Summary
In 2000, 61% of California voters established that “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.” With an ill-advised 4-3 vote, the California Supreme Court struck this down, and invented a new constitutional civil right on a collision course with other well-established constitutional rights. In doing so, they gave gays no new rights except the power to force us to use the label “marriage” to describe their partnerships. Proposition 8 restores what we voted for in 2000 and avoids the serious unintended consequences of this flawed ruling.
Thus Prop. 8 doesn’t limit anyone’s rights. Gay partnerships already had “the same rights, protections and benefits” as married couples (California Family Code 297.5), and that won’t change whether or not Prop. 8 passes.
Failing to pass this amendment would cause a Pandora’s box of problems including serious threats to religious liberties and parental rights. In addition, it would limit the ability of the state to put the needs of children first and to treat gays fairly as well. Please read on…
Gay Marriage and Unintended Consequences
You may think gay “marriage” is a matter of civil rights. You'd be right. And you'd be very wrong.
We've learned how wrong we were to treat people differently according to race. We learned how wrong it was to deny women the right to vote. So it follows that we've been wrong to deny gays the right to marry, right? In the name of fairness, equality, civil rights, and the American way, all we need is a court that can find this right for gay marriage someplace between the lines in the constitution. Then we can feel good, knowing we're treating everyone equally again. What else matters?
Then someday we'll notice we totally redefined a word. Not just any word, but the word that defines the bedrock institution of our society. Will it make any difference? Do you really think you can redefine the basis of society and have it not make any difference? And do you have any idea what difference it will make 20 or 30 years down the line? Consider that until this decade, marriage has been between the sexes in every known society that ever existed for all of history. Not a single religion or moral philosophical system since antiquity, East or West, ever defined marriage as between members of the same sex. Just maybe we should think twice—I'd settle for once—before totally throwing out the wisdom and experience of all history in the name of equal rights. Are we sure there won't be any unintended consequences?
If we redefine the basis of our society, the debate is over, and there's no room for discussion, even if the consequences are very poor and very unintended. Shouldn't we find out what will happen before we replace the very foundation of our society?
So what could possibly go wrong? Consider please six concerns:
First, redefining marriage may force us to treat gay unions inequitably. Very possibly, the legal union of a same sex couple should in some regards be granted more rights than marriages of a man and woman.
For example, to avoid genetic problems, society has generally deemed it inadvisable to allow too-close relatives to marry each other. Since same-sex couples cannot procreate, that restriction would have no purpose in the case of a gay couple. If we are fixated on equality of rights between gay and traditional couples, we will either have to prohibit gay cousin unions, or be forced to allow different-sex cousins to marry. Either result would be an inequitable, unfortunate, unintended consequence of valuing equality above all else and failing to see that there are differences between the two types of couples.
Second, legalized same-sex marriage will create an unprecedented level of legal confusion and invite a tidal wave of lawsuits regarding public accommodation law, employment law, and government funding. This was the consensus of a conference of First Amendment scholars both for and against gay marriage. "Because marriage affects just about every area of the law, gay marriage is going to create a point of conflict at every point around the perimeter," says one scholar.1
Many of these conflicts will entail forcing people to not just tolerate the gay lifestyle but to accept it as equal even when it's morally unacceptable to them. A photographer was sued by two lesbians for refusing to photograph their gay wedding. Doctors were ordered against their religious beliefs to help a lesbian couple conceive a fatherless child, or lose their medical licenses.
Third, what about the children? Decades of social science and government data show that overall children have the best outcomes when raised by a mother and father in a low-conflict marriage.2-6 That's not to say that same-sex couples should never be allowed to adopt, and it will always be true that some same-sex couples will be much better adoptive parents than some different-sex couples. But in order to make sure we do the best we can for the children, we need to recognize that there are differences between the two. This needs to be carefully weighed along with every other factor to determine which couples are best suited to adopt each individual child. Forget all that if somehow we think our constitution says we can't be sensible, we have to be equal and the same—even when it's not the same, and we are disadvantaging children to do so.
