members of my party to reject House Bill 437. It’s time to stand up for individual freedom and liberty, to live by the Golden Rule and to oppose any effort to diminish or strip away individual rights, and to return to the real business of building business, keeping taxes down and growing our economy. “Live Free or Die” should be more than just a slogan. -- The Union-Leader
NOM co-founder Maggie Gallagher has just published a research brief on this very topic: "Why Libertarians Should Oppose Same-Sex Marriage".
Ruth Institute President Jennifer Roback Morse has also published on the subject: "The Libertarian Case for Man Woman Marriage".
40 Comments
Maggie is so classy; if libertarians "let" gay people get married, then they'll have to "let" Muslims enter into polygamous marriages! Way to pull out a boogey man!
Also, nowhere does she address the main libertarian criticism that restricting participation in marriage to only certain types of couples is an example of expanding government.
Well, Jim, is it such a boogey man? You just said that "restricting participation in marriage to only certain types of couples is an example of expanding government." Well, aren't 'triads' a 'type'? Why don't they count? Does letting them marry personally affect you? By your standard, doesn't government expand when it restricts marriage at all?
By the way, Ken Mehlman has done a great job building business in NY. That's why taxes there are so low, right?
Those with same-sex attraction or those who self-identify with the gay political movement are already permitted to get married. Sexual identity politics has no place in the public institution of marriage.
Way to ignore over two hundred years of U.S. history, tradition, and SCOTUS precedence Jim.
I guess if you are capable of dismissing scientific fact out of hand while replacing it with non-scientific theory you are capable of just about any absurdity.
What a concise, but thorough, article from Maggie
People who favor small government naturally want the government to involve itself only in things that are of *public* concern. Opposite-sex relationships are of public concern, and warrant the institution of marriage. An expansion of government is for the state to involve itself in relationships that don’t concern the public, and to replace the public rationales for civil marriage with private rationales, such as “love.”
Relationships that don't unite the sexes to each other therefore don't serve a public purpose.For a government to grant such relationships benefits is an inappropriate use of government authority.
SS"M"-ers should fear Libertarian thought. Libertarians are essentially anarchists who want to reduce government to its most basic elements.
Anarchy, Libertarian style, would lead to an every man for himself approach to citizenship. Hate laws? The government should have no business in regulating what people think about others. Bullying? Let people work things out for themselves. If you want to know what a libertarian government would look like, check out an old movie western.
Libertarianism would essentially turn back the hands of time in this country. Religion would rise again as government bows out of regulating morality. Homosexuals would be back in the closet (government would no longer protect them) and traditional marriage would find its way back as the best way to survive in a society that dispensed with government safety nets for alternate and/or irresponsible lifestyles.
In a truly libertarian world, there would be no government benefits such a social security for married. So what about those thousand plus government benefits that the LGBT lobby likes to talk about? They would be gone. In a truly libertarian world, you wouldn’t be able to sue a photographer or a baker or a B&B owner for their actions or inactions with regard to your union. So whom would the LGBT lobby sue? In a truly libertarian world, marriage would be a purely private contract. Of course, LGBT folk can have private contracts now.
In reality, redefining marriage while leaving government powers and benefits in place (isn’t that where the LGBT lobby really wants us to go?) would vastly increase state power as the natural family would be henceforth be defined as a creature of the state. As Christopher Dawson put it: “If marriage is transformed into a temporary arrangement for the satisfaction of sexual impulse…the family loses its social and economic importance and the state will take its place as the guardian and educator of the children.” As Douglas Farrow points out, “same-sex marriage makes bastards of us all, and as a nation of bastards we are all wards of the sate.” Hence, SSM “marks an important milestone on the path to state tyranny.” We have already seen in the inner cities that the decline in the status of marriage and the family has led to social and economic decline, leaving a social deficit that the state will try to fill by increasingly expensive government programs.
In contrast, recognizing the special status of the natural family as the fundamental unit of autonomous and self-sustaining government and the special status of the churches as counterweights to unbridled state power, constrains the state. The LGBT movement seeks to undermine the status of the natural, pro-creative (and hence generationally self-sustaining) family, to restrict the influence and rights of people of faith, and to undermine democracy (don’t let the people vote) at every turn, undermining fundamental bulwarks against tyranny.
DoE, your frequent retort that gays already can get married (straight you mean) is boring and insulting. Give it up.
