Brideless or Groomless "Marriage" is a Modern Invention

From that bastion of right-wing ideology, Wikipedia, comes this history of same-sex unions...

While it is a relatively new practice that same-sex couples are being granted the same form of legal marital recognition as commonly used by mixed-sexed couples, there is a long history of recorded same-sex unions around the world.

Emphasis mine. Throughout the entry until we get to the present years, these unions are presented as something other than marriage. It has only been within recent times that any culture, religious system of more than a handful of adherents, or government has started to call brideless or groomless pairings "marriage" and included those "marriages" as the same as the uniting of a bride+groom. The vast majority today still recognize that marriage unites the sexes. Same-sex unions in history were never a widespread and ongoing part of marital systems. If one cleric "married" two men in antiquity, it was an abnormality that wasn't sustained by the culture.

But of course, someone who is willing to deny that the differences between the sexes are significant enough to distinguish marriage from same-sex unions will have no problem spinning history.

Oral Arguments at SCOTUS Over State Resistance to Marriage Neutering

Today is the day.

It wasn't all that long ago that the Supreme Court of the United States handled a marriage neutering case and indicated that the federal government, despite having the Defense of Marriage Act, had to defer to what states called marriage licenses. Thus, if a state had issued a "marriage" license to a groomless couple, the federal government had to recognize them as married for tax purposes.

Will the Court now turn around  and say, "Never mind! States must listen to the federal government on this matter since the federal government (federal courts) are requiring states to neuter their licenses."?



In the prior case, the Court did not find that there was a right to get a state marriage license without a bride or without a groom, only that if a state issued licenses in those cases, the federal government had to recognize them.



It would seem to me that if the 14th Amendment or any other part of our Constitution required states to neuter their licenses, SCOTUS should have said so back then. Ah, but maybe these dances in the courts aren't about ensuring that people have their rights, but rather social engineering at a calculated pace?

There are many larger issues involved here beyond the laws of one state or another, including the nature of rights and what makes something a right, the role of the federal judiciary, the role of states in licensing marriage, and public policy as it relates to family.



Even the MSM, or Marriage Neutering Media, is admitting that the Notorious RBG has more or less announced her decision to support neutering marriage ahead of hearing oral arguments. The shrieking and whining and general hysteria would be unbearable if Scalia had indicated his intention to rebuff the marriage neutering activists. RBG and perhaps another pro-neutering member of the Court should recuse themselves, but of course everything has to be sacrificed on the altar of esteeming homosexual behavior, whether it is sound precedent, obvious differences between men and women, protocol, and anything else that keeps the activists from being able to force everyone to celebrate their orgasms.

The best ruling SCOTUS could issue is to indicate that when they said the federal government needs to defer to states, they meant it, and thereby overturn most of the federal court decisions.


The people who say that neutering marriage, especially through federal judicial activism, will have no result other than simply allowing two men or two women to get a marriage license are either lying or severely naive. The naive people fail to grasp how marriage is part of a systematic way things are organized, both legally and socially.

However, there are ways SCOTUS could rule that could have devastating results beyond the specific issue of marriage neutering, including, but certainly not limited to:

• They could explicitly establish that men and women are interchangeable. Federal law does not currently indicate this. The "Equal Rights Amendment" was never ratified and women are not required, as men are, to register for the draft.
• They could explicitly establish that people who identify as homosexual are a class in the same what that people born black are a class, needing the same kind of civil rights protections.
• Establishing a disconnect in law between marriage and parenting, indicating that marriage has nothing to do with raising children.
• New rights can be created.
• Opening the door wide to removing other requirements in state marriage licensing, such as those restricting the licenses to two unmarried people and restricting the licenses to people who do not have a close degree of consanguinity or previous affinity.

It is possible they could allow the federal rulings imposing marriage neutering stand without explicitly doing these things as a settled matter, but would they handle it that way? And in the long run, won't any ruling they make advancing the neutering of marriage empower the activists to do those things?