Well, now there's a quandary. We desperately want to treat everyone equally. But what about the children who would be treated unequally? Are we really willing to force the adoption system to be blind to whether the adopting couple is same-sex or different-sex, even if we know that it is not in the best interests of the child? And we're doing that why? So that gays can call their associations “marriage,” no matter what price society has to pay? Or actually, no matter what price the children have to pay?
So you were right. It is about civil rights. But not the newly-invented “civil right” to use the label "marriage” for any type of adult association. It's about civil rights of the children—their right to be treated in their best interests. And their civil rights mandate that we maintain the option to legally distinguish between same-sex and different-sex couples in the interests of the children. We must never lose sight of the fact that marriage is about the welfare of children, not just about the interests of adults.
Furthermore, by taking from birth parents the fundamental right to have a say in what type of adoptive family their child will grow up in, we cripple parental rights and turn people away from the benefits of the adoption system. Moreover, we take away the right of private adoptive agencies to place children in families consistent with their moral standards, possibly causing them to discontinue their service to people in need as happened in Massachusetts. The result in many instances may be to drive people from adoption to other options that may not be in the best interests of the children.
Fourth, what would this redefinition of society's bedrock do to religious rights? There are religions which hold that gay "marriages" are unacceptable. They will always refuse to recognize them and refuse to perform them. But when four judges in California said the constitution mandates that they be viewed as identical to traditional marriage, they didn't interpret the constitution. They gave us a constitutional crisis.
The problem is that this would constitute a direct conflict with freedom of religion in America. Why would we allow any organization to have the governmental authority to perform marriages if they insist on using that authority to "discriminate”? But marriage is a central ordinance in many religions, and often the marriage has to be performed by their ministers. There is serious and justifiable concern that the government will end up restricting religious freedoms and denying religions the right to function, to hold property, or even to exist. The leaders of the religion may even be thrown in jail. Just for your beliefs, having broken no law, you may lose the right to vote.
Doubt that will happen? It already has—in America. Marriage laws have been used to disincorporate a church, sieze church property, and imprison its leaders. Laws were passed and upheld by the U. S. Supreme Court which denied all adherents to that church the right to vote or hold office, merely for their beliefs.7 And no one claimed their practices impacted anyone else's rights; but this time, it will be worse because it will be viewed as a matter of constitutionally-protected "civil rights." Heaven help any religion which “discriminates” in any way against the “civil right” of gay marriage.
Moreover, with the precedent now established that these "civil rights" trump religious freedom, don't think your religion isn't at risk also. Anyone who advocates marriage between a man and a woman may be morally regarded the same as a racist. Experience already teaches us that churches which won’t condone gay marriage will likely lose their tax exempt status. Preaching biblical principles, already under fire, may become a hate crime. We may be saying goodbye to true religious freedom in America, with religious persecution as our new public policy. Even if you have no religious faith, this should trouble you greatly.
Fifth, once we redefine marriage, other limits become arbitrary. Who's to say that gender is an unfair criterion for restricting marriage, but number is not? If you buy the argument that we are denying two gays their civil rights if we don't call their union “marriage,” then watch out. What possible logical or legal basis would we have for denying three gays the right to marry each other? They love each other and are committed to each other. Why must we arbitrarily exclude one of the three from the union? That person’s rights would be restricted unfairly and inequitably. If three, then why not more?
If our redefined notion of marriage no longer includes any logical reason why the number has to be two, and that gender doesn't matter, then what about polygamy? Traditional marriage was based in part on the immutable concept that it takes one man and one woman (=2) to make a baby. But we've already made that irrelevant in our concept of marriage. Of course, would-be polygamist couples will come forward and sue for the right to polygamist marriages. And the limit won't be three. Maybe multiple women and multiple men. Polyamorosity of all stripes and numbers could then become officially equal to traditional marriage in the eyes of the law.
Sounds absurd? Gay rights groups have already advocated for this. We may find that our new definition of marriage is no real definition at all, and the term will become nearly meaningless—as will the foundation of our society.
