Is Legalisation of Same Sex Marriages Necessary?

For starters, I vote Republican at Federal level, but Libertarian at State and below. So I have no Christian/Fundie axe to grind here. I peg somewhere in the “Agnostic” range on the religion-meter.

I have no qualms about same sex marriages, with full legal recognition, but my internal jury is still out concerning same sex couples adopting children (I did not say I was against them, just undecided!)

Considering that Unlimited Powers of Attorney can be drwan up, that Living Wills and Last Wills and Testaments can be drawn up, is it truly necessary to legalise same sex marriages?

The only other factor not covered under “general legal stuff” is health care and prescription medication benefits, and possibly employment/employer discrimination. Maybe Social Security/government (like taxes) benefits as well. And I fully realize that that “factor not covered” may indeed cover quite a bit of ground

Legalised same sex marriage may give those couples some protection and access to benefits that they are otherwise denied. Tax breaks and such (hey, I said I voted Republican and Libertarian ;)).

But if I were running an insurance company, I would run the probabilities, study the numbers, and then offer insurance packages to those people, based upon the likely risk those couples engender.

It only makes business sense, considering the demographic and income levels of the majority of same sex couples (I know that a “majority” isn’t entirely inclusive, but I feel that it is a reasonable opening to a dialogue and eventual compromise).

Basically, I don’t think it’s anybody’s business as to who’s sleeping with whom; not your’s, not mine, not the media’s, the private sector’s or the government’s.

But I haven’t figured out exactly how deep this can of worms truly is, and how far “inclusion” is going to go. Not in the sense in how many people and what types, but where can the “Law of Unintended Consequences” rear its ugly little head and wreak merry havoc on our society?

ExTank
“Mostly Harmless :p”

With your line of thinking, it doesn’t make any sense for insurance companies to offer benefits to spouces either, does it?

But we decieded somewhere along the line that it makes sense for insurance and other benefits to be extended to commited partners. A committed partnership is much more than “sleeping with someone”. It is a long-term personal and legal (and occasionally religious) declaration of mutual commitment. It is when two people decide that, before the eyes of their peers and the eyes of the law, they are a family. Now why should it matter to you (a libertarian of all people) what gender these consenting adults are?

Gay people get married (or desire to get married) for the same reasons that straight people do: they love each other and they want to build a life together. Shouldn’t they be allowed to do that with the same benefits and risks as straight people do?

**

I don’t think that homosexuals should be made to jump through more hoops then heterosexuals. Since unlimited power of attorney is available to heterosexuals as well why not just take the state out of recognizing marriages in all cases?

**

It might help to understand what exactly you’re worried about. In what possible way will this wreak havoc on our merry little society? Sure some groups will be pissed off. But then someone is always pissed off. I’m not concerned that it would affect my life in a negative fashion.

Marc

EvenSven:

They certainly should. But I think that you misunderstood my comments concerning insurance benefits for same sex couples.

Currently, as I understand the situation, many same sex couples are denied health insurance because they are same sex couples.

If same sex couples run some kind of higher health risks than hetero couples, figure out what that risk is and charge accordingly. I wasn’t advocating denying same sex couples health insurance. Whether or not an emplyee health benefits package (typically with contributions of some sort from the employer) should be extended to same sex couples is one of the issues of same sex marriage legislation.

I think that it should. What does it matter what sex the employee’s dependents/beneficiaries are? To me, personally, none.

MGibson:

One can o’ worms scenario: one member of a same sex marriage decides they need a sex change operation, and that their working partner’s employee health package should have to pay for it, and the attending counselling. The employer/insurance company denies the claim, and is sued for discrimination under our hypothetical “Equality In Sex Marriage Act”.

Should someone’s gender identity crisis be a matter of federal legislation?

That may be an extreme, but it is the sort of unintended consequence that I’m thinking of.

And, I’d just like to add: to have and raise children. Only some of them do that of course. Not all heterosexual marriages involve children either. But I definatly think they should do that with the same benefits and risks as straight people.

If, as some people against same-sex marriage claim, marriage in REALLY about the nuturing of children, then a gay couple is just as valid as any straight one who has adopted, has had children through artifical insemination, has children from a previous relationship, etc.
If supporting the idea of marriage is supposed to be good for children, good for a stable society, then all the more do those children deserve to have their parents relationship supported by their society just as much as children with straight parents.

Not that that’s the only issue…tho I’m just debating if I want to ask Extank about his internal jury…?