Maybe you're somebody who thinks all of those things would be great. And if you honestly admit that, I can respect where you are coming from even though I strongly disagree. But if you've been lying about it, well, you'd better hope that the tactics and precedents you have been using don't come back to bite you when they are used for something you don't like. And if you have just kind of gone along with what you think would make your friends and family and fictional television characters happy, you're in for a rude awakening if the homofascists gain more power. Hopefully, your awakening will not come too late.

Click on the tags to this post for previous postings about this topics.

It’s Not a Ban on Gay Marriage

Marriage amendments, such as the California Marriage Amendment, voted in as Proposition 8, and "defense of marriage" laws are often referred to in news articles, commentaries, and other media as "bans on gay marriage."

I frequently point out that this phraseology is inaccurate and misleading – and I don't like it when it is used by "marriage defenders" or the marriage neutering crowd.

I maintain that "same-sex marriage" is an oxymoron akin to "dry liquid".

Even granting that a man could marry a man, or a woman could marry a woman, the use of the phrase "ban on gay marriage" is still sloppy.

First, notice that there is a difference between "gay" and "same-sex". I don't know of anyone who is asking that the sexual orientation of the individuals obtaining a marriage license together be noted anywhere in the paperwork. It has never been part of the process. Consequently, a man of any sexual orientation and a woman of any sexual orientation have always been able to obtain a marriage license together, provided neither one was currently married to someone else, and provided they were not close relatives and were of age. A gay man could marry a lesbian or a straight woman. Likewise, a straight man could marry a lesbian. All of these combinations have happened more than once.

When and where neutered marriage licensing occurs, there is nothing preventing two straight men from obtaining such a license together, nor two straight women – provided they meet all of the requirements (marital status, age, non-relation). Thus the phrase "same sex" is more accurate than "gay".

The word "ban" is also wrong. Our marriage laws are no more a "ban" on same-sex marriage than they are a "ban" on polygamy.

Same-sex (and presumably homosexual) couples were having "marriage" ceremonies for years before any state our country neutered their marriage laws. They have exchanged rings, have had a minister officiate, have lived together, have referred to each other with spousal designations, have changed names, have held receptions and gone on "honeymoon" vacations, so on and so forth. Employers and other organizations could recognize them as married if they so chose. Neither California's Marriage Amendment, nor any other similar law prohibits any of this. Thus, it is not a ban.

Incestuous marriages have been recognized in the past, though now they are actually banned as people are prosecuted in most places for sexual activity among consenting adults who are closely related. People go to jail for this activity – forget about being a denied a state-issued marriage license.

Some – not all - states in the USA had actual bans on "interracial" marriage in the past that were struck down by a SCOTUS decision. Marriage neutering activists frequently compare this to the situation with neutered marriage licensing, but the comparison is flimsy.

With the adoption of the California Marriage Amendment or any other such law in other states, no couples were forced to split up or forced to stop living together. Not a single legal entitlement was lost, as the federal government has never recognized a same-sex coupling as marriage, and California still treats domestic partners as spouses. Contrary to a shameful television ad, no Mormon missionaries forced their way into the homes of sex-same couples to destroy or take their property.

Affirming traditional marriage licensing is not a "gay marriage ban". Such language is used by media outlets who abandon objectivity and engage in advocacy and manipulation.

Divorce Does Not Justify Marriage Neutering

People arguing for the neutering of marriage cite the high divorce rate as a reason why a brideless or groomless couple should be able to get state marriage licenses for their voluntary association, or perhaps why we, the people, don't have moral authority to set marriage licensing requirements. After all, if it is God's will that marriage last for life and we as a society aren't following God’s will in that respect*, how can we invoke God's will when it comes to insisting that marriage uniting the sexes?  They argue that if we want to protect marriage, we should ban divorce, or they claim they're going to push for such a ban themselves.

If you want to circulate a petition to place an initiative on the ballot that bans divorce, go ahead.  Nobody is stopping you. You can vote for it, too. Be my guest. If you donate money to back it, I won't boycott your business.

