Ed Palmer
01-29-06, 09:01 AM
If same-sex ‘marriage’ is legalized, why not polygamy?
Baptist Press News ^ | March 19, 2004 | Michael Foust
Posted on 01/29/2006 12:55:07 AM PST by Deepkimche
NASHVILLE, Tenn. Late last year, months after the landmark Lawrence v. Texas decision striking down anti-sodomy laws, two Utah polygamists filed suit in state court, asking that their relationships with multiple wives be validated by the government.
Laws against polygamy, they said, are unconstitutional.
“Everyone should be free unless there’s a compelling state interest that you shouldn’t be,” John Bucher, one of the lawyers, told The Salt Lake Tribune. “The state is not able to show that there’s such an evil to polygamy that it should be prohibited.”
As the nation continues to debate same-sex “marriage,” some have begun examining the logical extension of its legalization. If the legal benefits of marriage are awarded to homosexual men, then why aren’t they also given to, say, three polygamists?
“There isn’t a single argument in favor of same-sex marriage that isn’t also an argument in favor of polygamy –- people have a right to marry who they love, these relationships already exist ... we have no right to deny the children of their protections,” columnist Maggie Gallagher, an outspoken supporter of a federal marriage amendment, told Baptist Press.
Jennifer Marshall, director of domestic policy studies at The Heritage Foundation, said she sees no “logical stopping point” if same-sex “marriage” is legalized.
“This is the dissolution of the parameters around marriage,” she said. “You’d be hard-pressed to say, ‘Why not any other kind of arrangement?’”
Conservatives and traditionalists say the debate over same-sex “marriage” is the result of marriage being separated from its religious roots and from procreation. If marriage is not tied to childbearing, traditionalists warn it literally could mean anything.
(Excerpt) Read more at bpnews.net (bpnews.net)...
Baptist Press News ^ | March 19, 2004 | Michael Foust
Posted on 01/29/2006 12:55:07 AM PST by Deepkimche
NASHVILLE, Tenn. Late last year, months after the landmark Lawrence v. Texas decision striking down anti-sodomy laws, two Utah polygamists filed suit in state court, asking that their relationships with multiple wives be validated by the government.
Laws against polygamy, they said, are unconstitutional.
“Everyone should be free unless there’s a compelling state interest that you shouldn’t be,” John Bucher, one of the lawyers, told The Salt Lake Tribune. “The state is not able to show that there’s such an evil to polygamy that it should be prohibited.”
As the nation continues to debate same-sex “marriage,” some have begun examining the logical extension of its legalization. If the legal benefits of marriage are awarded to homosexual men, then why aren’t they also given to, say, three polygamists?
“There isn’t a single argument in favor of same-sex marriage that isn’t also an argument in favor of polygamy –- people have a right to marry who they love, these relationships already exist ... we have no right to deny the children of their protections,” columnist Maggie Gallagher, an outspoken supporter of a federal marriage amendment, told Baptist Press.
Jennifer Marshall, director of domestic policy studies at The Heritage Foundation, said she sees no “logical stopping point” if same-sex “marriage” is legalized.
“This is the dissolution of the parameters around marriage,” she said. “You’d be hard-pressed to say, ‘Why not any other kind of arrangement?’”
Conservatives and traditionalists say the debate over same-sex “marriage” is the result of marriage being separated from its religious roots and from procreation. If marriage is not tied to childbearing, traditionalists warn it literally could mean anything.
(Excerpt) Read more at bpnews.net (bpnews.net)...