Same-Sex Marriage Should Be Legal in the United States

The Charge of Question-BeggingRecall that in the previous rounds, I have attacked Pro's argument as being circular. In this round, Pro has attempted to defend his argument by appealing to the credibility of the Attorney General, the former Solicitor General, and various other federal judges. [1] However, other than this being an appeal to authority, I fail to see how this exonerates the charge of circularity from his argument. Appeals to equal protection and due process are inherently question-begging for to assert that same-sex couples should be allowed to marry because they are unjustly being denied a right is to presuppose that such a right exists. Issues regarding the burden of proof also depend on this notion.Pro has done nothing to attack this counter-argument, which as outlined before is that his argument begs the question by presupposing a certain conception of marriage to be true from the beginning. Before we can debate what marriage law should be, we first have to know the relevant facts. Pro is therefore putting the cart before the horse. As he has not responded to this, let me extend my arguments here. Let me remind the audience that if Pro's argument is circular, then his entire case falls apart.Regarding the assertion that same-sex relationships are not conducive to child-rearing, Pro's charge is simply false. I did indeed cite sources in the first footnote. That being said, this is being mentioned as an aside. Any and all appeals to social science are ultimately irrelevant to this debate. My argument appeals to procreative-type acts, not contingent statistical notions regarding child-rearing or the well-being of homosexuals.The State's Interest in MarriagePreviously, Pro appealed to Linette Scott's three criteria as being indicative of the state's interest in marriage. In response, I asked why should we take these criteria as being indicative of legal recognition. The fact that something may be good does not mean that it deserves legal recognition. Indeed, this was the focal point of my response to this particular argument. As far as I can tell, Pro has not responded to this. However, he did respond to the two parody arguments I raised. His responses to these fail as well. The relationship, decision-making, and economic conditions of two friends or college roommates would be greatly improved if we recognized their relationship as a marriage. So too would pet owners if we listed their pet as a child. Clearly these are rightly absurd. But examples aside, the salient question remains unanswered --- why should these be indicative of legal recognition? To be sure, all the criteria listed are good for society, but since when did something's being good for society automatically warrant the state in exending legal recognition? Pro's criteria, therefore, is unable to justify the state's interest in marriage. A fortiori, the reasons Pro outlined are in fact not the state's actual interests in recognizing marriage to begin with. As William Duncan points out, legal precedent "reveals four general interests that appear consistently: procreation, child rearing, tradition, and interstate uniformity." [2] Indeed, John Eastman has compiled an exhaustive list of court cases which support procreation as being the state's interest in marriage. [3]Defending the Procreation Argument1. Pro attacks the notion of marriage as based on procreative type acts as being "contrived and ad hoc" and that "entrenching heteronormative views into society is not a state interest." The charge of ad hocness is bizzare, as I have delivered a thorough argument as to why this conception of marriage makes better sense of the state's interest than Pro's conception of marriage. Moreover, nowhere did I argue that "entrenching heteronormative views" is a state interest. On that point then, Pro either has misunderstood my argument or is attacking a strawman.2. Pro argues that according to Turney v. Safley, procreation is not a necessary condition to marriage as prisoners are not permitted to have physical contact (and hence procreate). This, however, attacks a strawman. The prisoners may indeed be unable to procreate, but this has nothing to do with the conception of marriage Pro is attacking. This is only problematic if marriage is defined in terms of procreative effects, which is clearly not my position. Rather, marriage is based on procreative type acts (aka: Gender complementarity). The marriage of two prison inmnates remains a marriage even though they both know that it is impossible for them (state or prison laws) to procreate. 3. There is no self-contradiction going on. The state's interest in marriage is indeed procreation, and this remains true regardless of whether or not overpopulation obtains. As I argued previously, such a scenario would not undermine the state's interest in marriage, as the state would still recognize marriages for the point of affirming that conjugal marriage is the proper framework for procreation, even if procreation is not required at that particular moment. Procreation would thus remain as the state's interest.4. This is simply another strawman. Nowhere did I argue that same-sex marriage would harm the procreative function of heterosexual marriages. Indeed, I made this abundantly clear in the previous rounds. Moreover, Pro has failed to respond to my a fortiori counter-argument. I argued that "the state is not in the business of extending legal recognition fo relationships simply because those involved are emotionally commited to one another. Indeed, friendships can have the same level of love and fidelity as found in marriage, but obviously the state is not in the business of legally recognizing friendships."That being said, though I believe the statistics conclusively point the other way, any appeal to social science is a red herring. Not a single one of my arguments were based on sociological premises, hence social science is simply not applicable here.5. Apart from appealing to authority, Pro has not answered the charge that his argument begs the question. I hereby extend my argument here. As previously argued, the level of scrutiny employed by a court would depend first on what the relevant marriage facts are. Pro has not challenged this. As pointed out by Monte Stewart in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy: "[A] judge applying strict scrutiny will nevertheless sustain man-woman marriage against all constitutional attacks -- if she accepts the factual accuracy of the.... [conjugal] description.... At the same time, a judge applying the rational basis test will declare man-woman marriage unconstitutional -- if he accepts the factual accuracy of the [revisionist] description." [4] Pro has not responded to this nor the additional point I raised, which is that strict scrutiny is not the appropiate level of scrutiny that the courts should employ. As I pointed out earlier:"Moreover, as of late 2008 (I say this because the numbers may have changed slightly), there have only been three instances out of more than twenty cases in which appelate judges have decided that strict strutiny should be applied to conjugal marriage. The rest have held that rational basis review was either appropiate or could be applied." [5]ConclusionPro's argument remains question-begging. Once again, before we can appeal to notions of equal protection or due process, we first have to know the relevant facts of marriage. This will in turn help us to decide how equal protection or due process should be applied. Citing legal precendent, therefore, is only effective once we have established what marriage is. However, Pro has simply begged the question by assuming a certain conception of marriage as valid. Pro has dedicated much space to attacking my argument, but has done little in terms of defending his own argument except by appealing to authority. Sources: http://tinyurl.com...;