One need not be religious nor believe in God nor believe that divorce is a bad to believe that authority over licensing requirements belongs with the people instead of the courts, or that state marriage licensing should be reserved for voluntary associations consisting of a bride and a groom. But in entertaining this appeal to the Bible or religious tradition, I still don't see that immorality in one thing precludes making a moral judgment at all. (If you fell down some stairs this morning, you should still try to avoid crashing your car into a wall.) If the political authority doesn't belong with the people, it belongs with nobody, as all authority of our branches of government is assigned to them by the consent of the people.  The answer is not to promote more immorality or fundamentally alter the nature of marriage. It is also disingenuous to invoke Scripture or religious tradition against those who hold such things dear with one hand and dismiss it with the other.

Yes, divorce is a bad thing. Even if it gets someone away from a sociopath - and people should get away from sociopaths - it is bad in the sense that there never should have been a marriage in the first place, and the divorce is part of the larger mistake. Marriage, ideally, should be for life. But that there is divorce has no bearing on whether or not state marriage licensing should be neutered.  It is an entirely different issue. I can cut an orange in half. I can destroy it. It can be eaten away by fruit fly maggots.  There can be a wax likeness of an orange fraudulently passed off as a legitimate orange. None of that makes an orange rubber ball an orange, even though it is round and orange in color. We even revoke the state-issued driver's licenses of some drivers because they have been horrible drivers, but that doesn't obligate us to issue driver's licenses to bus riders, bicyclists, pedestrians, or anyone who can apply for a state identification card, even though driver's licenses are considered more desirable.

Really, it is silly to say that because there is divorce, we should neuter marriage. It simply does not follow.  A state-licensed marriage is essentially a kind of partnership. Partnerships are dissolved all of the time.

The high divorce rate can be cited as evidence for a devaluation of marriage in our culture. But how would neutering marriage help that? To me, it seems, it would be kicking marriage while it is down.  Some may argue that "heterosexual couples haven't been doing such a great job with marriage, so why not let same-sex couples have a shot at it?" That may sound appealing to some at first, but it also does not make any sense, as bride-groom couples will still be able to get state licenses, and it is akin to saying "orange growers have been doing a lousy job, so let's throw rubber balls into the crate with the oranges."

Yes, the divorce rate is too high, and those who want to protect marriage should take steps to change that. There are ways of addressing that, but neutering marriage isn't one of them. That there are a lot of divorces in no way means we should forfeit our votes to judges or activists.


*From a religious standpoint, (which, we are constantly reminded, the state can't consider), any church that takes the Bible seriously should not be performing marriage ceremonies or recognizing the marriage of anyone who divorced a previous spouse without Biblical grounds.  (Biblical grounds boil down to abandonment – actual geographical or sexual abandonment or other forms, such as abuse of others or self or adultery.  If someone divorces you without just cause, that is abandonment.)

I do agree that divorce is detrimental to marriage.  To this end, I could see it as reasonable if a state decided it was going to change its laws so as to stop issuing marriage licenses to couples in which at least one of the individuals had previously filed for and received a divorce, say, two or more times.  Note - that means being the divorce initiator, not the spouse presented with the papers.  I could especially see it as a reasonable restriction if the state also allowed some other form of civil licensing for such couples.  Ultimately, however, no number of divorces changes the basic nature of marriage, or the state's interest in licensing it.

The Heart of the Marriage Neutering Issue

David Whiting of the Orange County Register wrote a piece on neutering marriage and that prompted some letters from readers which the paper was willing to print.

Russ Neal of Huntington Beach:

Legalizing same-sex marriage means that people objecting to this transgression will be compelled to treat it as legitimate.

This is at the heart of the issue. It isn't just that someone who objects to homosexual behavior will be forced to endorse it. We will all, whether we have a moral objection to homosexual behavior or not, be forced to treat brideless and groomless pairings and marriage identically. State marriage licenses are issued on our behalf. The marriage neutering advocates don't want us to even have a word that notes there is a difference. It would be official government policy that there is not. Public schools (and many other schools, if not all) would be prevented from teaching that marriage is different from this pseudomarriage, and homosexuality advocates would be unrestrained in pushing their worldview in the schools as official curriculum. Parents would have no ability to opt their child out. Adoption agencies would not be able to give preference to placing children with a home that is inclusive of both sexes. No government agency, nothing associated with a government program or funding, would be allowed to make a distinction, unless of course it was to somehow provide a targeted advantage to same-sex couples. Soon after, no business, private employer, or private property owner would be allowed to make any distinction.