Only if one feels that all citizens should be granted equal protections and opportunities under the law. The term “marriage”, though, carries a long historical tradition of religious association which perhaps should be avoided in order to keep the issues in focus. The governemt, at all levels, provides rights to spouses and family members which are denied to others. The only justification for granting these rights to eterosexual couples and not homosexual couples rests in teh idea that a homosexual partnership does not, in some sense, represent a valid family.

Now, I understand that some religions teach that message. I understand that many individuals believe that. Both churches and individuals are free to hold such descriminatory ideas. The government should not be. I see no reason for the government to override the ability of consenting adults to decide for themselves who to include in their family.

The core of the arguments against same sex unions have always, and will always, return to the idea that there is something invalid about two homosexuals declaring themselves a family. A church is free to teach that idea. An individual is free to believe that idea. A government that espouses the idea that all of its citizens are equal and deserve equal protections should not be free to endorse that idea.

As for the “sex-change” scenario: surely we can find a better example. I know of no employer sponsored insurance programs which pay for gender reassignment surgeries (or therapies). Individual plans make medical/finanf=cial determinations about which procedures they will cover. Whyn should that be any different for same sex unions?

The more cynical and bitter half of me is inclined to agree with this viewpoint. People shouldn’t get married for social reasons, they should get married 'cuz they love each other.

But then the realistic half of me steps in and says “Hey, there are always going to be people who marry for money, whether or not the state is involved.” By getting the state involved, it provides reason for married-for-money couples to stay together (divorce court’s a bitch, don’tcha know :D).

I say, let the homosexuals marry, so they can find out for themselves how better off they were without a spouse.

(That last part was humor, by the way)

Guess that makes me the expert. :wink:

To summarize my article (which was published in the Spring 1997 edition of Brooklyn Law Journal - I’ll pull down the cite if anyone wants this):

  1. The Court of Appeals of the State of New York issued a decision in 1996 which allowed “second parent” adoptions by the gay partner of the parent’s child. This decision gave homosexuals the full range of adoption rights enjoyed by straights. Several other states have granted the same rights;
  2. The decision forsake a literal reading of New York state law on the issue “for the best interests of the child” to be adopted;
  3. To paraphrase (and to toss in a little hyperbole), “the best interests of the child” is a paramount social, ethical, and legal principle in our country today;
  4. According to a wide range of sociological and other studies performed, as well as the way certain pension and benefit programs are set up, children are, on average, better off psychologically, economically, and socially if they are raised by two married parents. Kids of unmarried parents, gay or straight, living together or not, are on average worse off;
  5. A significant reason children of marrieds are better off is because of the legal and moral obligations that flow between the parents due to marriage, which act to supplement and defend the legal and moral obligations due from each individual parent to the child;
  6. Now that gay individuals and couples have the same adoption rights as straights, they have the same possibility to become parents as straights (obviously not the same likelihood, but the same possibility);
  7. One of the long-standing purposes of marriage in our system of laws is to provide for the children of the union. Significantly, we give the special protections relating to children to married couples before they have children. The potential to have children is enough for us.
  8. Given all of the above, it is in the best interests of the actual or potential children of gay couples to allow their parents to marry.

My article fleshes all this out more, gives all the appropriate cites, and allowed me to use the word “penis” several times in a scholarly journal.

Sua

Sua, could I get the cite for your article? I’m taking Family Law this term, and the professor is really into same-sex marriage. It sounds like something worth reading before the final comes around next month… :slight_smile:

Good topic and I’m glad to see it hasn’t degenerated into a bashing fest as so many have when concerning straight’s asking “gay” questions.

I have always wondered what prevented homosexual couples from having state recognized marriages? I assume there is some law in all (minus Vermont) that says “boy+boy=no!” and “girl+girl=no!”. I’m certainly not a lawyer but I have always wondered why the ACLU does not simply challenge the constitutionality of outlawing same sex marriage under the logic that it is not only discriminatory but also has it’s basis in theocracy.

Personally i think marriage is a bum deal but should still exist so that lonely people have one less reason to envy couples. The tax break part of it has to go, however. Why should I be taxed more on top of having to pay all my rent and utilities unless i want some smelly roomate?

**ExTank wrote:

Considering that Unlimited Powers of Attorney can be drwan up, that Living Wills and Last Wills and Testaments can be drawn up, is it truly necessary to legalise same sex marriages?**

Same-sex couples can certainly do this, at a cost of several hundred to several thousand dollars, depending upon the attorney and state. And this is only at the state level, I’m not sure how federal courts would uphold such documents.

Yet, heterosexual couples can go to the JotP, get a certificate for anywhere for 10-50 dollars and AUTOMATICALLY have all of those benefits, recognized at the state and federal level.

An undue burden is being placed on the same-sex couples simply for being a same-sex couple. That’s wrong.

