THE ORIGINS OF MARRIAGE
Andrew Sullivan and others have shifted their tactics on gay marriage, arguing that it's not a religious ceremony or institution (they use the word "sacrament" in their arguments to separate it from Communion and other acts of worship) and thus religious teachings should carry no weight when defining it.That's a curious position to take.
Did marriage originate with the Constitution? Or the Federalist papers? Or the Declaration of Independence? Nope. Marriage obviously existed long before any of those documents came to codify American values.
How about the Mayflower Compact? The Magna Charta? Nope. Marriage was around long before them too.
Marriage as an institution began, at least in written form relevant to our culture, in an explicitly religious context: The Bible.
Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
--Genesis 2:24
Genesis is about 5,000 years old, give or take a few centuries. The Western concept of marriage springs from this text--the Bible has defined Western morality for nearly 2,000 years and it defined morality for the Jews for thousands of years prior. Other cultures allowed and continue to allow for all sorts of other arrangements--multiple wives or husbands, concubines, etc, but the Biblical definition is one man and one woman joined forever. Many Biblical personalities defied this, which nearly always resulted in family conflict and chaos. The Biblical standard nonetheless is one man and one woman joined forever, and that standard is the basis for Western culture's understanding of marriage.
Before there was a Constitution or a Supreme Court, before there was even a "West" to have a culture, there was marriage, set out as a covenant between a man and a woman. The argument that marriage is purely a civil institute is bogus. Marriage was set out long before there was much distinction between civil and secular authority. The argument that it's anything other than a man-woman covenant is likewise bogus. Further, this one sentence from Genesis encapsulates much about marriage that we take for granted but seldom discuss. Leaving the parents' household, or leaving their authority, is part of marriage, but not everyone does it. How many marriages have been spoiled because the husband or wife refused to leave their parents (either in terms of moving to a new household or in terms of emotionally leaving behind that relationship to wholly devote themselves to their marriage)? How many family squabbles can be traced back to the simple idea that, once you're married, that relationship takes precedence over the old family ties? The failure to cut the strings from mommy and daddy's opinions and authority is often the root of marital conflict. And becoming one flesh--quickie, no-fault divorces have severely undermined that concept to the point that it's almost meaningless. But in the eyes of the law it still holds true to some extent. Husbands and wives can be held accountable for the debts incurred by their spouses. The concept of "community property" is derived from the "one flesh" idea. Children are literally and figuratively the result of the joining of the flesh, and in an ideal family they may look equally to the mother and father as one in terms of authority and instruction. Marital breakups usually even acknowledge the "one flesh" concept, else alimony and child support would not exist. They recognize that, though the marriage itself be dissolved, some obligations remain.
Gay marriage is, just by going back to the original source by which the institution is defined for our culture, a redefining of the institution and thus an alteration to our culture. It's hard to say how allowing it will affect society, but it will. The only question is to what extent.
We are a secular society, and that is for the most part a good thing, but this most basic institution springs from deeply religious roots. To say otherwise is to lie.
MORE: It isn't often that we have our darkest suspicions confirmed in an op-ed column, but it's happened today. Many, myself included, suspect that the gay marriage fight is really about destroying marriage and thus the family as an institution. In his Slate column today, pinhead pundit Michael Kinsley advocates abolishing marriage. He thinks it will settle the gay marriage debate once and for all. Perhaps, but in passing he alludes to the chaos that will undoubtedly follow such a move, trivializing it with a couple of hand waves.
That chaos won't be trivial, not by a long stretch. Consider health benefits derived from employment. Corporations today operate their benefit plans according to commonly understood definitions of family. A husband or wife's benefits package is almost always extended to the spouse and children as well as anyone under their legal guardianship. Erasing the legal bond of marriage, as Kinsley proposes as a way of settling the gay marriage debate, confuses who may and may not receive such benefits. Corporations draw lines around potential coverage to keep a lid on costs. It's no stretch at all to imagine one partner in a three- or four-way polyamorous non-marriage attempting to force his employer to cover not only all of his partners, but all of their children as well--even those to whom the employee has no biological or legal bond. If parent-child bonds are dissolved in the wake of abolishing marriage, anyone could designate anyone else for coverage just by establishing some tenuous relationship. After one or two lawsuits demanding such coverage, corporations will conclude that they either have to cover anyone who demands it (because you can't prove that Jimmy isn't Gary's "wife" without dropping in on their bedroom or forcing them to undergo invasive physical examination, and they have no legal relationship because marriage no longer exists as a legal concept) or drop health benefit plans altogether. Corporations will most often choose the latter, especially in tight economic times. Which at least in the short run will force more people to rely on government services, which would in turn become confused as to who may and may not benefit from things like Social Security. Without marriage as a legal Framework, the same three- or four-way polyamorous "husband" may declare anyone as a beneficiary to his Social Security account, and may likewise cut off anyone who actually deserved the coverage with a simple declaration.
