Legalizing Gay Marriage is Overall Bad Public Policy

THE DUE PROCESS CLAUSE I actually would agree with CON here in some sense. Marriage has never been a static institution that has stayed exactly the same throughout history. There has been many elements to it that have change and some of those aspects have already been mentioned by CON. However, There are important elements from the institution of marriage that have ,for most part, remained constant for milleniums. For instance, 'marriage has always entailed more than a mere "contract". Marriage involves not just a couple, but extended family members, non-blood relations, and impersonal third parties like the church, state, or tribe. Marriage has always required an intention for a life-long commitment. Most importantly, Marriage has always contained the expectation of fertility' [1]. Here is an example from U.S. law of what I mean: In Murphy v. Ramsey (1885) the U.S. Supreme Court stated: "[C]ertainly no legislation can be supposed more wholesome and necessary in the founding of a free, self-governing commonwealth, fit to rank as one of the coordinate state of the Union, than that which seeks to establish it on the basis of the idea of the family, as consisting in and springing from the union for life of one MAN and one WOMAN in the holy state of matrimony; the sure foundation of all that is stable and noble in our civilization; the best guaranty of the reverent morality which is the source of all beneficent progress in social and political improvement." This quote is an example of why the U.S. Supreme Court themselves has always defined marriage to be between a man and a woman for the continuation of society. Its also why never made any inferences or signs that the fundamental right to marry included same sex marriage. In fact, the Supreme Court rejected the existence of such a definitions or right in the past and said there is no fundamental right to gay marriage . After the Loving decision, The U.S. Supreme Court in Baker v. Nelson in 1972 regarding the issue of Same sex marriage endorsed a Minnesota supreme court decision. There are also plenty of state and federal courts that mention Baker as a U.S. SCOTUS ruling , so I encourage everyone to look up this source to find out for yourself why I am telling the truth [2]. The case will show you that the same court in Loving v Virginia not only distinguished same sex marriage from interracial marriage, but established it as a right that does not exist under the constitution and never did. They also rejected and refuted many of the same arguments gay activists make today [3]: "The institution of marriage as a union man and woman, uniquely involving the procreation and rearing of children within a family, is as old as the book of Genesis. Skinner V. Oklahoma ex rel. Williamson, 316 U.S. 535, 541, 62 S.Ct. 1110, 1113, (1942), which invalidated Oklahoma's Habitual Criminal Sterilization Act on equal protection grounds, stated in part: "Marriage and procreation are fundamental to the very existence and survival of the race." This historic institution manifestly is more deeply founded than the asserted contemporary concept of marriage and societal interests for which petitioners contend. The due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment is not a charter for RESTRUCTURING it by judicial LEGISLATION." Universal Declaration of Human rights: "Article 16 1.Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a FAMILY. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution. 3.The FAMILY is the NATURAL and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State. " [4] As you can see, Marriage wouldn't be "fundamental" to the "existence" and "survival" of humanity if it was completely delinked from procreation or had nothing to do with reproductive potential. Marriage is the regulation of procreation and rearing of children. In addition, If you noticed from the Universal Declaration, it never said without any limitation due to GENDER and the ARTIFICIAL family. EQUAL PROTECTION CLAUSE Discrimination: " The equal protection clause is not intended to provide "equality" among individuals or classes but only "equal application" of the laws. The result, therefore, of a law is not relevant so long as there is no discrimination in its application. By denying states the ability to discriminate, the equal protection clause of the Constitution is crucial to the protection of civil rights. Generally, the question of whether the equal protection clause has been violated arises when a state grants a particular class of individuals the right to engage in an activity yet denies other individuals the same right." [5] 1. Sex Equality Bans on interracial marriage were about the segregation of protected classes ,which has been deemed in the Brown decision to be another form of discrimination. When it comes to the Sexes, The Supreme Court has never ruled integration to be a form of discrimination. Thus, there is no discrimination between the sexes because men and woman can equally marry someone of the opposite sex. 2. Sexual Orientation Equality Traditional marriage laws do not violate the equal protection clause because providing a separate institution like civil unions to same sex couples has been deemed constitutional on basis of sex (with some conditions of course). For example, We have separate but equal situations for men and women that permeate our country ranging from restrooms, the military, prisons, sport teams, and even separate but equal public schools. We have this even though women are a minority that historically have been discriminated against. In a case called Vorcheimer v. Philadelphia school District, the Supreme Court ruled, that "Separate" is essentially "Equal". As long as each gender equally has a choice in going to both schools for both genders and that, interests in creating separateness based on the biological differences grounded in sex and GENDER are a legitimate state interests.[6] In United States v. Virginia , the court agreed with this rationale as well: "Had Virginia made a genuine effort to devote comparable public resources to a facility for women, and followed through on such a plan, it might well have avoided an equal protection violation."[7]"it is not the 'exclusion of women' that violates the Equal Protection Clause, but the maintenance of an all-men school without providing any -- much less a comparable -- institution for women... It would be a sufficient remedy, I think, if the two institutions offered the same quality of education and were of the same overall caliber." Obviously, this has been deemed constitutional because there is a fundamental difference between race and sex. This is why we no longer have bans on interracial marriage or have Jim Crow laws but still have and always accepted apartheid for the sexes and define marriage between one man and one woman. Therefore, there is no reason to think that gay unions will also be viewed or treated inferior in practice or in principle, especially when the term "civil unions" by itself is simply a neutral term without meaning not a negative one. Unless CON can show that all or majority of the states that have civil unions for same sex couples were unable to provide the same rights and have failed to enforce their civil union laws, separate but equal is a valid compromise and does not infringe on the principles of equality. [1] http://www.law.harvard.edu... p.950 [2] http://en.wikipedia.org... [3] http://www.cas.umt.edu... [4] http://en.wikipedia.org... [5] http://www.law.cornell.edu... [6] http://law.justia.com... [7] http://en.wikipedia.org...