The Loving Corollary to Godwin’s Law

Those who frequent comment threads at blogs and news sites will be familiar with Godwin’s Law. For the uninitiated, Godwin’s Law basically says that in any comment thread, it’s virtually certain that someone will eventually make an analogy to Hitler and/or the Nazis, no matter what the topic.

There’s a corollary in the debate over so-called “same-sex marriage”. In any discussion of the topic, it’s a virtual certainty that someone arguing for the redefinition of marriage will bring up the Supreme Court case Loving vs. Virginia, and compare marriage being defined as male-female to anti-miscegenation laws.

But Loving vs. Virginia was strictly about racial discrimination. It had nothing to do with the definition of marriage, any more than making black people sit in the back of the bus was about the definition of “bus”, or segregated lunch counters were about the definition of “lunch” or “counter”.

As with society at large, the Virginia statute at issue in Loving presumed the essential male-female nature of marriage:

The Lovings were convicted of violating § 20-58 of the Virginia Code:

“Leaving State to evade law. — If any white person and colored person shall go out of this State, for the purpose of being married, and with the intention of returning, and be married out of it, and afterwards return to and reside in it, cohabiting as man and wife, they shall be punished as provided in § 20-59, and the marriage shall be governed by the same law as if it had been solemnized in this State. The fact of their cohabitation here as man and wife shall be evidence of their marriage.”

The Supreme Court ruled that the Virginia statute was a violation of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. The Justices presumed the 14th Amendment pertained to race, and that the violation was based solely on racial discrimination:

Because we reject the notion that the mere “equal application” of a statute containing racial classifications is enough to remove the classifications from the Fourteenth Amendment’s proscription of all invidious racial discriminations, we do not accept the State’s contention that these statutes should be upheld if there is any possible basis for concluding that they serve a rational purpose.

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In the case at bar, however, we deal with statutes containing racial classifications, and the fact of equal application does not immunize the statute from the very heavy burden of justification which the Fourteenth Amendment has traditionally required of state statutes drawn according to race.

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The clear and central purpose of the Fourteenth Amendment was to eliminate all official state sources of invidious racial discrimination in the States.

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There is patently no legitimate overriding purpose independent of invidious racial discrimination which justifies this classification.

The Court also presumed the basic procreative, male-female nature of marriage:

Marriage is one of the “basic civil rights of man,” fundamental to our very existence and survival.

The only rational basis for marriage being “fundamental to our very existence and survival” is due to certain basic facts of human biology and sexual reproduction.

But liberals aren’t seeking to redefine marriage because they think it violates the Constitution, they assert that it violates the Constitution because they want to redefine marriage. The various arguments and assertions are infinitely malleable because they’re entirely outcome-based. Still, they must be refuted. This one is easy to refute. Loving simply doesn’t provide any justification for redefining the institution of marriage. Loving had nothing to do with the definition of marriage.

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Democrats pushing social issues, not Republicans

The Democrats often assert that Republicans keep bringing up divisive social issues, ignoring the economy and jobs. And of course the establishment liberal media (the “DeMSM”) help their party to spread this false narrative.

Senator Charles Schumer was on ABC News This Week yesterday:

…Democrats are focused like a laser on jobs, the economy, and the middle class. Republicans, realizing that that’s not their strong suit, are going off on these other things, women’s issues and women’s health and contraception.

But of course that isn’t true. It was the Democrats who brought up contraception and made it an issue. It was the Obama Administration which chose to put the promise of a free contraceptive giveaway above the 1st Amendment guarantee of religious liberty.

Host George Stephanopoulos digressed by asking Senator Schumer about Bill Maher, but didn’t do anything to correct Schumer’s false premise, that Republicans had brought up the contraception issue. (Schumer didn’t express any opposition to Maher’s obscene misogyny, and said Obama’s super PAC shouldn’t return Maher’s million dollar donation. This tells us a lot about where their real values lie).

And also yesterday on Meet the Press, host David Gregory introduced a segment as a debate between social issues and economic issues:

And coming up here, a preview of the debate of the big issues in the fall campaign. Will social issues trump talk of the economy and job creation? Two of the nation’s top governors weigh in. Head of the Democratic Governors Association, Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley and head of the Republican Governors Association, Virginia Governor and Romney supporter Bob McDonnell.