Yes, there are several cans of worms being opened here, as there are when any legislation of this kind is considered. Does that mean we shouldn’t consider it? I think the concept of marriage should be re-considered, in the light of the modern society we live in, where so many roles and rules have changed over the past 50 years.

ExTank I don’t see why the federal goverment should get into a “gender identity crisis” more than a cut toe. Both are medical problems and both should be handled the same way. Gender identity also has to go through the federal goverment when you change your identity.

zen101:

Actually, I believe that in most of the states there was no defining language as to what constituted a marriageable couple until the Hawaii decision looked like it was going to come down on the same-sex-marriage (SSM) side and Congress (unconstitutionally) passed the Defense-of-Marriage Act (DOMA). Then state legislatures started sprouting SSM prohibitions like a dead tree sprouts bracket fungus.

Before this, the only thing that was keeping same-sex couples from being married in most states was a stubborn clerk of records. Which is why the Hawaii couples had a case in the first place. They were being denied something that they were not legally prohibited from having with each other: a marriage license.

DOMA was an attempt by Congress to circumvent Article IV, Section 1 of the Constitution:

It basically states that Article IV is suspended in the case of same-sex marriage. If a state should pass a law to recognize same-sex marriage, all the other states could legally ignore the recognition and the marriage. This would make a state’s marriage laws non-portable.

This is so obviously unconstitutional that its prognosis doesn’t look good for very long past a state actually giving full marriage privileges to same-sex couples. (And I believe Vermont doesn’t count, as its not a “marriage” but a “civil union”. Nitpicketyness is the soul of law…)

Well that pisses me off. I’m not even directly affected and it really pisses me off. I hate that kind of autocratic meddling in our affairs. Any men here who reside in Oregon and want to get married to another guy or at least make the attempt drop me a line. I’m straight but it seems to me that that isn’t any of the government’s business either. If I want to get married to a guy then it’s my fricking right even if I’m not gay. If I weren’t a Jew I’d move to Montana or Idaho and join a militia. Maybe we should form a Gay and Jew and Ethnic Minority Friendly Militia for all us fringe types that hate this kind of governmental felgercarp.

It’s 62 Brook.L.Rev. 399. It’s actually in the Spring 1996 edition; I don’t think it was published until 1997. What can I say? we were a little slow. :smiley:
Sua

Not being a true Legal Eagle like SuaSponte (thanks for the synopsis, btw), this has been fairly eye opening.

I’d had the impression that, outside of a few cases, it was a subject no one really wanted to tackle, and that most with no vested interest just wanted the issue to dry up and go away.

As I stated before, I have no real objections to the concept of SSMs, and Sua nudged my reservations about SSM adoptions a few points towards neutral (maybe I just have some residual small-town mid-western conservatism to shake off).

ExTank
“Mostly Harmless :p”

At the rate marriage is going, the only people who may be devoted to the concept is the same group who are, by law, excluded from official matrimony.

I have a same-sex-marriage question from left field.
I work in an industry that has a high level of illegal aliens. One of the ways these guys become citizens is to find a woman, pay her $2000-3000, become legally married and then get citizenship. Two years go by and they get a divorce.

Putting all the legal, moral and ethical issues of this aside(and I know there are many), if an illegal alien married a gay man in Vermont, would they become a citizen?

**Freedom2 wrote:

Putting all the legal, moral and ethical issues of this aside(and I know there are many), if an illegal alien married a gay man in Vermont, would they become a citizen?**

No. The Civil Union law in Vermont is only for that state. It says it’s specifically NOT marriage, but a Civil Union. Parallel, but not equal to. That’s what I’ve read and understood.

For this hypotheticial illegal alien to become a citizen, Congress would have to change their laws, especially regarding immigration and DOMA would have to be struck down.

It should be noted that DOMA was at least a factor in a lot of us gay folks’s decisions to vote for Gore. Yes, Clinton signed it into law, but with probably four Supreme Court seats plausibly coming up for grabs, the makeup of the Court is going to be very important. The Court that the new President appoints (whoever it is) will most likely be the one to decide the consitutionality of DOMA. If you count ten years as an average Court tenure, I can see some state in the next ten years actually passing a real same-sex marriage provision and the week that happens, you’ll have a test case. The ACLU at the very least is going to have someone from a state with a same-sex marriage prohibition go to the state in question, get married, and come back to their home state and ask for state recognition. The test case will be on its way within a week, and that Court will be deciding it.

Admittedly, most people didn’t realize how much closer the Senate was going to get and we certainly didn’t realize how close the Presidential vote was actually going to be. Even if Bush gets it right now, I don’t see him being able to name any Borks to the SC with Senate approval.