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The Supreme Court recently granted review of two lower-court decisions that were hostile to the core male-female nature of marriage. The future of marriage in this country is at stake in these cases. And so, ultimately, are the rights of faithful Catholics to participate fully in public life.
One case (United States v. Windsor) involves the federal Defense of Marriage Act. DOMA was adopted by overwhelming majorities in both houses of Congress — with votes from many supporters of homosexual rights, like then-Sen. Joe Biden — and was signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1996. For purposes of provisions of federal law only (such as those governing health benefits for federal employees), DOMA defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman. At the same time, and consistent with principles of federalism, DOMA leaves states free to redefine marriage as they see fit.
In 2011, the Obama administration irresponsibly abandoned its duty to defend DOMA. This past October a federal appellate court in New York issued a badly confused ruling holding that DOMA violates the Constitution by not extending federal benefits to same-sex couples who are "married" under New York law. Same-sex "marriage" advocates pretend that their DOMA challenge involves only the authority of the federal government. But if the federal government can’t define marriage as a male-female union for purposes of provisions of federal law, then all the similar marriage laws in the states would also be unconstitutional.
The second case (Hollingsworth v. Perry) concerns the constitutionality of California’s Proposition 8. In 2008, after the state Supreme Court had invented a state constitutional right to same-sex "marriage," California voters adopted Proposition 8 to restore the traditional definition of marriage. Same-sex couples sued to invalidate Prop. 8, claiming that it violated the federal Constitution.
The saga of the anti-Prop. 8 lawsuit would make an unbelievable novel. No federal district judge has ever committed more egregious acts of malfeasance and manifest bias in a case than Vaughn Walker. In the end, Judge Walker concocted a federal constitutional right to same-sex "marriage" and based that right on a set of absurd factual findings. Only after he finished with the case and retired did he disclose that he was in the midst of a long-term same-sex relationship — which means that he had been ruling on his own legal right to marry his same-sex partner.
To compound the farce: The Ninth Circuit ruling on appeal, which also held Prop. 8 to be unconstitutional, was written by notorious liberal activist Stephen Reinhardt. Judge Reinhardt’s wife, Ramona Ripston, directed an American Civil Liberties Union affiliate that filed briefs in support of the Prop. 8 challengers in the same case and publicly rejoiced over Judge Walker’s ruling. Yet Judge Reinhardt somehow refused to disqualify himself from deciding the appeal. Then, in a transparent effort to evade Supreme Court review, he ruled that Prop. 8 was invalid on the narrower (but infirm) ground that it took away a right that the state Supreme Court had previously conferred.
The Supreme Court ought to reverse both the DOMA ruling and the Prop. 8 ruling when it decides these cases at the end of June 2013. Under any sensible interpretation, the Constitution simply does not speak, one way or the other, to the question of same-sex "marriage," but instead leaves the matter to the realm of representative government for decision — to each state to determine its own marriage laws and to Congress to determine what marriage means in provisions of federal law.
Alas, the fact that the constitutional questions in these cases are easy is no guarantee that the Supreme Court will get them right. Where, as with same-sex "marriage," so many members of the academic, legal, and media elites hold such strong policy preferences and vituperatively disparage those who dare to disagree, some justices may well be sorely tempted to entrench the position of the elites as a newly discovered constitutional right. Plus, the court’s previous power grabs provide precedents that could readily be manipulated to rationalize further intrusions on representative government. So there is a very real prospect that the four liberal justices and the justice in the middle, Anthony Kennedy, could vote to strike down both DOMA and Prop. 8.
Such rulings would, I believe, threaten disastrous long-term consequences.
The collapse of our marriage culture in recent decades — a collapse that heterosexuals are largely responsible for — has brought with it all the social pathologies associated with divorce, out-of-wedlock births and single-parent families. Over the long term, the American experiment in ordered liberty cannot flourish amidst this collapse. It is time for all Americans to work to restore our marriage culture and to re-establish the inherent link between marriage and responsible procreation and child-rearing, rather than to redefine marriage to deny that vital link.
