Government Involvement In Marriage

[halconero]

Maybe this could go in the current thread on same sex marriage...but I more want to focus on both types (heterosexual and homosexual) and the involvement of government with both.

Do you believe it is appropriate for government to be involved in any type of marriage?

For myself, the more and more I think about it, the more I come to believe that the answer is no. To take what is a religious or cultural custom, and to declare who does or doesn't have a right to it places a dangerous amount of power in the government's hands. Restricting it or declaring all to have this right actually favours certain beliefs above others, and comes dangerously close to the mixing of church and state (I lump most athesitic/agnostic groups into "churches", which I define as organized groups of belief/non-belief).

Taking the current issue of same sex marriage, if a government elevates one position it is, in a sense, a legal recognition that one belief system is wrong. A government which sides with the belief that marriage is between a man and a woman there is an evelation of those groups holding that belief, and a legal condemnation to those who believe otherwise. The same can be said of a government that believes the opposite. I personally believe that either position restricts personal liberty rather than promulgates it. It sets a precedent for the government define what rites are rights in the future. It blurs the line between church and state.

My solution? Get rid of marriage liscences.

The granting of a marriage liscence places it on par with that of a driving liscence. We've granted the state the right to decide who can and cannot participate in a cultural custom. The government could, theoretically, pick and choose who can and cannot marry. While this isn't abused often, there are cases in the past, and who says that they couldn't increase in the future. I'm not saying that they will, but I'm not comfortable with even the potential abuse of power.

I believe this actually allows for an incredible amount of personal liberty. For members of the Church, it wouldn't decrease the sanctity of marriage. It would be completely in their hands to decided who can and cannot be married in the temple or by a bishop/branch president. There would never be any risk that another type of marriage would be forced on them.

For homosexuals, they could find a group or someone willing to marry them.

An experience I had recently made me realize what I believe the actual fight over same sex marriage to be over. A friend of mine just returned from going to another state (in which same-sex marriage isn't legal) to have a commitment ceremony with her partner with whom she is in a lesbian relationship. Suddenly it hit me. The problem isn't that there are/aren't legal restrictions on groups out there willing to perform ceremonies...it's all based around a piece of bureaucratic paper...who can and cannot get that paper. I began to ask myself, why should government have control over that piece of paper?

My position on this isn't in favour for either hetersexual-only marriage or homosexual marriage. It's that government shouldn't be involved with marriage at all. My position is that government shouldn't have a position. They take a hands off approach, saying "Hey, don't ask us who can or cannot get married." Where a couple's rights to estate, insurance, etc is concerned a declaration of communal living should suffice. I think even those(most of those) who believe that marraige should be between only a man or a woman agree that gay couples should have the right to live together and be able to pool resources.

I wouldn't be posting this if I didn't want to invite discussion or even dissent. Feel free to blast my position away, support it, or even give a different option.

[halconero]

Sorry, just to be clear, the topic of discussion isn't so much about same-sex marriage as it is about government involvement with marriage. This could include all types of marriage: Polygyny, Polyandry, Monogamy, Hetersexual, Homosexual, whatever.

[Mark Beesley]

There are a number of us who have been advocating for just this. It began even before Prop 8 when the Cal. Supremes held that SSM was legal in California since the law treat marriages and civil unions the same. It might help some of the LDS who have heartburn over the votes in Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Washington to simply think of those laws as establishing SSM civil unions, in spite of what word is used in the statutes.

But yes, get the government out of the marriage business and leave it as a religious sacrament where it belongs. There just doesn't seem to be any widespread motivation to get such an issue on the ballot.

[Duncan]

one issue that needs to be addressed though is age of consent. They need to prove they are over 18 and if they are younger they need a legal document signed by their legal guardians-Certaintly needs to be regulated elsewise do we want 11 yr olds getting married?! besides of which here in Canada they brought in gay marriage without a vote of the population, IIRC

Edited November 21, 2012 by Duncan

[The Nehor]

We are such a legalistically complex society we need government involved just to deal with things like child support, apportionment of property during divorce, inheritances, medical consent laws, etc.

