Posted on 06/29/2003 5:51:41 PM PDT by mrobison
By WILLIAM C. MANN, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - The Senate majority leader said Sunday he supported a proposed constitutional amendment to ban homosexual marriage in the United States.
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Sen. Bill Frist (news, bio, voting record), R-Tenn., said the Supreme Court's decision last week on gay sex threatens to make the American home a place where criminality is condoned.
The court on Thursday threw out a Texas law that prohibited acts of sodomy between homosexuals in a private home, saying that such a prohibition violates the defendants' privacy rights under the Constitution. The ruling invalidated the Texas law and similar statutes in 12 other states.
"I have this fear that this zone of privacy that we all want protected in our own homes is gradually — or I'm concerned about the potential for it gradually being encroached upon, where criminal activity within the home would in some way be condoned," Frist told ABC's "This Week."
"And I'm thinking of — whether it's prostitution or illegal commercial drug activity in the home — ... to have the courts come in, in this zone of privacy, and begin to define it gives me some concern."
Asked whether he supported an amendment that would ban any marriage in the United States except a union of a man and a woman, Frist said: "I absolutely do, of course I do.
"I very much feel that marriage is a sacrament, and that sacrament should extend and can extend to that legal entity of a union between — what is traditionally in our Western values has been defined — as between a man and a woman. So I would support the amendment."
Same-sex marriages are legal in Belgium and the Netherlands. Canada's Liberal government announced two weeks ago that it would enact similar legislation soon.
Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, R-Colo., was the main sponsor of the proposal offered May 21 to amend the Constitution. It was referred to the House Judiciary subcommittee on the Constitution on Wednesday, the day before the high court ruled.
As drafted, the proposal says:
"Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution nor the constitution of any state under state or federal law shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups."
To be added to the Constitution, the proposal must be approved by two-thirds of the House and the Senate and ratified by three-fourths of the states.
Frist said Sunday he respects the Supreme Court decision but feels the justices overstepped their bounds.
"Generally, I think matters such as sodomy should be addressed by the state legislatures," Frist said. "That's where those decisions — with the local norms, the local mores — are being able to have their input in reflected.
"And that's where it should be decided, and not in the courts."
Or we can wait until SCOTUS finds a transcendental right to socilaised medecine and a right to be free of firearms in the all encompassing 14th Amendment.
For those of us who are concerned for the health and well-being of the traditional family--and there are many of us in the Republican Party--this amendment is critically important.
Seems to me you're a libertarian, so nothing beyond your narrow focus of three feet and a cloud of smoke is important to you. Your shortsightedness is laughable.
Wrong, Frist needs to learn the law.
Read post #161.
I don't care, I don't want any new laws. I want an amendment limiting the power of the branch of government which has usurped the the tenth amendment and the people.
The fact that you equate your ideas with me about everyone's feelings toward me is quite revealing. Has it ever occurred to you that my argument has revolved completely around how conservatives should allocate limited resources - not whether I agree or disagree with the amendment at all? You don't even know whether I agree with the concept or not, but that hasn't stopped you from condemning me. How do you ever expect to win people to your side when you conduct a debate in this fashion?
You went off the deep end when I asked you to back up the hyperbole with facts. Here's another request: name some tangible effects of this ruling. Pretty please, with sugar on top.
They want to control our lives, take our money, and so on - they have no problem invading our lives with what they think is best for us. They have no problem over burdening private business with their many laws, I want less laws, they want more - fine, we will give them more. Maybe they will see what it is like to have your life legislated into the ground.
Marriage is centered around the idea of pro-creation. If gays want to live together, as my friends do, fine. If a company wants to give them benefits, that is up to the company to decide. Government recogizes marriage as a different type of union between two people, one in which the goal is to pro-create and continue to populate the land. There is nothing wrong with sanctioning such a set-up as something different and affording them tax breaks, et al. What people want to do in their private lives is their business, you don't even have to get married - it is an option two people can take if they want to have their committment recognized for either religious or legal reasons. If society as a whole places special meaning to a relationship where pro-creation is possible (dosen't always happen) and as a group decide to afford it a special status that does not mean we are keeping others from being together, it is simply a legalistic was to say we think it is a worthwhile endeavor for the betterment of society.
Gays are not being deprived any more than a farmer who wants to marry his daughter or a goat. Society has simply stated that those things are not what marriage as a recognized institution was designed for. Government can stay out of marriage, and just let people live together and do as they please - which they do (lots of gays live together), but government went a step further and said they recognize a special type of relationship which they felt had a positive affect on society, a man and a woman. If you CHOOSE to participate, by getting a marriage license, fine. You get both the rewards and legal ramifications for it.
Marriage has had, for some great time, had a definition. Why change that definition to please the few?
Amazing.
"I don't want any new laws."
That's exactly what I am telling you.
The polling data is right. If anything the numbers are a bit high.
But your conclusion makes no sense. Many people are uninformed. Many people aren't very bright. So no, I wouldn't think the number of Puritans in the voting block would really influence the number of LP voters.
How about you prove to me that 80% of the GOP voters are social conservatives?
16% of GOP New Hampshire voters consider themselves part of “the religious right” while 36% of the same voters in South Carolina associate themselves with this movement
http://www.adamsmithca.com/Columns%202000/Columns%202-4-00.htm
Whew. 36% in such a HUGE state as South Carolina. Somehow that'll add up to 60-80% :) I'll keep looking for ya...
BTW, here are the most populated US states. Hotbeds of Puritanism I bet.
1 California 2 Texas 3 New York 4 Florida 5 Illinois 6 Pennsylvania 7 Ohio 8 Michigan 9 New Jersey 10 Georgia
Not any more they don't. Justice Kennedy and his 5 dwarfs now define marriage. They're currently working on a new definition and it's coming to a theatre near you.
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