In 2003, the Massachusetts Senate had certified a question to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court asking if a proposed civil unions bill that EXPLICITLY provides that “eligible same-sex couples the opportunity to obtain the benefits, protections, rights and responsibilities afforded to opposite sex couples by the marriage laws of the commonwealth, without entering into a marriage” and that “spouses in a civil union shall have all the same benefits, protections, rights and responsibilities under law as are granted to spouses in a marriage”.Opinions of the Justices to the Senate, 440 Mass. 1201, 802 N.E.2d 565 (Mass. Sup. Jud. Ct. 2004)
Several gay rights groups submitted amici briefs arguing that the civil unions bill would violate the Massachusetts ERA, on the basis that civil unions are “separate and unequal” and a form of “segregation”, GLAD Brief, Opinions, at 12, because they denied the “social recognition” that comes with marriage, Id. at 24,they would “mark [same-sex couples] as inferior to their heterosexual counterparts and diminish their status in the community”regardless of whether they provided “the same benefits, protections,rights and responsibilities under law as are granted to spouses in a marriage”, Civil Rights Brief in Opinions at 12 , and that civil unions “would not constitute equality, because their relationships still would not be recognized by the rest of society as being as valued as heterosexual relationships.” id. at 13
And inLi v. State of Oregon, 338 Or 376, 388, 110 P3d 91 (Or. Sup. Ct. 2005) plaintiffs had argued that civil unions would be “inherently stigmatizing and "inherently separate and unequal” Reply Brief of Plaintiff-Respondents/Cross-Appellants, Li, at 10.
And in Jackson v. Abercrombie , the plaintiffs are suing because of the "special status" of marriage, not just
the "bundle of rights" which the civil union law would allow them. See Complaint in Jackson v. Abercrombie, CV11-009734-ACK-KSC, at 13, quoting Kerrigan v. Commissioner of Public Health, 289 Conn. 315 at 289, 957 A.2d 407 at 416 (Conn. Sup. Ct. 2008)
The underlying fallacies of these arguments are the assumptions that the social recognition and social value, and social status of marriage is independent of the male-female dynamic, and that heterosexual relationships are valued BECAUSE they are called marriages. If this be so, it is not because of anything in the proposed civil unions acts, but the solely due to the construction sodomist fundamentalists choose to put upon it.
In other words, the purpose of same-sex “marriage” is to make sodomist fundamentalists feel better about themselves.
That opinion piece was nothing but sophistry.
This part was particularly deceptive:
"New Hampshire’s civil marriage law protects religious freedom. No religious institution has to perform or recognize same-sex marriages. This is important because different religious traditions have different views on this question."
Wow. Isn't that nice. This current law has carved out some exemptions for 1st amendment rights. So don’t worry, no one in the future will ever try to whittle them down further. I wonder if Mr. Melman would ask gun owners to be complacent about 2nd amendment rights and claim that it’s consistent with Republican ideals.
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/the-libertarian-case-against-gay-marriage/
This is worth reading.
@Michael Ejercito
So to put it more bluntly, it's vindicate their personhood or lifestyle.
@Zack, thanks for the link.
@Michael, great information. Your post gets to the heart of the matter, which is societal approval of homosexual relationships...not rights and benefits.
So by Ejercito's interpertation of equal access, black people wanted to use the same water fountain to feel good.
Let there be no mistake, Ejercito's comments are bigoted, the sodomist term confirms it.
Mike J.
Try demanding "equal access" to the sexually segregated restrooms and see how many courts and how many women agree with you. You could start by staging a sit-in in the nearest women's restroom and claim that this is just like the black civil rights movement and that those who disagree with you are bigoted. You could then try that in a women's restroom in a black neighborhood for good measure.
I do wonder sometimes if the opposition has repeated their flawed comparisons for so long that they're actually starting to believe themselves.
Black citizens wanted to participate equally in the long-established tradition of man-woman marriage. They weren't trying to radically redefine it, as are the SS"M" advocates.
Publius, I see you we're never part of the debate team or anything that exercises critical thinking. The gains made worldwide and in the US for equak access to marriage is astounding. What's sad are the religionists who just can't get it, they need the world to bend to their beliefs. So sad. But hey, I'm sure your health plan has a mental health component. Why not seek the help you need.
@Mike
"So by Ejercito's interpertation of equal access, black people wanted to use the same water fountain to feel good. "
Mike you are equating race to orientation. This argument holds no water because homosexuals aren't being denied that.
Black people were given separate EVERYTHING. Schools, fountains, seats on the bus. For gods sake, if a black person was riding in a car with a person who was white, they had to be in the back seat.
Blacks had to BY LAW refer to white people as "sir" or "ma'am" where as white people could call blacks as they wished.
They drank from the same fountain because aside from the color of their skin, they were Americans and human beings. Not cattle.
Correction:
It wasn't to feel good. It was to feel like a human.
Moderator: The link to 'Jennifer Roback Morse has also published on the subject:' does not lead to an article by Dr. Morse. It leads to the same article by Maggie Gallagher, which is very much to the point and excellent. I think, nevertheless, that anti-intellectuals won't be able to catch the crux of the legal opinion, and even if they did, they would still try to argue ad hominem, ad infinitum.
Mike J.
Personal attacks are not arguments.
There is no distinctly "black" or "white" way to sit in a bus seat or drink from a fountain,activities that have nothing to do with being black or white.Marriage however is about uniting males to females,and claiming that anything that does not do that can still be or deserve to be treated as a marriage is "boring and insulting".
Blacks had the right to sit on a bus, they just couldn't sit on the FRONT of the bus because that was the overwhelmingly popular opinion of the south. Then they had to go and use that pesky legal system to redefine "bus sitting" for everyone.
Well, I think that people practicing sexual activities with people of the same sex have the right to live their lives, but not the right to redefine my life.