Gregory opened with a question about the economy, asking (hopefully) if the improving job creation numbers over the past several months would help President Obama’s campaign. Governor O’Malley diverted the conversation to social issues:

GOV. O’MALLEY: …instead, under Governor Romney’s leadership, they ranked 47th out of 50 states in job creation. So I think you’re going to have a pretty clear contrast here. And if you look at the presidential campaign, I mean, let’s be honest, there’s been a lot more time spent pandering to the extreme right wing ideologues of the new Republican Party than has been spent talking about jobs and the economy. Rick Santorum in the Arizona debate mentioned the word jobs not once, not a single time. So I believe that the president is looking strong, is strong, is focused on the economy, and that’s going to carry him through this election.

“Pandering to the extreme right wing ideologues”. So much for Democrats’ civility.

Governor McDonnell tried to get back to the economy:

GOV. McDONNELL: Well, I think that’s a manufactured issue. I think the Democrats and this president are trying to do everything they can to take the issue off of jobs and the economy, debt, deficit, energy, because they don’t have a plan. I would say that Republican governors have had something to do with that [the lower unemployment rate]. The seven out of the 10 states with the lowest unemployment rates are governed by Republican governors. …

David Gregory continued trying to steer the conversation back to social issues, while the Republican governor tried to stay focused on the economy:

MR. GREGORY: Let’s talk about social issues because in some cases in the, in the Republican race, this has overshadowed talk about the economy and you, in fact, in Virginia, have been at the center of some of this. You backed an abortion bill initially that included a very invasive procedure as part of an ultrasound [False. The bill didn’t require an invasive procedure, it merely required an ultrasound. We can always count on David Gregory to repeat Democratic Party talking points.] that the state would have required and then you backed off of that. Were you wrong to support that initially or did you simply back off because the political heat got turned up the way it did?

GOV. McDONNELL: No, I think–listen, that was one bill out of a thousand that we passed that was all focused on jobs and economic development, education, and a number of other things. That’s my agenda is restoring the American dream for people in Virginia. We’ve got the lowest unemployment rate in the Southeast and surpluses for two years. That’s what I’m doing. You know, this bill allows Virginia to join about 20 other–23 other states that have an ultrasound procedure.

MR. GREGORY: It’s actually only about seven that have these kind of procedures.

GOV. McDONNELL: No, but there’s 23 that require a, a, a woman to have an opportunity to see an ultrasound.

Gregory spent several more minutes pressing McDonnell on the issue, before turning to Democratic governor O’Malley:

MR. GREGORY: Do you think the sense that certainly Democrats are talking about and that some women feel that there is a growing assault on reproductive rights, can it become a more central issue in the race? Or is that going to become a side issue, as the governor says?

GOV. O’MALLEY: Well, I think the central issue in this race is creating jobs and expanding opportunity. I think these cultural–don’t like to use the term wars–these cultural divisive wedge issues, these sort of roll back of women’s rights, roll back of women’s access to contraception and other health, roll back of voting rights, roll back of workers rights, all of these things that take us back are not strengthening our economy and creating jobs. And I think that people start to see a pattern, David, emerging in states like Wisconsin, states like Ohio, states like Florida.

MR. GREGORY: Mm-hmm.

GOV. O’MALLEY: And sadly, recently even in Virginia, where these cultural issues are crowding out the things that really should concern us most.

GOV. O’MALLEY: Seven, seven out of 10–seven out of the best 10 states for creating 21st century jobs in science and technology, are governed by Democratic governors. Now Virginia, credit where credit is due, is one of those top states. The question is whether we’re making the right investments in jobs, education, more affordable college, that will keep Virginia in that top ranking in the future. Maryland’s there. We’re making college more affordable, we’re creating jobs at twice the rate of Virginia. And these cultural battles that drive people apart are not helpful to driving us forward.

MR. GREGORY: Do you think your counterpart here in Virginia would be a good running mate for Romney or would you cast him as an extremist?

But Governor O’Malley and his Democratic party comrades in the Maryland state legislature have in fact not been focusing on the economy. Governor O’Malley just signed into law a bill passed by the Democratic majority of the legislature which changed the definition of marriage in the state to include same-sex unions. They’ve spent a lot of time debating the issue.

And David Gregory, who had plenty of time to press the Republican Governor of Virginia on social issues, never even bothered to bring it up. A law requiring a major social change in the state of Maryland was signed by the Democratic governor just this month, and Mr. Gregory didn’t bother to bring it up, in a discussion about social issues.

Why didn’t David Gregory bring it up? Why didn’t he ask Mr. McDonnell if Mr. O’Malley is an “extremist”? These are of course rhetorical questions, because the discussion was premised on the idea that Republicans are the ones focusing on social issues, and Mr. O’Malley’s record doesn’t fit that narrative. So Gregory didn’t bring it up. An unbiased, professional journalist would not have made such an obvious omission.

