Why a Marriage Amendment is necessary.

Opinion Times ^ | 10/6/04 | Jim Pfaff

[HallowThisGround]

I consider myself a Christian libertarian. I believe that ultimately marriage is an institution ordained and sanctified by God Himself, and not by government institutions. But my governmental ideology on the subject is such that I believe that governments are instituted among men to provide arbitration against what I call "excessive liberty" defined as the collision of two individuals rights in willful disobedience to the Golden Rule and the Law of Nature. When individual rights meet in a violent manner, government must play a role in adjudicating the dispute. This was the dilemma of Moses for which his father-in-law Jethro helped him make a structured system of judges to resolve.

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Thus Locke starts by laying rights into individuals in their natural state who consequently adjust their individual liberty into "Conjugal Society" through marriage. Then, as dictated by necessity, man and woman cede some of their authority in the family to Civil Society through representatives appointed by them who make laws and administer justice on their behalf.

Individual rights to traditional marriage responsibilities to the representative structure of Civil Society. Governments take their origin from the traditional family in Locke's eyes. And I agree with his assessment

That is why I am against a redefinition of marriage and also why my libertarian instincts are not offended by this position. Break down the family and you break down the whole structure and origin of Government.