[CV75]

Do you believe it is appropriate for government to be involved in any type of marriage?

inasmuch as government is an extension of many smaller, individual family unit administrative systems and authorities (and believing that both government and marriage are instituted of God), there is a role for government to be involved in marriage. This role should reflect the will of the people, with checks and balances to protect all, like the US constitution.

[halconero]

I think this can addressed without the government becoming involved in marriage. A law prohibiting the forming of a relationship if one of the parties is below the legal age of consent still doesn't involve the government in allowing/disallowing the ceremony of marriage.

We are such a legalistically complex society we need government involved just to deal with things like child support, apportionment of property during divorce, inheritances, medical consent laws, etc.

I think that those things could be maintained while eliminating the involvement of government with marriage. Is there a place for the recognition that a couple are living together, have a relationship and share legal rights to child support, inheritance and medical consent? Yeah, absolutetly. Even those against all types of marriage save monogamous heterosexual marriage should recognize the fact that two people live together, have an intimate (sexual, emotional, mental) relationship and pool resources. To paraphrase Ghandi, while I don't recognize the legitimacy of another type of relationship, I do recognize the reality of it.

[CV75]

But yes, get the government out of the marriage business and leave it as a religious sacrament where it belongs. There just doesn't seem to be any widespread motivation to get such an issue on the ballot.

I think that is because government is an extension of many smaller, individual and family administrative systems and authorities, and most believe in involvement on personal, communal, religious and governmental levels.

[CV75]

To paraphrase Ghandi, while I don't recognize the legitimacy of another type of relationship, I do recognize the reality of it.

And there is also a reality that the nature of a cohesive society is that people are interested in each others' business, and welcome others' interest in theirs.

[Bob Crockett]

I gave a presentation to UCLA Law on the day before the Prop 8 election making this point, with a twist. The only reason government licenses pastors to perform a government function is because of the marriage of church and state. So long as the government licenses pastors to perform marriages, then pastors should have a say in what is marriage and what is not.

If the people don't want religion to influence the decision of what is marriage and what is not, then the government should get out of the marriage business and if you want to get married, go to your rabbi.

The Gay and Lesbian Student Union and the law students didn't quite know what to make of that argument. They were expecting me to come in and argue the notorious "Six Consequences" of gay marriage. They still tried to argue that with me, and I said that those Six Consequences were, at least five of them, despicable.

[Duncan]

I am going to throw this out there and see what it hits but something that drives me bananas is this dichotomy of Gov't involvement or no Gov't involvement. For example here in Canada in Brooks, Alberta there was a huge meat plant that as it turned out had tainted meat and it's a huge mess. People wanted no Gov't involvement in there and when something hits the fan as it did, people were now crying there should have been more Gov't inspectors to inspect the meat. Like do you want them there or don't you, you can't have it both ways

[halconero]

inasmuch as government is an extension of many smaller, individual family unit administrative systems and authorities (and believing that both government and marriage are instituted of God), there is a role for government to be involved in marriage. This role should reflect the will of the people, with checks and balances to protect all, like the US constitution.

The role of the constitution isn't to reflect the will of the people. One of it's main framers, James Madison, saw it as a way to check the will of the people. In the liberal (classical, not modern) environment in which the constitution was framed the government wasn't meant to be an extension of society. It was an independent party, an arbiter of disputes between society. These disputes were the ones that harmed an individuals rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Religious, cultural or ceremonial disputes were intended to be left out of government arbitration unless these were harming the individual's aforementioned rights.

Marriage liscences were first instituted to prevent the marriage of consenting adults whose parents disagreed, they were also used to prevent the marriage between whites with blacks, “mulattos,” Japanese, Chinese, Indians, “Mongolians,” “Malays” or Filipinos. These reflected the majority of the opinion of the voting class at the time. One of the specific purposes of the US constitution is to prevent this tyranny of the majority. A proper response to this, in my opinion, wouldn't have been a declaration from the US Supreme Court that these marriages were discriminatory, but that government shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion (or culture).