Catholic institutions and faithful Catholics are at special risk. The logic and rhetoric deployed in support of same-sex "marriage" depict supporters of traditional marriage as the moral equivalent of racist bigots. If a Supreme Court majority indulges that libel, those organizations and individuals who embrace the Church’s teaching will in the coming years be stigmatized, marginalized and penalized on matters ranging from educational admissions and employment to professional licenses, accreditations and tax-exempt status.
All Americans should hope and pray that the Supreme Court doesn’t take a huge step in the wrong direction.
Ed Whelan is president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington
and is a regular contributor to National Review Online’s Bench Memos blog.
Tim Drake: Register Radio: Catholics in Politics and the Darkside of Disclosure Laws
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“. . . the Constitution simply does not speak, one way or the other, to the question of same-sex marriage but instead leaves the matter to the realm of representative government for decision — to each state to determine its own marriage laws and to Congress to determine what marriage means in provisions of federal law.”
But when DOMA was passed it set a new precedent asserting that the federal government could refuse to recognize that what a state recognized as a valid marriage was a valid marriage for purposes of federal law. Has DOMA passed a constitutional test in the Supreme Court prior to this?
If DOMA is confirmed as constitutional you could easily have a situation where half the states or more recognize same-sex marriage as valid while people married under state law are still taxed and receive benefits as unmarried under federal law. Granted, it would be paradise for lawyers and accountants, but the court challenges would be unending. What would be the social benefit of maintaining this formal tension? Especially since the rising generation Just Doesn’t Care?
If the social pathologies of divorce and the decline of marriage culture (which I agree are terrible social pathologies) are related to the acceptance and presence of gay marriage, then why is divorce lowest and marriage strongest in the states where gay marriage is legal? Massachusettes has HALF the divorce rate of most southern states. Sure, a lower proportion of adults are married in the Northeast, but this is because they DELAY marriage (which also correlates with low divorce) not eliminate it.
Divorce is also lowest - by far - among the socio-economic class most accepting of gay marriage: well educated adults, who have less than half the divorce rate of non-college educated adults. The rate of illegitimacy among the children of college educated women is in the single digits.
If gay marriage has a relation to divorce, then why has divorce been going down since gay marriage has gained acceptance, reversing the divorce spike of the 60s and 70s?
There is no denying the decline of marriage culture is a disaster among the working class and in the southern region of the United States, and this is a horrible social tragedy. But to even relate it to gay marriage flies in the face of the evidence.
Marriage culture is the strongest among educated, upper middle class Americans and Northeasterners. It is incredibly strong. Most college educated young people expect to marry (even if after a lengthy single period in their 20s), they will likely succeed at marriage, and bearing illegitimate children is still considered one of the WORST things you can do, anathema, even if your family is not religious. This demographic is also largely supportive of gay marriage.
And legal gay marriage does not mean sacramental gay marriage. OF COURSE the Sacrament can only be between a man and a woman, just as of course the sacrament cannot be dissolved, even with liberal secular divorce laws. But I see no reason why secular gay marriage should concern Catholics or those who care about American families. Gay marriage is accepted in some religions, and denying them the right to live according to their faith is a denial of their Religious Liberty.
My family lives in a state with legal gay marriage, and it has NO effect on our ability to be a good Catholic family, in relationships with other good Catholic families. It isn’t even noticable. We have a wonderful culture of marriage among both religious and secular people where we live. But then everyone we know has at least a Bachelors, and most have advanced degrees.
I think if we want to strengthen families, we need to look to economic solutions to the destruction of the working class, and promote the benefit of marriage there. Secular gay marriage is just a phantom windmill to tilt at.
I suspect that SCOTUS will overturn both. BUT, if they don’t, the states will be inundated with gay marriage votes to overturn the 30 constitutional bans in place. California will have a vote to overturn prop 8 and the Catholic Church won’t be able to win all or most of the votes. Your Mormon alies in prop 8 are gone after the beating they took in the publics view.