I don't want my marriage confused with a same-sex relationship.
My marriage has different dynamics, has different outcomes, and deserve the right to be recognized by the law with a different statute than the statute given to a relationship between people of the same sex.
Giving marriage a different legal treatment than same sex relationships is perfectly rational, and should cause non discomfort to people living in a same sex relationships.
@Arthur
You can go into a restroom. You just can't go into a women's restroom because that is the popular opinion in the U.S. You need to use the pesky legal system to get "equal access." Please tell the court that this is just like the civil rights movement.
Mike seems to think that sexually segregated restrooms aren't like racially segregated ones. Fine. Most courts both in the U.S. and around the world have rejected the notion that the redefinition of marriage is just like the civil rights movement.
I totally reject the insulting, slanderous and grotesque comparisons of traditional marriage to segregation, as do most blacks and as did the SCOTUS in Baker v. Nelson.
@AM
Personal attacks are a mainstay for NOMers, not seeing the criticism of the attacks by your fellow posters here or the name calling in Ejercito's post.
Mike J.
Your comment to me
"Publius, I see you we're never part of the debate team or anything that exercises critical thinking. The gains made worldwide and in the US for equak access to marriage is astounding. What's sad are the religionists who just can't get it, they need the world to bend to their beliefs. So sad. But hey, I'm sure your health plan has a mental health component. Why not seek the help you need."
is clearly a personal attack and name calling. I decline to take personal offense, but find it strange that you turn around decry personal attacks when you are making them yourself and use terms like "religionist" and then decry name calling.
Nothing in the original post contained personal attacks or name calling. I have tried to keep my comments civil. I would be happy if the moderator deleted all personal attacks and name calling.
I am not responsible for (nor do I necessarily approve of) Michael Ejercito's comment and the same is true for NOM. I would support moderating all comments.
AM is right, of course. Personal attacks are not arguments, they are just personal attacks.
Mike J.
The personal attack I was referring to is your comment at 3:58pm to Publius.
A direct and personal insult aimed at another commenter. Brian, Maggie and other posters on NOM's blog allow some pretty awful invective directed at *them* to go through moderation. Please remember that the rest of us, as commenters, do not control the moderation.
And
I don't like the name calling, either. Terms like sodomite (or religionist) are just rude even if the rest of what the person has to contribute is spot on.
Keep up the great posts Publius and Zack and do not let the personal attacks bother you. Your posts are so brillant they resort to personal attacks because they cannot refute your message.
Michael E. that point you made summed it up nicely. You must be a lawyer because your insight into the courts are better than all of us here.
All NOM supporters understand this. Our brillant posts are meant to sway the open minded and independent people who log onto here. We need not be concerned with what the sodomites feel.
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Why is everyone so pro gay marriage and all you KKKristians so damn hateful?
Thank you Zack, I read the article.
Pubes, Zack and racist John, why aren't you on this NOM post where NOM was caught lying?
http://www.nomblog.com/18768/
Birds of a feathers, NOM and their liars.
Ah, I see.
In places where civil unions are in effect, persons in marriages and persons in civil unions may use the same water fountains, they may sit at the same lunch counters, they may sit at neighboring seats in public buses, they may sit in the same railcars in trains...well, a same-sex couple in a civil union can share some of the same public restrooms, while married couples can not.
Yup, that is segregation.
I know more about the law than Rosemary Barkett and H. Lee Sarokin, that is for sure.
Maggie Gallagher is wrong.
Her repeated assertion that marriage has remained unchanged and does not need redefining is wrong.
What i have not seen discussed is that marriage has ALREADY been RADICALLY REDEFINED in the past 40 years -- to make women equal to men.
Previously in many "traditional marriages" a woman was a man's property. She was forced to give him a male heir and he could have sex with her until she died trying. Later, women were granted agency, this was called rape, and women and men -- in a radical REDEFINITION of marriage -- are now considered equal partners in the marriage.
Gallagher owes her whole livelihood to having redefined traditional marriage in favor of women: If Maggie Gallagher were truly an adherent of traditional marriage, she would not be running a national organization, she'd be making dinner for her husband.
Tax paying Gay citizens at least deserve to have equal access as Ms. Gallagher, to the REAL modern definition of this civil institution that grants 1,000 rights and benefits. Period.
Mehlman is a joke. Not too long ago he was against gay "marriage".
I'd be surprised if you stay around here for long, Mike J.
"Pubes"? Keep it classy. And I bet if you're banned you'll whine about how the NOM moderation blocked you, merely for trying to expose we NOMers to the truth. In actuality, all you did was insult like a child.
Not that I expect much better from SSMers who are incapable of debate. I'm just sayin...
Strepsi,the details of relations within a marriage,the ability to divorce,etc. are inconsequential compared to the cornerstone of the entire concept of marriage,the union of male to female.Only that is the core definition rather than a detail.
@ Mike J.
--Ash
I agree with Ash on this one. Stop calling Publius "Pubelius." You've done it before and it's not in any way acceptable for civil discourse. While I'm not one to decide what's okay and what isn't, I know I wouldn't like it if people turned my name into a sex joke (which they easily could).