The framers of the consitution saw society and government as two different things. To them society was a group of individuals coming together and forming a social contract, recognizing their own sovereign rights, and then forming an government independent of that society to protect those rights. It had to be seperated from society so that it could not be corrupted into tyranny.

Edited November 21, 2012 by halconero

[halconero]

I am going to throw this out there and see what it hits but something that drives me bananas is this dichotomy of Gov't involvement or no Gov't involvement. For example here in Canada in Brooks, Alberta there was a huge meat plant that as it turned out had tainted meat and it's a huge mess. People wanted no Gov't involvement in there and when something hits the fan as it did, people were now crying there should have been more Gov't inspectors to inspect the meat. Like do you want them there or don't you, you can't have it both ways

I think you can have a happy medium. It acts as prevention but also allows for self-regulation. Heavy, extremely heavy, fines and criminal charges. I worked for a fruit company in BC over the summer and we had no government oversight. However, we did have to follow certain health procedures and work saftey inspections. Why? "If something goes wrong we will get a huge fine, and Bill (my boss) could face charges."

[BCSpace]

Do you believe it is appropriate for government to be involved in any type of marriage?

Yes. I believe the state has a compelling interest in getting involved in those relationships which might produce children or result in rearing them. Such interest extends only to heterosexual relationships as they are the ideal. A formerly married single parent, for example, represents this ideal as well since they have not entered into a less exemplary and more risky relationship.

I do not believe it necessary for the state to second guess such marriages in the sense of making sure there are children involved. The potential for such is good enough.

[Duncan]

I think you can have a happy medium. It acts as prevention but also allows for self-regulation. Heavy, extremely heavy, fines and criminal charges. I worked for a fruit company in BC over the summer and we had no government oversight. However, we did have to follow certain health procedures and work saftey inspections. Why? "If something goes wrong we will get a huge fine, and Bill (my boss) could face charges."

in food industries you need a happy medium as we want no one getting sick or dying on account of bad beef from Alberta, I mean its Alberta! what else do they do all day besides meat stuff, oil junk and send a disporportionate amount of drivers to be on Canada's Worst Driver?

Edited November 21, 2012 by Duncan

[RobertAC]

But yes, get the government out of the marriage business and leave it as a religious sacrament where it belongs. There just doesn't seem to be any widespread motivation to get such an issue on the ballot.

I would tend to agree.

In Buddhism -- and much of Hinduism -- marriage is a secular institution that is usually arranged between families. I therefore disagree with many people's perception that marriage is inherently a religious institution.

However, getting government to perform civil unions for all would avoid the issue many have that government is redefining a religious institution. Best solution: Government gets out of the marriage business altogether.

[halconero]

Yes. I believe the state has a compelling interest in getting involved in those relationships which might produce children or result in rearing them.

Why?

Also, a relationship =/= marriage. The family I lived with during the summer was from the Punjab, India. They had been married since they were young, but hadn't seen each other for a long time before they had even communicated. I'm not going to say whether this was right or wrong, but to say that they had a relationship is straining things. That was their perspective. "We didn't have a relationship until we met after 15 years of technical marriage."

I think a recognition of a relationship is important too. Marriage though? Not so much.

[wenglund]

On a superficial level I can understand your "hands-off" position.

However, I am not sure you grasp the full implications of what you are suggesting.

To fully grasp the implications it may help to learn about the history of marriage and discover the reasons why governments got into the marriage business to begin with.

From what I can tell from my research, governments became somewhat involved in marriages, not so much because they wanted to perform the marriages, but for licensing and regulatory purposes. The governments interest hasn't been so much in relation to marital ceremonies (religious or otherwise), as it has been the substantial effects of unregulated marriages, or the lack of regulated marriages, on the society as a whole, and the civil courts in particular. While religions may have customarily performed marriages in various cultures, often the civil courts were left to shoulder the burden of adjudicating disputes within those marriages (adultery, etc.) and even more so when those marriages were dissolved, either through divorce or the death of a spouse--such as property rights, custody rights, and inheritance rights.