“Same-sex marriage” as elite fashion statement

A good examination of the strange drive among liberal elites for “same-sex marriage”, via the UK Telegraph: Gay marriage is now the issue through which the elite advertises its superiority over the redneck masses

A question rarely asked about gay marriage is how it became such a massive flashpoint issue. … The speed and ease with which gay marriage has gone from being a tiny minority concern to become the No 1 battle in the modern culture wars has been truly remarkable – and revealing.

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The use of gay marriage as a platform from which to announce one’s superior moral sensibilities can be seen in the way that its backers, those ostensibly liberal reformers, look down with undiluted snobbery upon their critics and opponents. …

Or as one commenter at the NOM blog succinctly put it: “Supporting ssm is becoming no more than a fashion statement. Kinda like ‘going green.'”

Illegitimacy becoming the norm in the U.S. as Democrats work to undermine marriage

Via The Daily Caller:

Now more than half of all births to American women under 30 are born out of wedlock, and the trend in marriage-less birth is becoming an accepted reality of American life.

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A number of factors have led the the rising numbers of illegitimacy – which most researchers agree increases a child’s risk of emotional problems and falling into poverty – including, as The Times noted, economic factors that have thinned the number of available, marriageable men; a larger social safety net; and a more promiscuous society.

And liberals, Democrats, and activist liberal judges are working to undermine marriage further by redefining it, asserting that the institution is unrelated to having children – in Washington, New Jersey, New York, Maryland, and California, among other places.

We as a society can either decide that marriage is connected to having children (and that creating a child ought to occur within marriage) – and support that understanding in the law, or we can abandon that understanding and redefine marriage to mean nothing more than a collection of government benefits for “Spouse A” and “Spouse B”. We can’t have it both ways. The statements “marriage has nothing to do with procreation” and “people should get married before having children” are in obvious conflict.

UPDATE: More on the effects of illegitimacy here.

9th Circuit rules against marriage in California

The liberal 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in California has ruled against Proposition 8 in California, which defines marriage as between a man and a woman in the state constitution.

Right off the top, the 9th Circuit begins their ruling with a phony assertion: “Prior to November 4, 2008, the California Constitution guaranteed the right to marry to opposite-sex couples and same-sex couples alike.”

But the California Constitution says no such thing, and never did. And quite obviously, history did not begin in November 2008. Proposition 8 was offered in answer to a prior act of judicial fiat from the CA State Supreme Court overturning the definition of marriage in the form of a statute.

Reading the ruling, it’s pure value judgment, not legal reasoning. The court is simply substituting it’s values for those of millions of California voters. That is not the role of judges in a free, democratic society.

On the the Supreme Court, where hopefully this shameful judicial activism will be reversed.

From Ed Whelan at National Review Online:

In the grand scheme of things, there is nothing enduringly significant about today’s ruling. The Ninth Circuit was just a way-station on the path to the Supreme Court, and the composition of the Ninth Circuit panel meant that there was no prospect for a reversal of Walker’s ruling. What would have been most troubling would have been a ruling that Prop 8 proponents didn’t have standing on appeal, as that might have complicated the prospects for Supreme Court review. But the case now has a seemingly clear path to the Supreme Court.

From Alliance Defense Fund Senior Counsel Brian Raum:

“No court should presume to redefine marriage. No court should undercut the democratic process by taking the power to preserve marriage out of the hands of the people. Americans overwhelmingly reject the idea of changing the definition of marriage. Sixty-three million Americans in 31 state elections have voted on marriage, and 63 percent voted to preserve marriage as the timeless, universal, unique union between husband and wife.”

“We are not surprised that this Hollywood-orchestrated attack on marriage – tried in San Francisco – turned out this way. But we are confident that the expressed will of the American people in favor of marriage will be upheld at the Supreme Court. Every pro-marriage American should be pleased that this case can finally go to the U.S. Supreme Court. The ProtectMarriage.com legal team’s arguments align with every other federal appellate and Supreme Court decision on marriage in American history.”

Marriage: Appeals court to decide fate of Prop. 8 on Tuesday

Here’s a good example of liberal bias at work in news media coverage of a controversial issue, from the Los Angeles Times:

A federal appeals court is expected to rule Tuesday on the constitutionality of Proposition 8, the 2008 ballot measure that banned gay marriage in California.