Without some legal frame of reference what should the state do if, for instance, a "husband" declares in his will that the woman he has lived with for 60 years, and with whom he has raised four children, is not in fact his "wife" and shouldn't get his remaining Social Security benefit or take possession of their shared estate which happens to be in his name on the books? She has no legally binding proof that he did anything other than copulate with her four times (and her proof is only legally acceptable if blood tests have been done to ascertain paternity), and no legal standing to claim anything that didn't already have her name on it. In the age of Photoshop, a lifetime of family photographs won't cut it--they could easily be fakes. Even circumstantial evidence won't work if he declares in front of any third party at any time that she isn't his wife--she will have no legal standing if marriage isn't itself a legal concept. A certificate from the local Wal-Mart won't have any legal standing either--the couple could have bought dozens of them during their non-marriage, but not a one will make a bit of difference in the eyes of the law if marriage is legally dead.
To put it bluntly, the state needs marriage, if for no other reason than to greatly simplify its dealings with citizens. Without legally recognized marriage, things could get extremely unstable and crazy in parent-child relationships. Today, the concept of a parent is understood in most instances to be both a biological as well as a legal bond. Parents--biological or adopted--have preeminent rights when deciding nearly all things concerning the minor children under their care, even over their children's own wishes. Where applicable, both parents have equal say over their children in the eyes of the law. But why should this be? If the marriage bond itself is no longer recognized by the state, what then should we do with biological bonds between parent and child? In the absence of consent, the only legally consistent thing to do would be to dissolve them too, because giving biological bonds preeminence without the child's consent discriminates against anyone who cannot naturally procreate in the normal course of their chosen relationship. Marriage would have been abolished to end the discriminatory practice of limiting it to its traditional man-woman definition. Consistency would demand we do the same to parent-child relationships.
Abolishing the family would also open yet another door for men to escape their obligations to the children they sire and the women with whom they sire them--don't petition for legal rights and you're not the father, even if you are the biological father (can't discriminate based on biology). Since you aren't and could never be the husband, you have no potential obligations to the mother unless you volunteer, or if you are automatically obligated then so is everyone else (it's only fair). For irresponsible men, it's abortion without the murder. Husbands or wives might have to adopt one another in order to maintain the family structure for the purpose of taxes, property and so forth. All of this makes the state supremely powerful in all aspects of life, at the expense of even our most intimate relationships.
What effect will this have? It's hard to say, but with respect to the state it would likely atomize society. Children would have no legal parental shield from the state, thus giving the state legal authority to do practically anything it wants with them. Parents, having no legal bond between them, would have to go through all sorts of crazy legal contortions--defining themselves as a "class" or some such--in order to jointly fight anything the state does or anything anyone does to them as a family. In today's climate, it's not hard to imagine one child directly suing another for bullying or sexual harassment on the playground, with the defendant's parents powerless to do anything about it. Adults could potentially sue children, too.
I've offered some strange, contorted scenarios, but in a marriage-free world they are all possibilities. Organizations like the Children's Defense Fund already attack parental rights as a matter of course, and the state already has great leeway to remove children from homes that it has deemed unfit for almost any reason. Abolishing marriage in order to keep from hurting a tiny minority's feelings would just exacerbate and energize these tendencies. Parenting and habitation could become little more than a square dance between partners, homes and "families" if marriage itself is abolished as a legal concept.
Kinsley's proposition to abolish marriage--born of the gay marriage debate--is so potentially destructive it's difficult to put into words. That he so glibly, thoughtlessly proposes it says much about his attitude toward society. He would tear it all down to appease a tiny minority. I suspect Kinsley is playing devil's advocate, offering up abolition as a red herring and then, when that is rejected, countering with gay marriage as a compromise. It's an extremely cynical tactic, but apparently nothing is out of bounds if you're dead set on legalizing gay marriage.
MORE: Maybe Kinsley's abolition proposal is less of a tactical (as opposed to a principled) move than I thought. Reason's Hit & Run notes that libertarians got out ahead of him and proposed the same thing. And libertarians wonder why no one outside their movement really takes them seriously. Abolishing marriage has to be the singularly most idiotic proposal I've heard in a very, very long time.