The civil courts were also left to shoulder the burden of adjudicating familial issue where no religious marital ceremonies were performed (common law marriages and civil marriage for non-religious people, etc.), and where there was a diversity of religious or cultural customs regulating marriages.

Essentially, the governments stepped in to uniformly regulate marriage so as to ease the burden on civil courts and to stabilize secular aspects of the fundamental institution of society.

This means that were governments to get out of the marriage and family business as you suggest, who then will shoulder the enormous burden of regulating and adjudicating marital and family disputes? How will non-religious people get married if they so desire?

Some things to think about.

My opinion is that since government involvement in marriage wasn't much of an issue prior to attempts by gay advocates to bastardize the fundamental institution of society, and since the government's involvement has very little to do with performance of ceremonies, and not much more to do with regulating of marriage, particularly when compared to the civil burden it shoulders in relation to marriages, I don['t personally have a problem with the current level of governmental involvement.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[Bikeemikey]

I think this can addressed without the government becoming involved in marriage. A law prohibiting the forming of a relationship if one of the parties is below the legal age of consent still doesn't involve the government in allowing/disallowing the ceremony of marriage.

I think that those things could be maintained while eliminating the involvement of government with marriage. Is there a place for the recognition that a couple are living together, have a relationship and share legal rights to child support, inheritance and medical consent? Yeah, absolutetly. Even those against all types of marriage save monogamous heterosexual marriage should recognize the fact that two people live together, have an intimate (sexual, emotional, mental) relationship and pool resources. To paraphrase Ghandi, while I don't recognize the legitimacy of another type of relationship, I do recognize the reality of it.

I think New Zealand is a very good example of this. Australia also.

They have a "De-facto relationship law" that covers almost all of the major issues marriage normally legally covers. It should also be noted that New Zealand has no different incentive program for married couples over unmarried couples when it comes to govt. entitlements or taxes. As a nation they also have a higher eduction metric, higher life expectancy, a higher sense of community well-being, a substantially lower imprisonment rate than the USA. The decision to remove the marriage incentive has not had significant impact on any of these measures vs. the USA. In fact, it appears NZ has actually outperformed the USA over the period of time the USA has maintained the marriage incentive and NZ has removed it.

http://www.lawlink.co.nz/members/timpanywalton/defacto.pdf

http://www.justice.govt.nz/courts/family-court/what-family-court-does/property

[Bikeemikey]

On a superficial level I can understand your "hands-off" position.

However, I am not sure you grasp the full implications of what you are suggesting.

To fully grasp the implications it may help to learn about the history of marriage and discover the reasons why governments got into the marriage business to begin with.

From what I can tell from my research, governments became somewhat involved in marriages, not so much because they wanted to perform the marriages, but for licensing and regulatory purposes. The governments interest hasn't been so much in relation to marital ceremonies (religious or otherwise), as it has been the substantial effects of unregulated marriages, or the lack of regulated marriages, on the society as a whole, and the civil courts in particular. While religions may have customarily performed marriages in various cultures, often the civil courts were left to shoulder the burden of adjudicating disputes within those marriages (adultery, etc.) and even more so when those marriages were dissolved, either through divorce or the death of a spouse--such as property rights, custody rights, and inheritance rights.

The civil courts were also left to shoulder the burden of adjudicating familial issue where no religious marital ceremonies were performed (common law marriages and civil marriage for non-religious people, etc.), and where there was a diversity of religious or cultural customs regulating marriages.

Essentially, the governments stepped in to uniformly regulate marriage so as to ease the burden on civil courts and to stabilize secular aspects of the fundamental institution of society.

This means that were governments to get out of the marriage and family business as you suggest, who then will shoulder the enormous burden of regulating and adjudicating marital and family disputes? How will non-religious people get married if they so desire?

Some things to think about.