The church will allow to continue to discriminate, no problem. But the public will know they do it. Young people won’t understand the animus you show to gays.
“The logic and rhetoric deployed in support of same-sex “marriage” depict supporters of traditional marriage as the moral equivalent of racist bigots.” This is exactly correct. Why wouldn’t they? Where would they be wrong in that claim?
Well, In June the battle will continue with a win for some and a loss for others. May what is best for humanity be done.
“...collapse that heterosexuals are largely responsible for…”
No doubt, a line has been drawn in the sand between those who identify themselves and others according to sexual inclinations, and those who respect the personal and relational essence of the human person as we live our life in relationship as husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters… The breakdown of Marriage is due to the contraception mentality and the sexual objectification of the human person to the point that we have been conditioned to refer to one another not as God desires us to be, but as heterosexual, homosexual, GLBT…
The Supreme Court does not have the authority to change the inherent essence of Marriage, or the inherent essence of the human person. It is a self-evident truth that every son or daughter of a human person can only be a human person, and that only a man and woman can exist in relationship as husband and wife.
Universally, not just in the USA, Marriage is acknowledged as a union of man and woman. Inreality, it is the complementary nature of the two genders existing in our nature that gives rise to marriage. This means that marriage is designed in and by our nature and not by politicians or judges.
The USA federal government right recognizes this and this is why it was made law. Citizens, including the President, are bound to respect this law.
It is also important to that this marriage is the only relationship that has the ability to naturally provide society with stability and continuity. It has been recognized by all cultures to be the fundamental unit in society assuring its stabilty and continuity.
I marriage is at stake, then so is the society. Damage one and you will damage the other. Absolutely no doubt about that!
Wow - This is the best synopsis of the issue I’ve read, and I’ve read (and pondered) this issue prodigiously. Our society is so toxic, and is on such a trajectory of decline, that I hope and pray for a ‘stay’ on this divisive issue of the definition of marriage, (a division caused by postmodern liberal nihilists, I would say). I think our future as a society depends upon the ‘center holding’, which is the basic functional social unit, the family - mother, father and child(ren).
You see…. This is what happens when the Church is afraid of offending the devil!!!
So now she wants us all to jump up and cry foul, and pray to God for His intervention. I have to laugh as I pray the Morning Office each day and the Psalm states that “God is laughing them to scorn.”. What does that mean? Look at the diobolical delemma we have ” CHOSEN” for ourselves. Yes just like abortion WE allowed this to take hold in this country, now we need 40 years of sack cloth and ashes to atone. It is OUR doing that has undone the Natural Law and Gods’ Law, not theirs!!!!
Thank you, anon, for your thoughtful observation.
It’s just like what Debbie said on another NCRegister post, “Isn’t it amazing that throughout history we’ve had some good popes and bad
popes but the bad popes never changed the faith and morals teachings…but
look at any other bad ruler - they immediately change the laws on morals. I
find that very interesting. The Catholic teachings really do seem to be
protected…the gates of Hell do not prevail against it.”
Pray for our nation and it’s leaders, that God will be with them to guide their work.
Georgetown has and Nortre Dame may soon have an on campus gay etc. identity club…non judgemental. Imagine if they had covetousness clubs…non judgemental. Vatican and papal non administration is part of the problem. Flattery of Rome’s document wisdom is obfuscating it’s lack of administration of our schools. The papacy must become primarily administrative…not part time administrative.
The depiction of defenders of traditional marriage as racist bigots is a tried-and-true tactic of Alinskyite propagandists. The American people have been washed in this type of propaganda for decades, and the Catholic Church (its leaders and membership) have dropped the ball in putting forth TRUTH to dispel the propaganda. The price is now being paid.
BTW, I agree with “Quo Vadis” about the quality of the analysis and the column. Well considered and well written!