Sixth, the teaching of our children may be compromised in the name of equality. Societies have always held that they have an interest in the integrity of marriage as the source of future generations, and children generally tend to do best when they can be raised by their biological parents. But if we make traditional and same-sex "marriages” equal in the eyes of the law, we as a society may give up any basis for presenting traditional marriage as the traditional, usual, typical, or even the default form of family. In our schools, we will be forced to give equal time, emphasis, and value to gay unions as to traditional unions, to polygamous unions as to monogamous unions. Descriptions of how sex acts are performed by gays will become standard fare in our schools, right along with the birds and the bees. Already in Massachusetts gay marriage is being taught to second graders, and parents are denied the right to opt out.
And private schools will not be exempt. You might just want to home school your children when you see what gets taught in our schools.
But then what's to prevent the long arm of government from extending into the living room of the home where children are home schooled, to impose the same agenda? How could the government allow a child to escape public education in order to be taught "discrimination" and “hate speech” at home? Governmental controls on home schooling are already under way, and discrimination against gays may be another compelling reason why the government must further intervene.
Sounds a bit too Orwellian? You may not think all this will happen, but you have no assurance that it will not. No one has ever before redefined the basis of society like this and reported on the outcome 20 years later. Every one of these six concerns is very likely to become a problem at least to some degree and many problems have already arisen. The burden of proof that these things won't happen falls on those who wish to change the basis of society.
OK, so we'd like to treat gays equitably, but we don't intend any of these unintended consequences. Is there a better way to go about it? Absolutely.
Start by realizing that the ultimate supreme goal of society isn't equality. More important is social justice. We don't wish to treat two different entities equally if that means we treat them (and others) unjustly. Equality can be inequitable.
Realize that the issue of gay marriage isn't about equality and rights. In California, they already have all the rights. They want to be able to force everyone else to pretend gay marriage is the same as traditional marriage, while teaching the children all the differences in how it's done. They want to indoctrinate the children in homosexual practices. They want to force people to not just tolerate their lifestyle but to accept it as equal even if it's morally unacceptable to them. That's not being tolerant of other people's moral choices, is it? And now that it's their civil right to insist that we pretend there are no differences between the two, they'll use the state to crush any church or individual who refuses to compromise their moral values. In the name of equality and tolerance, they want to cram this inequality and intolerance down our throats—whether we like it or not. Don't ever underestimate the determination of those who fanatically lobby for such upheaval of society. They won't stop until it is achieved. It is a matter of civil rights, but whose civil rights and religious freedoms are being undermined?
Since gay unions already have all the rights, why in the world did the California Supreme Court, by a vote of 4 to 3, reinvent the Constitution, throw out the overwhelming will of the people, eliminate with a stroke of the pen all the legal differences between gay and traditional marriage, and set us on a collision course over constitutional rights? That isn't judges protecting minorities. That's judicial tyranny.
And their refusal to stay the order until the people of California vote on it in November was even more arrogant. As one of the three dissenting justices on the court said, the majority of the court is guilty of “seriously overstepping the judicial power,” resulting in a “cataclysmic transformation” of the institution of marriage “by judicial fiat.”
In California, now that four judges have rewritten the Constitution, conservatives and liberals alike must work together now to establish constitutional protection for marriage. Most states have already done so; it is time for California to join. Vote “yes” on Proposition 8.
References:
1—Anthony Picarello, president, Becket Fund for Religious Liberty
2—David Blankenhorn, Fatherless America: Confronting Our Most Urgent Social Problem (New York: Basic Books, 1995).
3--Barbara Schneider, Allison Atteberry, and Ann Owens, Family Matters: Family Structure and Child Outcomes (Birmingham AL: Alabama Policy Institute: June 2005).
4—David Popenoe, Life Without Father (New York: Martin Kessler Books, 1996).
5—Maggie Gallagher and Joshua K. Baker, “Do Moms and Dads Matter? Evidence from the Social Sciences on Family Structure and the Best Interests of the Child,” Margins Law Journal 4:161 (2004).
6—David Popenoe and Barbara Defoe Whitehead, The State of Our Unions 2007: The Social Health of Marriage in America (Piscataway, NJ (Rutgers University): The National Marriage Project, July 2007 ) pp. 21-25.
7—(See <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmunds_Tucker_Act>); The Restored Church, William E. Berrett, pp. 316-320.