If California's constitutional amendment (Proposition 8) was allowed to stand, and California's domestic partnership and other laws were kept in place, same-sex couples would retain their treatment as spouses by the state government and everyone else, including businesses, could treat them as spouses. They're free to draw up legal paperwork, have ceremonies, change names, exchange rings, live together, share a life, and call themselves married. But the rest of us would not be forced to ignore the inherent difference between marriage and pseudomarriage.

Jerry Brown Signed the First DOMA

I'm reposting this entry I made early on in my contributions to The Opine Editorials.

The San Francisco Chronicle's political writer, Carla Marinucci, had an article discussing the fact that current California Governor General Jerry Brown, while Governor the first go-round, signed into law a bill codifying the legal definition of marriage as being a bride-groom pairing. There are lots of quotes defending Brown for his "progress" on the issue as he fights to remove California’s Marriage Amendment and prepares to run for Governor again. I found a quote in the article that stood out to me.

Veteran journalist Marty Nolan, who covered Brown for the Boston Globe in the 1970s and 1980s, said the defense represents Brown's longtime political mantra. "He's got a six-word answer - 'that was then, this is now,' " Nolan laughed. "It's an all-purpose shield."

This is an example of why we are supposed to be a nation of laws, not men, and we have a constitution and a representative republic. Opinions and votes can change over time, even if the truth and right and wrong do not. But we should not be held hostage to the whims of a single person. "That was then, this is now" is not a justification for a past or current action or policy, no more than saying "It's the twenty-first century." Yes, and the sky is blue. So? Was Brown wrong then? Is he wrong now? Why? Has a "right" to a state-licensed marriage for brideless or groomless couples emerged since the 1970s, or has it always existed and just not been recognized by flawed politicians? If the politicians were wrong then, what makes anyone so sure they are right now?

Neutering Marriage: Where We Are and What It Means

The Supreme Court of the United States of America heard arguments regarding two laws. It is possible that in June, they could issue a ruling that would invent a new federal right to get a state "marriage" license without a bride or without a groom, often called "gay marriage" or "same-sex marriage".

Less than fifteen years ago, no government in the world had neutered licensing to replace marriage. No President of the United States ever indicated a belief that a marriage exists without a bride or without a groom. President Bill Clinton, Democrat, had signed the federal Defense of Marriage Act into law, which had the support of many Democrats in Congress. Not a single great civil rights leader in history had ever called for a "right" to a marriage license without a bride or without a groom – not Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., not Susan B. Anthony, not Gandhi, nobody. None of the people who wrote and voted for the Constitution or the Amendments was ever on record as saying marriage was anything other than the uniting of a bride and groom. Running for President in 2008, Obama claimed to believe that marriage is between a man and woman, and he did not say that there was right to a state marriage license without a bride our groom. (He has partially changed his public position since then.) In Loving v. Virginia, which overturned scattered state bans in "interracial" marriage (which actually prevented freedom of association while Proposition 8 protected freedom of association), SCOTUS did not find that a brideless or groomless union was a marriage. In Lawrence v. Texas, which overturned laws against private homosexual sodomy, SCOTUS did not find that brideless or groomless union is a marriage. There are longstanding federal and state restrictions on marriage, including against polygamy and marriages between first cousins, both of which have a long worldwide history. (Some say that same-sex "marriage" should never be compared to polygamy or incest, and I agree – after all, the latter two have been historically and widely accepted as actual marriages.)

When SCOTUS heard the cases, only nine states and Washington, D.C. had neutered their licensing, something that was largely started by judicial activism with only one of those states doing it through a direct vote of the people that was initiated by the people rather than a judge or state legislature.

Most of the remaining states have constitutional amendments or state laws, many of them directly approved by voters, maintaining the bride+groom requirement in their licensing.

Yet here we are, facing the possibility that nine judges could force the neutering of state marriage licenses on all 50 states, even those where the people have recently voted to reaffirm the bride+groom requirement.

