A Ruling for Polygamy -- and Freedom

RealClearPolitics ^ | January 5, 2014 | Steve Chapman

[2ndDivisionVet]

In modern America, sex is increasingly where it should be: outside the reach of government. Anti-sodomy statutes have been tossed by the Supreme Court. Contraception is widely accessible. Anyone with a computer can gorge on pornography without fear of prosecution.

Same-sex marriage has been legalized in 18 states and the District of Columbia. Now another step has been taken to expel police and legislators from the bedrooms of consenting adults: a federal court decision striking down a key element of Utah's ban on polygamy.

Last month, District Judge Clark Waddoups ruled that the law infringes not only on constitutionally protected sexual privacy but on the free exercise of religion. Utah, he concluded, doesn't have to issue multiple marriage licenses to Kody Brown and his consorts, who appear in the reality TV show "Sister Wives." But it can't dictate their living arrangements.

The group belongs to a renegade Mormon sect that regards polygamy as sanctioned by God. Brown is legally married to one of the women and "spiritually married" to the other three. Together, at last count, they have 17 children.

If a man and a woman want to live together and call themselves partners, buddies, teammates, friends with benefits or Bonnie and Clyde, the government will leave them alone. Ditto if a guy can entice several fertile females to shack up with him and spawn a noisy horde of offspring.

But in Utah, it matters what the man calls the women living with him. If he refers to them as wives, he can go to prison. The law covers not only formal polygamous marriage but any relationships in which a married person "purports to marry another person or cohabits with another person." That was the provision ruled unconstitutional....

[EternalVigilance]

I value my freedom as provided to me by the constitution

Your freedom was not provided to you by any written constitution. It was given to you by God. This is America's First Principle.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men..." --The Declaration of Independence

[Hiddigeigei]

Polygamy in a society were young males are killed off in war makes some kind of sense. Women need mates.

I once knew a girl from a polygamous Chinese (an ancient civilization) family in Malaya (now Malaysia). She was studying medicine at Duke University. Her family was not a happy one. The mother-in-law, her father’s mother, was the autocrat of the family. The wife that produced a male heir was immediately raised in status. The girls in the family were treated generously (foreign education in the this case), but she said somewhat ruefully that on her birthday she was given a five-carat diamond ring, but her brother was given a tin mine.

I’ve also known monogamous marriages that were unhappy (my parents, for instance). Some work, some don’t!

[ansel12]

What a bunch of nonsense.

I’m not playing word games, the feds have been making law regarding legal marriage since 1780, and that law did not include polygamy or gay marriage, and would not have regardless of someone having an unrecognized religious ceremony.

If a marriage did not comply with law, then it was just in your private mind, the law didn’t recognize it.

You are trying to push the end of marriage by saying let anyone and everyone define their own, well they can already do that and always could, but it doesn’t get recognized by law and the courts.

In America, legal marriage was never just a matter of a church marrying you, it had to comply with the law, and usually required a government license, Jefferon had a license although his first marriage predated the US, Washington paid for his favorite nephew’s marriage license.

Civil marriage definitely existed in early America, even common law marriage was recognized, as it is today, AS LONG AS IT IS LEGAL and complies with law.

Do you really want the Mosque to tell us what legal marriage is?

[ansel12]

Wow, you are so wrong about everything that it is breathtaking.

[Ransomed]

Are there 18 or 19 states with ‘gay marriage?’ This article says 18?

Freegards

[EternalVigilance]

I just have to say, this article really, really stinks.

Such thinking will be the death of this republic, if something is not done soon by real conservatives, real Americans, to put a stop to it.

[2ndDivisionVet]

Utah is the 19th, IIRC.

[trisham]

"Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. "

~George Washington

"Statesmen, my dear Sir, may plan and speculate for Liberty, but it is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand. The only foundation of a free Constitution is pure Virtue, and if this cannot be inspired into our People in a greater Measure than they have it now,
They may change their Rulers and the forms of Government, but they will not obtain a lasting Liberty. They will only exchange Tyrants and Tyrannies. "

~John Adams

[Ransomed]

Everything I am seeing says 18, but I swear I’ve tried to count them before and my numbers didn’t come out right. So you may be right.

18 or 19 have or had ‘gay marriage?’

30 with amendments? This might actually still include Hawaii, the legislature could passed law banning it again if they wanted, to my understanding, so maybe only 29?

2 or more(?) with no amendment and no ‘gay marriage’ as yet? West Va and and Pa?

Freegards

[oldenuff2no]

"And if people who participate at a conservative website such as this not understand such basics, where does that leave us?"

You obviously believe that all conservatives are bible thumpers. This is not true. You seem to believe that all conservatives have to sit in the pew behind you and say the same god words you do. No again. There are many conservatives who base their political beliefs in science and our constitution. Like it or not that one is true.

You have a right to believe in what ever you want to and I have a right to not believe as you do and am protected from you or anyone else forcing your beliefs on me. You believe the bible is the final word on everything and I do not. Like it or not that is my right and my truth. I will not belittle or insult your faith but I will not bow to it or turn away from my own beliefs either. So I guess we must agree that we disagree.

[ifinnegan]

“There are many conservatives who base their political beliefs in science and our constitution.”

I think all conservatives do that.

I’m not sure where your hostile attack on religion comes from based on my comment or conservative principles.

Your lack of logic belies your claims on how you base your political beliefs. Logic is the foundation.

You’re just ranting incoherently about your personal likes or dislikes.

