----"I'm sure I'm in a very small minority on FR, but for the record I agree with the logic of the rulings in all of these recent cases. Religious marriages recognized by private organizations are the business of those private organizations, but state-registered civil marriages -- whether called 'marriages' or 'domestic partnerships' or 'civil unions' or whatever -- should be available to same-sex couples for as long as they're available at all. The various courts that have addressed this issue in the famous cases of the past few years have gotten the Constitutional part right. (I only wish they were as zealous in protecting Second Amendment rights.)
The power of the government is not a legitimate weapon in a 'culture war' -- on either side. The government simply has no legitimate role in the marriage-definition game (other than restricting unions to parties legally competent to give consent)."----
This idea that if the govt affords legal recognition to traditional marriages, then it must do the same for alternatives is nothing less than a complete surrender to the Left on this battle in the Culture war. Whether its valid or not, the Courts have become THE weapon for the Left in the Culture war since its the only one they have that works. Just as its the only way for extremists to get public nativity scenes and prayers before highschool football games banned, so too is it the only way to have abortion on demand and gay marriage/civil unions.
So you think its right for judges to take some part of the Constitution that was ratified w/o any thought or intent that it ever be used in such a manner as imposing gay marriage/civil unions, to turn around and do just that? When the Constitution and its subsequent Amendments were ratified, that represented an approval from the people for the purposes put forth by the authors. For the Courts to take it upon themselves to declare that now these provisions apply to thing for which they were never intended is a violation of the whole principle of having the consent of the governed.
This is clearly one of those things for which the Founders designed the 10th Amendment. And the people of each state have a right to decide which if any type of union they will grant legal recogntion (i.e. public endorsement). If someone in Texas or Ohio doesn't like it, then they should move.
Moreover, good luck in finding judges who on the one hand think its their duty to impose gay marriage/civil unions, but on the other hand have respect for the Second Amendment. You can find them; Kennedy and O'Connor might be examples, but in finding one who favors the former you'll probably end up with a thoroughly leftist judge like Souter, Stevens, Breyer, etc.
When the Constitution and its subsequent Amendments were ratified, that represented an approval from the people for the purposes put forth by the authors. For the Courts to take it upon themselves to declare that now these provisions apply to thing for which they were never intended is a violation of the whole principle of having the consent of the governed.
No, that's pretty much how the Constitution was intended to work, and I have yet to meet anyone -- conservative or otherwise -- who really thinks it's always a bad thing when the SCOTUS applies a Constitutional limitation in a new way.
I assume you're happy the police have to get a warrant before tapping your phone. Well, prior to 1967 they didn't, as long as they didn't place the wiretap on your property; the SCOTUS ruled on that in 1920-something (Olmstead), holding that a wiretap wasn't a 'search' within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment (as of course it wasn't if we stick to what the framers and, more importantly, the ratifiers expressly had in mind). However, in Katz (1967), the SCOTUS overturned Olmstead and famously held that the Fourth Amendment protects people, not places; ever since then, the Fourth Amendment word 'search' has been expanded to apply to something that was clearly not intended in 1789.
I'm not saying the same-sex marriage case is completely parallel, but that example ought at least to give you a little reason to reconsider whether '[f]or the Courts to take it upon themselves to declare that now these provisions apply to thing for which they were never intended is a violation of the whole principle of having the consent of the governed' always and in principle.
This is clearly one of those things for which the Founders designed the 10th Amendment.
Well, I think the Ninth and Fourteenth are implicated as well. To make a long story short, I think that the Tenth Amendment reserves to the states the power to regulate the exercise of, but not to violate or infringe, the liberty rights 'retained by the people' according to Amendment IX, and the Fourteenth Amendment imposes additional limitations on such regulation. The question is whether the right to marry whom you please is such a right, and I take it we'll continue to disagree about that. No biggie; I'd have been surprised if very many FReepers did agree with me on that point.