How did we get here?

I didn't follow the case involving the federal DOMA as closely as I did the case involving the California Marriage Amendment, which was adopted by voters through Proposition 8.

There was already a California law, signed by Governor Jerry Brown decades ago during an earlier term as Governor, stating the bride+groom requirement. In 2000, Californian voters directly passed Proposition 22, reaffirming this. California lawmakers passed law(s) creating state domestic partnerships in which same-sex couples (these partnerships were denied – discrimination! - to both-sexes couples unless at least one of them was a seasoned citizen of a certain age) would be treated by state and local governments exactly the same as if they were a married couple. Striking down Prop 8 did not give same-sex couples any additional "rights".

Then the Leftist marriage neutering advocates, including people who were sworn to uphold and enforce the law, decided to thumb their nose at the law by "marrying" brideless and groomless couples and then suing for recognition as marriage. That wound its way through the state courts.

Meanwhile, the voters of California decided to strengthen the bride+groom requirement by placing on the ballot a measure what would make it part of the state constitution. As that was heading for the ballot, the California Supreme Court ordered the neutering of the state's marriage licenses. Later that year (2008), California voters voted for Obama AND they adopted Proposition 8 to restore the bride+groom requirement, placing it in the state constitution.. For many months, long-term (and short term, for that matter) same-sex couples could have obtained "marriage" licenses, and thousands did. Snoozers were losers.

Of course, the California Marriage Amendment was challenged in court by marriage neutering advocates, and so it went to the California Supreme Court, then into the federal courts.

You can read all about this at these links to The Opine Editorials, where we covered it as it was happening:

On the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on Proposition 8

On the Proposition 8 Trial

On the California Marriage Amendment

On Judge Walker - the federal judge who heard the federal trial over Proposition 8/California Marriage Amendment but did not disclose he stood to immediately and personally benefit from the results.)

(Click on the tags at The Opine Editorials and here on this blog for more on these subjects.)

It is possible SCOTUS may leave this matter up to the individual states, or may order states with "same as marriage" domestic partnerships, like California, to neuter their marriage licensing. There could be some other rulings other than a sweeping one.

If SCOTUS instead invents a "right" for brideless or groomless pairings to get a state marriage license regardless the state law, that will establish these can-of-worm precedents (because remember, we’re not talking about personal freedom, private behavior, and freedom of association, but rather demanding a state-issued license):

1) Minorities that are only distinguishable by their voluntary behavior or unverifiable claims about themselves will be specially-protected classes. Some might ask how this is different from protecting religious groups, but freedom of religion is specifically listed in the Constitution. Those who are in the minority in their sex-like practices will now be specially protected classes. What if someone finds it advantageous in a lawsuit to claim they are gay, even though there is no evidence they are actually homosexual? We certainly can't ask for proof, can we?

2) There will be a right to state-issued licenses and those licenses have to be recognized in all states. That should get very interesting when it comes to restrictions placed on the Second Amendment right to bear arms, or driver's licenses for people who refuse to actually take the driving test due to personal characteristics present since birth.

3) The equal protection principle applies not only to individuals, but to pairings (or groups) not similarly situated. If I had a business partnership, I'd sue for the same protections afforded to marriages (for example, not being compelled to testify against each other in court) and nonprofits.

4) Certain different behaviors must be treated by government as though they were the same. (Yes, a woman socially and sexually uniting with a man is behavior demonstrably different than a woman joining with a woman.)

5) Courts/governments have the authority to forcefully redefine organic institutions established long before the existince of those courts/governments.


Here's a basic argument against neutering marriage that is not religion-based.
1) Men and women are different. Even most of the people who try to deny this demonstrate that they understand this to be true. After all, if men and women were not different, all, or at least three, of the terms in "LGBT" would have no meaning.

2) The pairing of a man and a woman is different than the pairing of two men or two women. It is the only kind of pairing that is able to naturally produce new citizens (who, unlike the adults, do not consent to the relationship), even if not all do. This alone is enough to give the state more interest in the pairing of a man and a woman.

3) Men and women are different in personal relationships. If that difference matters enough to someone in picking a lover, how can it not matter when it comes to the parent-child relationship?