The bishops have called for increased prayer, fasting, and sacrifice in preparation for the Supreme Court decisions on marriage, as well as the August 1, 2013 deadline for the HHS mandate “safe harbor” clause: http://www.usccb.org/life-marriage-liberty
@Anon: You asked, if gay marriage has a relation to divorce, then why has divorce been going down since gay marriage has gained acceptance, reversing the divorce spike of the 60s and 70s? The answer is that the overall marriage rate is down, and cohabitation is up. So divorces are down. This is caused by promotion of contraception and abortion, which negated societal respect for marriage. People can freely cohabitate and become single parents. Reproductive choice also encouraged the rise of gay liberation around the world. Homosexual acts in and of themselves are contraceptive because they are closed to the transmission of life. So yes, there is a relationship between contraception, fornication, and the homosexual lifestyle and the degradation of traditional marriage.
Catholics believe marriage is a sacrament. The Supreme Court isn’t ruling on the validity of sacraments.
Arguably, because so many parts of our “public” or “secular” culture are contrary to Core Christian values (i.e. war, capitalist pursuit of goods, etc.), the claim that this development in the culture is what would (or should) prevent so-called “faithful” Catholics from “participating fully in public life” is absurd. We are called to be a people set apart, a light to the world, and a witness to the life of Christ. If we are fully participating in the culture, then same-sex marriage is not our biggest problem.
The Church can maintain marriage as a sacrament. That does not mean that civil law must be in concert with the Church’s view of marriage. Not everyone is Catholic. Many of us Catholic’s believe in marriage equality for LGBT citizens-it does no and will not affect the Chruch’s opinion of marriage as a sacrament.
How many Roman Catholics are divorced? Why does the Church go after them?
Defenders of traditional marriage need to stop SAYING it will be disastrous and start constructing persuasive arguments to EXPLAIN to people how it will be disastrous.
People simply do not understand the cause-and-effect relationships between how our institutions are structured and how those institutions serve us.
People genuinely believe that changing the basic definition and rules defining marriage and family will only enable a few people to be happy, while all the other variables will hold constant.
But all the variables are interrelated. The whole point of an institution that relies on legal and social rights, norms, and benefits is that they must apply categorically - to all persons within that category. If we expand the category “spouse” to include anyone who loves anyone, then we are making a great change.
Some of the rules we are proposing a change to:
- whether adultery is a legitimate means of reproduction within marriage
- whether people may continue to recognize the strong bonds (think covalent bonds) of kinship as superior to and preferable to the weak bonds (think hydrogen) of “choice” or “affection” (it is not a reductio ad absurdum to argue that people may find their brother is no longer their brother when their parents break up, if that brother was never really their brother in the first place - only a fantasy game that the others don’t feel like playing any more).
- whether marriage will still be able to protect women and children from exploitation and/or abandonment, after the institution is expanded to legitimize and actually encourage the exploitation and abandonment of women and children
- whether adoption can still be legitimate as an institution if it throws away its strict adherence to the ‘child’s best interest’ standard, and instead bases its custody decisions on the wishes, needs, and fantasies of the parents over the best interests of the child.
Is anyone working on identifying and explaining the changes that might come in the wake of such a drastic change to our law?
Has anyone - on either side of the issue - done a proper “cost/benefit” analysis, or done a “probable impact” analysis?
Almost certainly the Supreme Court will rule that Prop 8 is unconstitutional and that DOMA must be overturned. THis will increase the rapidity with which Social Security runs out of funds. Society has an interest in promoting families who bring children into the world and who educate them for the future. Marriage therefore has as its end game, as far as the state is concerned, the generation and care of future citizens. Social security benefits exist so that the partner raising children will not be deprived of retirement because she has foregone employment to have and educate these future citizens.
But the way homosexual marriage has been sold to the public is as a civil right, not as a mechanism to provide an educated and productive citizenry (and the cheapest and best method by far).
Please also remember that the Chief Justice has suddenly, and for inexplicable reasons, taken a 180 degree turn in his philosophy of government, and in his interpretation of the constitution.
Do not expect him to support marriage between a man and a woman.