[ansel12]

A legal marriage always has to be legal, whether thousands of years ago in Rome, or among a head hunting tribe, whether using banns or licenses.

Library of Virginia :
""Marriage License: This form was granted by public officials to couples intending to marry. The license indicated to the minister and the public that there were no impediments to the marriage.
The governor originally granted marriage licenses; county clerks and commissioners were granted the authority to issue them in the seventeenth century. By the 1670s marriage licenses could only be issued in the county in which the bride resided.
Marriage by license was more expensive than marriage by publication of banns, but couples did not have to wait an extended period of time to marry.""

**Thomas Jefferson's: Bond for Marriage License, 23 December 1771
Know all men by these presents that we Thomas Jefferson and Francis Eppes are held and firmly bound to our sovereign lord the king his heirs and successors in the sum of fifty pounds current money of Virginia, to the paiment of which, well and truly to be made we bind ourselves jointly and severally, our joint and several heirs executors and administrators in witness whereof we have hereto set our hands and seals this twenty third day of December in the year of our lord one thousand seven hundred and seventy one. The condition of the above obligation is such that if there be no lawful cause to obstruct a marriage intended to be had and solemnized between the abovebound Thomas Jefferson and Martha Skelton of the county of Charles city, Widow,1 for which a license is desired, then this obligation is to be null and void; otherwise to remain in full force.**

**George Washington paying for his nephew:

[tophat9000]

Your statement is illogical .....if government stayed out of peoples lives..then the government need do nothing but stay mute on marriage and let it be the religious vow of its origin.........government would see no difference in people being married or not married...and surely have no concept of consuming a marriage..ie having sex, to decide if a marriage can be annulled vs a divorced........ but its called a marriage “license”..its the government providing something special if you do something the government wants..it promotes it provides for..its a so called “positive” right...

[ansel12]

The biggest indicator of how someone votes, is their Christian faith.

Those hostile to traditional American faith, are overwhelmingly democrat voters.

Those supportive of it, are overwhelmingly conservative voters.

Traditional American values don’t normally win over the atheists, so exceptions are just exceptions, they don’t mean anything or have much valuable input to conservatism.

From atheism to moderate faith, to intense Christian faith (Bible thumpers to lefties), the level of conservatism usually matches the degree of Christian faith.

[tophat9000]

does anybody see irony of libertarians on marriage? The core argument was always in the past we had natural rights, God given rights that the government had no right to grant or deny, they were God given. That has somehow been turned in side out that what in the past is our natural God given rights are not longer natural.. but are now government must provide license rights and privilege.

[Talisker]

Wow, you are mixing up so many things it’s almost impossible to parse them all out - legal versus common law? Banns versus marriage license? What is the difference between “legal” and common law? Are you saying that corporate administrative law is more legal than common law? What is the difference in the legitimacy before the law, it’s legality, of banns, versus licensing? Isn’t licensing just a codification of the process that can also be lawfully acknowledged as banns? In which case, why license - just to spend extra money to avoid the time necessary for banns? So is legality, to you, merely a process of money?

Because to the government, it’s definitely about the money. And to get the money, the government claims to declare legitimacy - if you pay - for something you don’t have to pay for. Something not, in fact just “in your private mind,” but before you and your spouse and God. And the Founders acknowledged that that relationship was no business of government. Your own quotes show that those licenses were voluntary, and did not supply the sole source of legality, because they were traditionally done by banns out of where? Where I said - the church.

Do I think a Mosque should tell us what marriage is? Absolutely - it should tell us what marriage is FOR MUSLIMS. Do YOU think that a Christian church should tell Muslims what marriage is? Do you think Christian churches should hold validation authority over Muslim marriages, and invalidate them for not being Christian?

And you think that government licensing is the solution? Then your position is pure statism. The solution is not the government, it is the laws that protect freedom of religion that does not require government licensing of religious acts, AND protects religions from EACH OTHER. Why should the government need ot “acknowledge” a marriage, except under grounds of violations of the public welfare? And why should the definition of public welfare have anything to do with something that is not already a crime? Pedophilia is a crime, so marrying a child is a crime. Kissing a tree is not a crime, so marrying one should not be illegal. What do you care what other people do? Why the hell has everyone decided to get into everyone elses business? And you don’t have to try to marry a tree - Protestants think Catholic marriages are void, Catholics think Buddhist marriages are void, Muslims think everyone’s marriages are void and want to marry children themselves. The Founders ACKNOWLEDGED this - and PROTECTED IT. Not by requiring government licensing, but by keeping the government the hell out of it.

Banns versus licensing gives your whole argument away. Licensing is revealed to be a government addition, purely voluntary, and not required. That’s what Jefferson agreed to, for his own reasons. But it was NOT required for validity.

Sometimes I think people simply don’t want to be free anymore. No one even comprehend the thinking of the Founders. Society is NOT government, dammit. And neither is civilization. And neither WAS America.

But if you want to submit your relationship with your spouse and your vow before God to a government bureaucrat’s judegement - go for it. Don’t let me stand in your way.

[Lurker]

” but its called a marriage “license”

Please cite for me, Article and Section, EXACTLY where in the US Constitution the word “marriage” is found.

Thanks in advance.

[Lurker]

Where EXACTLY was the Code of Hamirabi incorporated into the US Constitution?

[mrsmith]

Yeah, they think they are getting freedom but it’s really just license, and in totality they will have less freedom from government.

To be fair, there are wiser ones who realize that a society of licentiousness is not a society of freedom.
But not the young ones LOL!

[mrsmith]

You won’t respond... and I assume insults follow.