Simpson Family Values

Former Sen. Alan Simpson pens an op-ed in The Washington Post today that finds calls to amend the Constitution in order to "define marriage" fairly nuts. In addition to usurping a state issue for the federal level, such an amendment sends the wrong message while doing little to actually help marriage, Simpson says.

"The real threats to family values are divorce, out-of-wedlock births and infidelity," he writes.

Comments

[Brian Bos]

What's more, it is surely not the tradition in this country to try to amend the Constitution in ways that constrict liberty. All of our amendments have been designed to expand the sphere of freedom, with one notorious exception: prohibition. We all know how that absurd federal power grab turned out

Federal income tax?

[Thomas]

He doesn't even bother to tell us what "liberty" is eliminated by the proposed amendment. Is there a "liberty" to have the state recognize one's relationship?

[Phil]

I guess Simpson only has a problem with Federal usurpation of the marriage question when it reaches the Constitutional level, since he had no problem voting for the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996. And he did so after he had already announced that that term would be his last, so he wouldn't even have had to face the voters if he had voted against it. What two-faced baloney.

[Phil]

Thomas, perhaps you've heard of a Constitutional precept called "equal protection"? A "marriage amendment" would specifically define some marriages as more equal than others, yes? In fact, it would say that some marriages don't even exist. That doesn't sound like "equal protection" to me.

[thoreau]

The liberty at stake is the right of consenting adults to enter into any voluntary agreements they want to enter into. When two people get married, there's a moral, emotional, religious, and social aspect (by far the most important aspect) but there's also the legal aspect: the married couple shares property, basic legal and financial responsibilities, power of attorney, etc.

Any two consenting adults (or 5 in Utah 😉 should have the right to enter into that sort of legal arrangement. But the state only permits heterosexuals to enter into such legal arrangements.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think the state should try to redefine the moral, spiritual, emotional, and social aspects of marriage. If your religion doesn't endorse gay marriage, fine. If you personally don't endorse it, fine. If you own a store and you don't want to setup gift registries for gay marriages, fine.

But if a gay couple wants to share property, responsibility, etc., well, it's their property and their lives, to do with as they please (basic libertarianism 101) and the state should have no right to stand in the way.