The entire religious and moral structure of America is at stake.
The Supreme Court has already rejected the Declaration of Independence,a founding document and violated the highest moral court of the God our nation once trusted with the carnage of over 59 million slaughtered American unborn children and still counting. Since they have already rejected God, how can we depend on them to preserve the marriage of his design? I certainly fear for our Americs’s future.
A PAGAN NATION?
Has it finally come to an ignominious end?
Must liberty and religious freedom we now rescind?
Our Founding Fathers must now be assuredly aghast,
if they knew their City on a Hill is now in the past.
America was a definitive faith exercise.
The United States is now decidedly otherwise.
Compromise between good and evil can never prevail.
Without the God our nation trusted, life is no avail.
The Declaration of Independence we could once trust.
Life, liberty, and happiness have been overcome with lust.
Seeds of democracy’s destruction have now germinated.
Every phase of government has been permeated.
The American dream is now only a socialist scheme.
It has then become a nightmare we can only blaspheme.
American traitors committed a scandalous sin.
They should never be allowed to enjoy freedom again.
We must resurrect revolution to save us once more.
Tyranny is something we have always known to deplore.
God help return religious freedom to our native shore.
So we can ask You to bless America evermore.
Bob Rowland
X1/XII/MMXII
As stated by cowalker earlier the Constitution does not address the issue of gay unions. For the first millenium marriage was not even recognized as a sacrament, but as a civil union. It was not until Peter Lombard pushed for marriage to be recognized as a sacrament that it was so. This article is not a demand for protection of any religious rite, but rather calls for the church to interfere in others rights who happen to be gay. Church fathers can address homosexual union in any manner it wishes; calling them objectively disordered or some other manufactured pejorative. It has no right to interfere, as has been its legacy throughout the ages in matters contrary to its authority. Such action by the church is anti-American, disrespecting America as a pluralistic and diverse nature. If the church is allowed to interfere, so shall all other religions be allowed to interfere in matters which accord its religion… a great rationale to insist that church and state continue to be separate.
Demographically, the church is out of touch. An increasingly higher majority of young Americans disavow these primitive teachings and holdings of the church. Sadly, the church remains mired in medieval thought recognized by all outside of the church hierarchy and the knuckled under kneeling in pews, mindlessly acquiescing.
At The Wedding at Cana, Christ elevated Marriage to a Sacrament. This does not change the fact that only a man and woman can exist in relationship as husband and wife, or the fact that Marriage, by its very essence is restrictive to begin with. The fact that a father and daughter, mother and son, brother and sister, children, two men, two women, one man and two women, two men and one woman, cannot be married to one another is not unjust discrimination.
I hope for the best but I expect the worst. We are reaping what our church leaders had sown. Our nations Bishops and priests said nothing and did nothing while our society melted down. Now their backs are against the wall. But prepare yourselves to witness many church leaders complying with the HHS Mandate.
Journalists need to focus on this part of Mr. Whelan’s commentary - on the very real, devastating results of officially sanctioning homosexual “weddings”: “...those organizations and individuals who embrace the Church’s teaching will in the coming years be stigmatized, marginalized, and penalized, on matters ranging from educational admissions and employment to professional licenses, accreditations, and tax-exempt status.” Catholicism teaches us that NO ONE should be penalized, marginalized, stigmatized or treated in any manner not respecting of human dignity when they stand up for the Church’s teachings.
If same-sex “marriage” is embraced, there won’t be any fairness for anyone. With respect for human dignity comes God’s blessings when we participate fully in what He asks of us. Conjugal love within heterosexual marriage is truly fulfilling marital love. Anything else (adultery, homosexual sex, fornication, masturbation, etc.) is only partially fulfilling “pseudo-sex” which NEVER brings true happiness. Why would people of good will wish to impose partial happiness on anyone? We know that Christ’s blessings are the best there can be.
