“As long as we’re redefining marriage, why keep this last vestige of the medieval idea of marriage? Why not three, four or as many as the blissful spouses could tolerate? If it is a denial of equal protection of the law to prohibit any two persons of the same sex to marry, then why isn’t it also a denial of equal rights for three or more persons to marry? What is so magical about a couple, as opposed to a trio or a quartet? What’s the big deal about monogamy?”
With state involved, at least in the modern era, the definition it uses to recognize the institution is simply whatever judges, pols, or 51% of the voting public think marriage can be at any one time. That’s it, that’s all it can ever be, there’s no other way to do it. Sometimes the definition the state uses will coincide with the real definition, sometimes it won’t. It was always a danger, Pope Leo XIII warned about the state’s involvement in the institution 130 years ago. Makes one wonder what the state will consider marriage in another 130 years.
Freegards
“That’s it, that’s all it can ever be, there’s no other way to do it”
Marriage is marriage - what it is doesn’t change. The state has the obligation to protect marriage just as it has an obligation to protect other things that come along with the package.