But this is loaded language. It isn’t neutral reporting, it takes a side on the issue. Proposition 8 did not “ban gay marriage”. Proposition 8 defined marriage in the California state constitution as it has always been defined in state law, as male-female, in response to an activist court decision overturning that traditional definition. It didn’t ban anyone from marrying according to that definition.

The media do this kind of thing all the time, intentionally or not, using the language of the left in their reporting of various issues. If the editors of the Los Angeles Times want to support repeal of Proposition 8, they should say so on their Editorial page, not in their supposed news coverage.

The Libertarian Case for Traditional Marriage

Here is a nice concise summary of the case for marriage from Maggie Gallagher at the National Organization for Marriage.

There’s more reasoning in those two short pages than in a majority of the Washington State legislature.

And a lengthier article on the same subject by Jennifer Roback Morse.

Marriage is a naturally occurring, pre-political institution that emerges spontaneously from society. “Marriage equality” is sometimes presented as an enlargement of personal liberty and a diminishment of the power of the state. In fact however, redefining marriage as the union of any two persons, abandons the natural view of marriage. The institution of natural marriage, one man and one woman, is more consistent with a society of free and responsible individuals, governed by a constitutionally limited state, than the alternatives.

Both via the NOM Blog.

Obama Supports, Opposes “Same-Sex Marriage” at Same Time, Lapdog Press Goes Along

It’s hard to choose which is more ridiculous, President Obama’s continuing disingenuous double-talk regarding so-called “same-sex marriage”, or the willingness of so-called “journalists” to go along with the game.

After Obama’s press conference today, we get this bizarre abuse of language in a headline from the Los Angeles Times: Obama praises New York on same-sex marriage [sic] but won’t endorse it

The story doesn’t do much to clarify the difference between “praise” and “endorse”:

The president has been on the record as opposing same-sex marriage [sic], but Wednesday, he attempted, as he has previously, to attempt to carefully navigate a middle position. At a news conference at the White House East Room, he lauded the recent move by the New York Legislature to legalize the practice, calling it “a good thing.”

So the president himself, out of his own mouth, calls it “a good thing”, but he doesn’t endorse it. Crystal clear. The Times doesn’t really explain what the “middle position” is between endorsing and praising that Obama attempted to attempt to carefully navigate. Maybe “praise” means he’s for it (but not really, bigoted hick voters of middle America, wink, wink), and “endorse” means he marries a man himself. What, he’s already married, you say? Stop being so judgmental – what are you, the Taliban?

Maybe the Times will clarify further in their next Obama campaign press release.

The L.A. Times concludes:

But as his reelection campaign heats up, Obama gave no sign that he will move toward openly embracing same-sex marriage [sic], a priority for gay and lesbian advocates.

Really? For this supposedly “professional journalist”, saying the redefinition of marriage “is a good thing” gives no sign, none at all, that Obama openly embraces the redefinition?

It cannot be that journalists are that gullible. They’re obviously, dare we say “openly”, participating in a transparent ruse to try to fool some voters going into the next campaign.

The Times piece ends with a real confidence-builder from the president:

“I’ll keep giving you the same answer until I give you a different one,” he told one reporter.

Real Marriage Loses in New York

So last night the state legislature of New York chose to radically redefine marriage in their state law away from its most basic roots as a male-female institution. Worse, they chose to ignore the rights of individuals to follow their own consciences and reject this new definition according to their own values and religious views. They included some window-dressing protections for religious organizations in order to fool a few more legislators into voting for the bill, but no protections for individuals.

This is a sad day for America. But the fight must go on to keep the contagion from spreading further into other states.

The unmarried Governor of NY, Andrew Cuomo, who pushed very hard to destroy the institution he obviously has no respect for himself, claimed after the vote, “… The other states look to New York for the progressive direction.”

This is just arrogant nonsense, of course. No one outside of New York looks to New York for anything but a cautionary example.

It’s obviously too late now to convince those “Republicans” who voted yes to change their votes, but cutting them off and running them out of office can serve as a strong example for wishy-washy Republicans in other jurisdictions. The fight must continue in (hopefully) more sensible places than New York.

What makes marriage, marriage?

Via the American Power blog, we found this excellent post from last August on the definition of marriage from Sense of Events:

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All of which is to say that the accidental characteristics of marriage – love, affection, property and other rights – spring from what marriage is rather than define what marriage is. Therefore, whatever relationship homosexuals may have with one another, and whatever legal rights civil authority may confer upon them, marriage is inherently – indeed, metaphysically – the province only of men and women united in matrimony.

Well worth a read.