My opinion is that since government involvement in marriage wasn't much of an issue prior to attempts by gay advocates to bastardize the fundamental institution of society, and since the government's involvement has very little to do with performance of ceremonies, and not much more to do with regulating of marriage, particularly when compared to the civil burden it shoulders in relation to marriages, I don['t personally have a problem with the current level of governmental involvement.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

The Govt can continue to be involved in the issuance of licenses and permits relating to marriage. I can't see any objection behind this. Such licenses do help fast-track complaints that come before the courts around support when the relationship dissolves and there is fiduciary support obligations and question of custody etc.

This portion of your position has no bearing at all on whether such licenses and permits should also provide preferential treatment from the Govt. in terms of access to entitlements and tax treatment. I still think we could remove all such preferential treatment related to marriage but perhaps entertain the idea of still issuing licenses to save the courts time.

In terms of the differrence between a married relationship and an unmarried (defacto) one: it ought not be the case that the a father of a child has any more or less obligation in the support of his children if the couple are married. Traditionally, a part of the history of marriage which I did not see mentioned in your link, unmarried women who got pregnant had no legal claim on the children's fathers at all ; Downton Abbey any one :-). There is a lot about traditional marriage and historic marriage laws that were barbaric and placed huge burdens on women and let men get a way with limited accountability for their behavior.

Many of the movements away from the traditionally legislative perspective on relationships only existing within marriage occurred in an effort to ensure reasonable support and accommodation for those who found themselves in identical situations as married people (eg. just had a baby and the father has left) but with no legal recourse to make claims. Such a shift is a positive move that makes partners in relationships much more accountable for there actions, even in the event they have no piece of paper that says marriage.

Relationships exist outside of marriage.

Many first world nations have dispensed with preferential treatment for relationships period... some have extended it to all relationships married, de-facto, homosexual.

Many first world nations no longer have marriage as the base legislative principle in dealing with relationship disputes and are still capable of resolving the issues relating to custody, partner support obligations, visiting rights, property rights, etc etc at the dissolution of the relationship.

Almost all of the first world nations who do this beat the US in educational standards and have dramatically lower imprisonment rates. (Thats right Wade, those countries have not descended into chaos).

Divorce rates are not at variance with the US, though marriage rates are lower so I am not sure this means much.

So, get rid of the marriage govt. entitlement. Use all the extra money to provide couples and families with free counseling when they are having problems, like the do in New Zealand. Wouldn't that really show you are serious about relationships?

Edited November 21, 2012 by Bikeemikey

[Calm]

in food industries you need a happy medium as we want no one getting sick or dying on account of bad beef from Alberta, I mean its Alberta! what else do they do all day besides meat stuff, oil junk and send a disporportionate amount of drivers to be on Canada's Worst Driver?

Mmmmm....Alberta beef.....

If you don't like Albertan drivers, please never move to Utah.

[Duncan]

Mmmmm....Alberta beef.....

If you don't like Albertan drivers, please never move to Utah.

i'll remember that!

[Robert F. Smith]

Yes. I believe the state has a compelling interest in getting involved in those relationships which might produce children or result in rearing them. Such interest extends only to heterosexual relationships as they are the ideal. A formerly married single parent, for example, represents this ideal as well since they have not entered into a less exemplary and more risky relationship.

I do not believe it necessary for the state to second guess such marriages in the sense of making sure there are children involved. The potential for such is good enough.

I'm not certain what that "compelling interest" of the state is and why you think it exists. More troubling is the high failure rate for heterosexual marriages, the low fertility rate (less than replacement) for much of that population and vast numbers of children in one-parent households. Moreover, tax law and other legal provisions punish people for being married.

[thesometimesaint]

Make them all Civil Unions and leave the marriage business to the churches.

[harfad]

Since marriage is a legal contract between two parties, and it is the job of the government to make and enforce laws, the government has a business of being involved in marriage. Marriage needs to be defined in law, and its interests protected; otherwise what could prevent someone from marrying the trees in his garden, and adopt the flowers in his flowerbed as his kids, and claim child benefit for them from the state?