Then, when a shifty job interviewer tries to elicit how you feel about “married” gays, will you lie, or make up a compromising politically-correct answer, or evade the question to get the job? Christ tells you no. Your livelihood, the government, and responsibilities will tell you yes, go ahead and tell some half-truths. Lie. Disrespect the gays because they “deserve” homosexual “marriage”. The whole Truth is, pretend marriages are a farce and an insult to human dignity - especially for gays.
In a similar vein, history tells us that Native Americans were “charitably” offered alcohol as a “token of good will” by invaders on their land to quell disputes. What they got was destruction of their culture and lives along with a stigma that caused them to be ridiculed and marginalized to this very day. Granting homosexuals “pseudo-marriage” status will in effect twist the tables on morality, making the Truth of Christ false in the eyes of the law and society, as it imposes edicts NOT to marginalize or ridicule gay “choice”. Catholics - who wish to marginalize no one - “instead”, will be spitefully rejected for wanting to see the best happen. Acts of good will to free gays from this insanity will be treated as acts of hatred. This is the subliminal part of the legal edict that Americans will be expected to follow. We know it is already happening.
Cardinal Dolan discusses the fall of human dignity here:
http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/cardinal-dolan-freedom-is-rooted-in-human-dignity True freedom and dignity result from following God’s will. Heterosexual marriage is the only right and good kind of marriage.
Nancy D., at the wedding feast of Cana, Xt elevated water into wine, that’s it. Nothing else do we know about it, only conjecture. Marriage through the ages was many things, mostly political, civil, and a matter of property rights. Women were chattel and tendered as such. Is this the rite to which you refer or wish to maintain.
cowalker said: “..could refuse to recognize that what a state recognized as a valid marriage was a valid marriage for purposes of federal law.”
The question is whether the federal government is obliged to accept any states definition for federal use just because it has co-incidentally been in agreement with that definition in the past.
SCOTUS will have to decide.
From the early Christian era (30 to 325), marriage was thought of as primarily a private matter, with no uniform religious or other ceremony being required. However, bishop Ignatius of Antioch writing around 110 to bishop Polycarp of Smyrna exhorts, “t becomes both men and women who marry, to form their union with the approval of the bishop, that their marriage may be according to God, and not after their own lust.”
Before this, marriage was viewed (by the Jews) as a contractual bond commanded by God in which a man and a woman come together to create a relationship in which God is directly involved and is understood to mean that the husband and wife are merging into a single soul.
Jesuitical graduate, “….but rather calls for the church to interfere in others rights who happen to be gay.”
We are talking about law here – there is no moral right. The Church cannot interfere, it can only teach ans persuade. Homosexuals have no right to marry until their state passes a law that allows it. It is a desire only until then. As it is a desire for polygamists to marry, as it is a desire for Zoophiles. We might as well marry the whole population to each other and be done with marriage altogether!
Howard, the state passes a ‘law’ because the state has realized and determined that gays have a right to marry by choice. Marriage is not a ‘desire’, but a decision. That decision rests on a multiple of factors. Love is not the sole criterion or sufficient cause, nor is the decision to have children. Marriage is a civil ceremony that grants the spouses access to benefits such as health insurance, inheritance, retirment benefits and general welfare. Whatever the church’s attitude governed by its religiosity, it has no right to interfere against the actions and self-determinatin of those who do not ascribe to its beliefs.
Further do not confuse ‘desire’ with ‘decision’ to marry as in ‘polygamy’. That is not a ‘desire’. Homosexuals have a desire for the same gender, heterosexuals for the opposite gender. Sexual orientation is a desire, a choice. Chastity is a choice, marriage is a choice. Kindly note that the church is entitled to state whatever it believes is the word of God; it has no right to interfere in the civil choices of American citizens who think such thinking is ‘out of touch’.
Jesuitical - More than ‘beliefs’ determine our stance on marriage. As has been stated numerous times here and elsewhere, the basic complementarity of the genders, and that unique and wonderful role in conceiving/bearing/raising children, the greatest echo of God’s creation made known to us, is at the heart of the insistence on marriage between one man and one woman. You really do make the case, however, for a watered down ‘marriage’ between any and all partners based on desire and benefits and finances. This is very sad - the ultimate in ‘moral relativism’.
