Some “common ground” on gay rights

June 10, 2005

Guest Post by Ed Stephan.

Hillary Clinton recently stuck her neck out to propose looking for some “common ground” on the issue of abortion, actually going a step beyond her husband’s stated goal of making abortion “safe, legal and rare”.

The GOP, which these days could serve as a prime example for Eric Hoffer’s brilliant True Believer, will have none of it. As Bush says on just about anything which comes up, “You’re either with us, or you’re with our enemies”. Bush doesn’t do subtlety very well. He doesn’t do it at all. I’ll leave the reasons why to those who can claim the ability to look into his soul.

I want to suggest some “common ground” on an issue which the GOP employed in the last election to run the Democrats into the ground. Gay Marriage. They show every sign of continuing to make that the principal wedge issue in future elections. They succeded in 11 states, last November, in banning same-sex marriage, and most remaining states have one form of ban or another under consideration. Bush has, of course, endorsed a federal ban through constitutional amendment. Much of the civilized world (e.g., Canada, Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Massachusetts) seems to be moving in the opposite direction.

I question why government is involved in marriage in the first place.

Demographers make heavy use of governmental statistics regarding such “vital events” as marriage, birth and death. The government’s role in birth and death is fairly simple: it issues a certificate of each. Birth certificates and death certificates provide the elementary data which demographers use in analyzing population structure and change.

Governments also issue marriage certificates. These, along with those for births and deaths, enable society to recognize rights and responsibilities as these change during the course of the family life cycle. They are society’s most elementary way of declaring who is responsible for whom.

People who belong to various religious communities may add on fruther declarations. In addition to the government-issued birth certificate, religious groups may perform a rite of Baptism, either for the newborn or those whom they recognize as “re-born”. In addition to the government-issued death certificate, religious groups may perform a Funeral rite to commemorate the passing of one of their own.

Governments, ours anyway, do not perform religious Baptisms or Funerals. The mayor may have a staff member send a greeting card to the newborn. There may be a State funeral for a beloved leader or for those killed in combat. But these are strictly civil activities, with no legal bearing on anything.

Marriage is different, for reasons which are not clear to me. Since government can make legally binding marriages, laws have to be passed to regulate the practice. I’m not aware of any such laws governing baptisms and funerals (except perhaps in the interest of public health).

Since government marries people, the question of who qualifies for marriage can (has recently) become a political issue, one which the GOP is now only too willing to exploit. And there’s no “middle ground” on the subject: as Bush so often chants, “Either you’re with us, or you’re ….”

But there is a possible “common ground”, I think. Government could restrict itself, as it does with births and deaths, to simply issuing a certificate … in this case a certificate of civil union. Not just for gays. This would government’s sole recognition for straights as well. Society’s need to define who is responsible for whom would be satisfied.

If, beyond that, religious communities want (or don’t want) to acknowledge such unions (man and woman, man and man, black and white, catholic and non-catholic, etc.), that’s up to them. Marriage, like Baptism and Funerals, would be out of government’s hands altogether.

Seems simple enough to me. A church opposing such an arrangement would clearly be acting in violation of – if not its own sense of ethical treatment of others – at least the First Amendment of the Constitution. It’s already the practice in France (eek!). Why not here? Why not de-fang this Republican vicious dog at least?

Interesting.

  • NOTE: My apologies. I must’ve hit some button incorrectly. This item now appears in two places, here and as the last item from yesterday (where there are also two comments attached, as of now – I don’t know how to move them to here). Maybe the real Carpetbagger can fix things when he returns.

  • Several writers over at Reason magazine’s Hit & Run blog have written on this same topic over the last year, and wondered whether one or the other of the major parties could be convinced to take what is, ultimately, the libertarian position on the topic. Since the Republicans can’t give up a major religious wedge issue — even though “get the government out of the marriage business” should be an easy call for so-called “small government conservatives” — if the Democrats go that way, they can win some libertarian friends and votes.

  • Advocates of gay marriage bans or restricting “marriage” to a union between a man and woman tend to say that the government has a role to play in enabling society to continue. They’ll say that the government has a role to play in allowing our species to continue to exist. They’ll say that the government has a role to play in maintaining the “foundation of our society.” And that by failing to specify rigid gender requirements for marriage, government would be undermining that foundation, indeed threatening the survival of not only the society, but the species.

    What is the answer to this argument? Personally, I think it’s absurd and silly. Anyone have anything more substantive than “absurd and silly”?

  • Ed,

    I’m very much with you on this, and other things that you’ve blogged about. I tend to be Democratic with Libertarian tendencies.

