Dear Subscriber
I read today that there is a move afoot to reverse the Supreme Court’s ruling on gay marriage.
Seems zealots want to take advantage of the recent ruling on abortion.
Marriage is a medical issue. It sets up tranquility, security, stability, medical decisions, end of life matters, etc. in people’s lives.
Unfortunately, the issue was labeled as “marriage”. The real issue is state recognition of a civil contract of union. I happen to think the issue, unlike abortion, is found in the Constitution.
Remember, marriage is a contract. It has always been held so. Two provisions in the Constitution support the right of two people to civilly contract and hence, to unite.
The first is the ban in the constitution on the state impairing the obligation of contract. (Article 1 section 10). That is clear. The 14th amendment guarantees equal protection.
I don’t like how the 14th amendment has been used. It was ratified to reverse the Dred Scott decision and protect the newly freed slaves. The court has expanded it beyond its intent. Nevertheless, the concept of equal protection in firmly embedded in our system.
Years ago, there used to be blue laws in southern and other states. Personal sexual behavior was regulated, even between a heterosexual married couple. To me, that is simply nuts. They have a marriage contract. How does the state step in when there is no injury or complaint by either? Even sex between two consenting adults without a paper contract is a verbal contract. What goes on behind their closed doors by consent is theirs.
Now comes gay “marriage”. I believe that term has further implication than simply a contract of union between two people and the problem comes by imposing that term on a large segment of the population, who read the Bible one way (their right to do) and seek to impose their Bible understanding on the two attempting to contract. Using the state to enforce this might be a violation of the first amendment. Many people are not Bible believers and they don’t have to be. For them, using Biblical sources to proscribe their contracts would be a violation of Amendment 1. I believe the state’s obligation is to protect that civil contract of union, survivorship, inheritance, etc. There are only two people involved.
I can see where abortion is different since a third human life is involved and does not involve a contract that does not impact another beyond the two. That is a far greater ignition source, since you will never be able to solve the square root of minus one (when life begins) between differing groups of people.
As I mentioned, my homosexual patients generally were aligned with this philosophy of keeping the matter away from terms of ignition. Get the term “marriage” out of the equation. What matters is boiling it down to “rights” of the union, not what government calls the union. I am hopeful that those looking at these matters will consider it this way and head off a potential needless controversy. I believe the Supreme Court DOES have the right to protect the civil union of any 2 people as a Constitutionally protected contract. I believe the central government has the right and power to recognize those contracts just as it does for heterosexual couples. Some people might be surprised about this alternative take.
To Your Excellent Health,
Robert Jay Rowen, MD
I certainly appreciate your comment. I invite dissent. You were relatively respectful in your viewpoint. We will agree to disagree. I don't like the term "marriage" across the board. The issue is the government respecting the will of two people to contract for property, survivorship, medical matters, etc. That deals with acceptance of "civil contract". I strongly believe that any two people can do this (civil contract). Past societies did not have such interlocking laws, regulations, restrictions as we have today, which requires some kind of contract to overcome now.
Regards to multiple partners, what two ADULT people consent to do behind closed doors (say, a contract of open marriage) is their business, not mine. I have a female wife and a monogamous marriage. That is our choice, and what I believe in. I will not judge others.
Sorry, I understand the contract argument, I understand the equal treatment of all people. But...marriage should be confined between two distinct sexes, not the same sex. Why? Because marriage is also compliant with natural law. There is nothing in nature that aligns the same sex to propagate the human race. Marriage is for that reason, it has, or it is, the longest ruining contract in our history. It uses the natural process of child bearing and upbringing of children that same sex partnerships cannot preform, no matter what science they may use to justify their perverted arrangement.
Yes, perverted, and that is exactly what their practice is, a perversion of nature itself. This is undeniable. Same sex marriage is a railroad spur, it leads nowhere. It has no value to further humans, it does not create new humans. It is a selfish arrangement that should be outside of the traditional marriage arrangement.
Secondly, we have now seen, and as I and many others predicted, that gay marriage would be the springboard to all types of nasty perversions that many of us have not even considered. Take for instance the currant push to make child sex with an adult, same sex or not, a legal or natural practice.
Are you going to write later that this should also be considered a right as an individual? How about having multiple mates in marriage. There is now a push for that too. And on and on. All the perversions that have been hidden are now surfacing because of the failure of mostly right wing people, conservatives, that have taken the position you just wrote.
What you and others have done is open a pandora's box of further lifestyle perversions that will now attempt to be legally normalized because of the gay marriage allowance into society. You bought the nonsense that since two people love each other they should be equal under the law, no matter if they are the same sex. Do you really believe the framers of the Constitution believed this idea?
Further, this whole notion that traditional marriage is a religious based contract is idiotic. All races, all religions, atheistic organizations, communistic non-god nations, have all used traditional marriage of one man one women. Even tribes of traditional people for eons use the same traditional underpinnings of their societies.
The main reason religious ceremonies were preformed for centuries by religious organizations is because there was no other governmental authority that validated that arrangement. The church or the different religious organizations codified marriage for the benefit of their societies. None of them included same sex, no matter the religious organization. As governments moved in to take over this process that same applied.
Your attempt to justify this inane ruling by the Supreme Court has the direct result of dumbing down the morality of society. Much as the effect did in the waning years of prior empires. Maybe this is the natural consequence of the fall of America, maybe we should just let it happen and let America go the way of Rome and other great nations as they cycle through history of one nation taking the place of another. Maybe this is the natural course that we should allow to happen. If so, you have the happy prospect of knowing your role in the destruction of great institutions.