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Am I the only person in the universe who wants to declare, ‘The emperor has no clothes’ on this issue? Two men ‘marrying’? Surely you jest - where is the bride in this arrangement?
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If some group of people were to assert that the sun is blue and the sky is yellow, and persisted in this assertion, mocking anyone who countered their claims, it could be no more bizarre than the assertion that two men or two women can ‘marry’. It is insane, a calamitous development for our rapidly fracturing society. God help and save us.
At The Wedding of Cana, Christ elevated Marriage to a Sacrament. The rite of Marriage that should be maintained is the rite that respects the inherent personal and relational essence of the human person, not a rite that sees human persons as mere objects of sexual desire. We are husbands and wives, fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters…, To identify oneself or someone else as heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, polysexual…demeans our inherent Dignity as human persons.
Since it is a self-evident truth that every human person has the inherent Right to be treated with Dignity and respect, any State or Government that condones the engaging in or affirmation of sexual acts or sexual relationships, that demean our inherent Dignity, violates the inherent Right of all persons to be treated with Dignity and Respect. Marriage equality does not exist because not every couple can exist in relationship as husband and wife, creating a new Family. The State has protected the institute of Marriage because it recognizes that the union of husband and wife is Good for the posterity and the prosperity of this Nation. The State should desire that which is Good for the posterity and prosperity of this Nation, and thus The State should desire that all Marriages serve for the Good of The Family.
To deny that Marriage exists for the Good of the Husband and the Good of the Wife, and thus the Good of The Family they have created, is to say that there is no restriction on Marriage, that everything is permissible, and thus there is no reason for The State to recognize the existence of Marriage to begin with.
Jesuitical graduate, you still do not understand what “a right” is. No right has existed legally or morally regarding homosexual marriage. If a State wishes to grant the “right” through law that is a decision it makes. You can assume some ethereal “right” having existed, it is just a claim – and a false one. You cannot refer to God for the moral justification and the State has never been a source of morality. A states action is the result of human will and voting numbers, not anything else. At one time sodomy was a criminal offense in certain States. Would you claim now that States always act wisely.
Marriage can be both a desire (sexual and otherwise) and a decision. Do homosexuals not desire it? Are not polygamists male and female? You are playing with words instead of understanding them. Truth is not what you wish it to be. You should have learned at least that much from the Jesuits.
Why do Catholics require government approval for their religious belief of what marriage is or isn’t? Why must the rest of us follow Catholic doctrine against our wishes? When same-sex marriage is legal, Catholics are still free to not get gay married, just as they are free to not have pre-marital sex, not commit adultery and not get divorced, even though all those things are legal.
Or does the Bible only apply to gay people???
It’s the conservative House GOP caucus, which, depending on your point of view, either keeps the Republican leadership in tune with its conservative, reduce-government-spending mandate, or is so rigid that it prevents reasonable compromise that could lower the deficit and generate the confidence that government leaders know how to govern.
For Scalise, his upset win to chair the Republican Study Committee, is a major opportunity. No congressional caucus has more influence given that its membership includes 170 of the GOP’s 234 members.
Rep. , R-Ga., describes the RSC as “the rudder” of the House GOP.
“There is always going to be pressure to move to the middle and surrender, but we don’t need anybody to help with that,” Woodall said. “We need someone to help explain why our Republican caucus left their families at home. Why it is you have an opportunity to make America a better country than it is today? That is what Rep. Scalise is tasked with doing and he can bring out the best in the RSC with his leadership.”
With an RSC dedicated to fighting tax increases, even if it means nixing deals worked out by Speaker , and newly re-elected Democratic president with a “mandate” to cut deficits by asking more of the wealthy and not slashing programs that benefit the middle class and poor, it might seem gridlock is inevitable.
Scalise insists it isn’t.
