Gay Marriage should be Illegal (6)

Opening ArgumentHere is my first argument, lets call it the you need a good reason to make and keep something illegal argument. P1) Freedom is our defaultP2) You need a good reason to make something IllegalC) If a law exists that does not have a good reason for making something illegal, then the law should be changed so the thing is no longer illegalPremise 1) Freedom is our defaultWhat I mean by saying that freedom is our default is that there is and should be a presumption in favour of liberty when considering what should and should not be illegal. The presumption in favour of liberty is the cornerstone of Western societies. "This might be called the Fundamental Liberal Principle(Gaus, 1996: 162-166): freedom is normatively basic, and so the onus of justification is on those who would limit freedom, especially through coercive means. It follows from this that political authority and law must be justified, as they limit the liberty of citizens. " [1]The alternative would be that freedom is NOT our default. If freedom was not our default then you couldn't even go to the bathroom or make a sandwich until it had been justified that you should be allowed to do so. Premise 2) You need a good reason to make something illegalI suppose we could just have rules based on the whims of a king or tyrant, but I doubt Pro will argue against this premise. Mill too argued that ‘the burden of proof is supposed to be with those who are against liberty; who contend for any restriction or prohibition" [1]The alternative would be that you DON'T need a good reason to make something illegal. Conclusion) If a law exists that does not have a good reason for making something illegal, then the law should be changed so the thing is no longer illegalThe State & the Harm Principle"The harm principle holds that the actions of individuals should only be limited to prevent harm to other individuals. John Stuart Mill first articulated this principle in On Liberty, where he argued that "the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. "[2]"According to the harm principle, if gay marriage doesn't cause harm to others, then there is no grounds to make it illegal. I think I should also address something about the harm principle, its not enough to ban something just because its not beneficial to the state. The state allows lots of things which are not beneficial to the state even when applying the harm principle for example smoking, obesity etc. Arguable these things are even harmful, but ultimately they harm the individual more and not the general public as such the state is not justified in banning it according to the harm principle. Like wise it may be the case that gay marriage is not beneficial to the state but that still isn't enough to justify the banning of gay marriage. Closing RemarksIf Pro agrees freedom is our default when considering these matters, and you need a good reason to make something illegal then Pro will have to provide a good reason to make gay marriage illegal. Until then the resolution is not affirmed. I look foward to Pros opening argument. Sources [1] . http://plato.stanford.edu...[2] . http://en.wikipedia.org...