    Your postings have uniformly been interesting and informative, and definitely contribute positive information to the debate.

    Thanks for offering such great posts.

  • I’ll task you with carelessness concerning funerals as a matter of government interest, Ed. At the state and local level funerals are subject to heavy regulation, a fair amount of which stipulates “standards” aimed mostly at putting a generous floor under the income of funeral homes.

  • I would have no problem with this, and as others have commented neither should Libertarians, but I can’t see the GOP going for it.

    The problem is not simply the word “marriage”, it is the fundamental nature of “…rights and responsibilities as these change during the course of the family life cycle. They are society’s most elementary way of declaring who is responsible for whom.”

    The GOP refuses to accept that two men or two women should be able to be responsible for each other no matter what we call it. If the Dems adopt this position it might work as a wedge to help split the “Wall Street” & Libertarian type Republicans from the Dobsonites, but they seem to be endlessly able to bury their differences….

  • Michael,

    You’re right, of course. I only meant that generally governments don’t *perform* funerals (or birth ceremonies). In addition to issuing licenses, governments do perform marriages. That’s what I’m questioning. Why not just issue the licenses and leave it churches to decide whether/how to “sanctify” the already recognized civil fact of legal union.

  • Since we cannot be trusted to display our better nature at all times, government does have some interest in ‘regulating’ marriage. Someone should determine that both parties are free to enter the union (not already married, for example) and that each entering the union of their free will. Other’n that, government should register the license for statistical purposes & to accrue the benefits. Who gets married isn’t their business.

  • If government were simply to certify civil unions between capable consenting adults, why should it limit these union to single pairs? Shouldn’t religions that advocate polygamy be allowed to recognize such marriages, and the government have to certify the multiple unions they contain?

  • Quinn, I think contracts could be drawn up among several consenting adults regarding many of the rights and duties included in marriage. Some, though, would be impossible to execute or administer, for example having your employer’s health plan cover the 100 individuals in your union. Polygamy I won’t comment on.

    Ed, What’s in a name?

    I imagine that even if we could separate out the mundane, secular aspects of marriage, putting them under the purview of the state, while assigning the emotional/sacred/meaning-full aspects to more appropriate organizations, or simply to individuals, there would still be an argument about the word “marriage.” Some would insist that the law recognize gay marriage as marriage, with that word. Some would vehemently object. The emotional aspects would still inhere in the word. I don’t know how long it would take to get to the state of affairs you envision, and I wonder if that’s where it stops being “simple enough.”

    Perhaps it’s like this: when you talk about marriage, you are talking about a deep and passionately felt part of people’s (and families’) identity. Some feel that that part of their identity is very much not gay, and can’t perceive gay marriage as anything but an inherent contradiction, confusing others’ self-perception with their own. It requires cool thought to understand this, but it is hard to think coolly here. Hopefully a dialog can and will take place to resolve that issue.

  • Framing this issue can be remarkably simplified: No need for the word “marriage”; just frame it in economic terms; Democrats support extending “property rights” to committed, same-sex couples.

    Only those who think that homosexuality can be outlawed and prevented would be against any person having their full property rights.

  • Jim,

    Good points. There is a fair amount of research demonstrating (what many of us probably figure we already know) the “instability of triads”. Groups of three equals almost always, over some important issue, break into a “dyad” plus the one left out.

    A patriarchal society (e.g., many Muslim countries) can make a case for more than one wife. There is really only one “head of the family”. The women are there to produce babies for him. As one of my very brightest Arab grad students once put it, to be the oven for his bread dough. He should have as many wives as he can afford to treat very well, he said.

    But in a society where all adults are to be treated as equals I think the state can make a case for assigning marital (or civil partnership or whatever) unity solely to a group of two.

    As to the emotional strength of the word “marriage”, I agree. On the other hand I can remember, being in high school in the ’50s, a very emotion-laden phrase, “shacking up”. Does anyone use that phrase, or care about what it refers to, anymore? I can also assert that no one that I knew back then believed they knew anyone who was “gay” (except in the non-sexual sense of that word). Times do change, and people can find new words and new meanings for them.

  • This idea will never get off the ground. It makes entirely too much sense.

    As far as the government is concerned, marriage should be a legal contract specifying certain rights and responsibilities. Nothing more, nothing less. Of course, it should mean a lot more than that to the people involved, but that’s none of government’s business.

    Also, I see no reason to force any church or other religious institution to solemnize any relationship, whether gay or straight, to which they object. There are more than a few churches, including my own, willing to recognize such relationships.

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