“After the 1994 elections, President Clinton worked with the new Republican majority in the House on legislation such as welfare reform and spending cuts” that led to a budget surplus, Scalise said. “If President Obama would <a >{keyword}</a> only acknowledge we have a spending problem, we can work together to reduce the deficit.”
Democrats remember the 1990s differently, a budget battle between then GOP Speaker Newt Gingrich and President Clinton that shuttered the federal government; and a bitter fight when Republicans moved to impeach Clinton. Yes, Democrats said, the federal deficits were slashed partly as a result of cooperation between House Republicans, led by then Appropriations Committee Chairman Bob Livingston, who represented the same Louisiana house district as Scalise. But Democrats contend that most of the credit goes to tax increases adopted early in Clinton’s term without a single Republican House vote.
The view around the Capitol is that Tuesday’s bipartisan vote to avert big tax increases and spending reductions is more of an anomaly than the beginning of new round of cooperation between congressional Republicans and a Democratic president.
The so-called fiscal cliff legislation, while winning the support of 40 of 45 Republican senators, only garnered 85 votes from the House GOP majority, or 33 percent of the GOP <a >{keyword}</a> votes cast. Scalise said the percentage was even lower for RSC members.
Scalise said he and most of his RSC colleagues opposed the bill because it didn’t include enough spending cuts. He said the committee sees its main task as “keeping the GOP leadership focused on conservative policies and bringing federal spending under control to get our economy back on track.”
Boehner, who was re-elected speaker Thursday, can only allow so many votes on bills approved with a minority of Republicans and majority of Democrats before sowing seeds of rebellion from his <a >{keyword}</a> rank and file. Boehner has said he’s finished negotiating one-on-one with President Obama—no doubt because some of the previous deals he negotiated with the White <a >{keyword}</a> House to lower the deficit were repudiated by the RSC whose members generally oppose any increased taxes.
“Boehner’s job is like herding cats and some of the toughest ones to herd belong to the RSC,” said , director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. “But it probably helps Boehner to have an ally (Scalise) as chairman. Relations were more uneasy with the last chairman (Jim Jordan of Ohio).”
Scalise promises the Study Committee will advocate strongly for spending cuts, including entitlement reforms, as Congress nears votes on extending the debt ceiling and on a continuing resolution that will fund the federal government for the rest of the federal fiscal year.
At times, though, Scalise will have to balance his different roles. He’s considered a Boehner ally, but over the last few years, RSC members grew restless when they didn’t believe the speaker was staying true to conservative principles.
And as a member of the Louisiana delegation, he would be expected to fight for <a >{keyword}</a> robust funding for the Army Corps of Engineers and coastal restoration programs that many of his members presumably would want to see scaled back.
Normally, members are given a free hand to vote the interests of their districts. “But there are pretty hard-nosed conservatives on the RSC and we’ll have to see how much free reign they give to Scalise,’ said a GOP staffer.
The president has said spending must be reduced, but he favors combining cuts with new revenues through tax reform—ending tax deductions for wealthy Americans and corporations. But so far, Scalise and most Republicans have said such reforms should go entirely toward lowering overall tax rates.
Scalise’s election to chair the RSC was unexpected.
The committee’s 112th Congress leaders, and its past leaders, all endorsed Rep. Tom Graves, R-Ga., a favorite of the Tea Party.
Scalise won partly because he argued that his ties to Boehner could help the committee get more of its policy initiatives through the House. But more than that, hard work—he talked to every RSC member, sometimes two or three times—and a winning personality, helped him defeat the favorite.
Though Scalise regularly uses harsh rhetoric to criticize Obama and Democrat’s—“radical policies” is his favorite description for Democratic governing principles—he doesn’t have many enemies. Even Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif, describes Scalise as a friend, though the two regularly fight over global warming (Scalise is a skeptic, Waxman believes it’s a huge threat that needs to be addressed immediately).
“Steve is an example of how things used to work in Congress,” said, R-N.C., a Scalise backer on the RSC. “You’d battle it out and afterwards you can sit down and be friendly with one another.”
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