4) State licensing of bride+groom pairings provides children with a role model, guardian, and bonding partner from each of the two sexes that comprise all of society, legally bound to each other as well as the children; generally, this is good for children.

5) It is Constitutional, moral, common, and necessary to treat different kinds of relationships differently. Since all that is needed to enforce this requirement for a STATE-ISSUED license is a pair of STATE-ISSUED birth certificates, it can be done objectively and with impartiality to sexual orientation and without violating anyone's privacy.

6) One need not believe homosexual behavior, relationships, or people to be harmful, sinful, or inferior to accept any or all of #1-5. Indeed, there are people who identify as LBGT who agree with this argument.


Although marriage neutering advocates equate their campaign to civil rights for African-Americans, the comparison is insulting. Homosexual people certainly can't be described as a powerless minority akin to how African-Americans were 50-60 years ago, given how many already serve in elected and appointed positions at all levels of government, how they are treated throughout academia, their overrepresentation and positive portrayals in media, their socioeconomic status, widespread support by business including major corporations, so on and so forth. Unlike African-Americans, homosexual people were not taken from their homeland by force, systematically enslaved and denied status as human beings, systematically segregated by force of law, tortured and lynched by the thousands in festive events attended in broad daylight by entire towns (including children), denied their right to vote, etc.

Even so, heterosexuals would have just as much access to licensing a same-sex union as "marriage" as homosexual people, so how can it be about helping a suspect class?

Marriage neutering advocates are claiming they have unstoppable, growing momentum, and a clear majority of popular support with inevitable victory among voters. How can that be if they are a powerless minority subject to widespread, systematic animus? Which is it? Californians broadly supported homosexual people having the same rights as everyone else and pet legislative causes, but at the same time, voted to affirm the bride+groom requirement.

Clearly, we are talking about treating different voluntary behaviors differently. This is not the same thing as simply being able to look at someone and know they are female, or black, or an Orthodox Jew. We are told over and over again that we can't know whether someone is heterosexual or homosexual just be looking at them.

Many people who support retaining the bride+groom requirement in state marriage licensing have no animus for homosexual people or homosexual behavior. Some of them identify as LGBT themselves.

Other people who one claimed a gay or lesbian identity now live as heterosexual or claim to be heterosexual. I’ve never seen an African-American become a white guy. This is apples and oranges.

If SCOTUS does invent that new right, it will not be the end of what the fascists behind the marriage neutering movement will do. It will just be the beginning. Nobody will be allowed to hold up marriage as a bride+groom institution, such as in educational lesson plans. Other limitations on marriage licensing will be attacked, and marriage may no longer be recognized at all by government. Churches and synagogues who believe that marriage unites a bride and groom will be attacked. We’ve already seen indications of this before. Individuals will not be immune, either.

Will SCOTUS uphold the rights of California's voters? Or will it set dangerous new precedents? Do the people have a government, or are we all property of the government?

The Race Card and Neutering Marriage

Marriage neutering advocates frequently cite prohibitions in the past against "interracial"* marriage as why African-Americans, judges, an all who care about civil rights should support the neutering of marriage laws and the replacement of marriage with a counterfeit. The claim goes that because African-Americans in some parts of the country in the past could not marry white people, they should identify with the inability for brideless pair of a groomless pair to get a "marriage" license, and they should fight for marriage neutering.

When one takes a closer look at the situation, though, if African-Americans, as a group, have something with which to identify in this case, it is actually the denial of their voting rights. More African-Americans were denied their voting rights than were ever prevented from marrying a white person.

For example, if the pollsters are to be believed, African-Americans, as a classification, strongly supported California's Prop 22 and subsequent Prop 8, which was adopted as a state constitutional amendment. And yet their votes were cast aside by courts based on a made-up "right" and based on a demand to treat different kinds of voluntary associations as though they are the same. In other words, they were denied their voting rights in favor of imaginary rights demanded by an even smaller minority.

"Interracial" marriage has been readily recognized to be marriage by every major religion (though not all sects) all throughout history around the world. Some places in this country banned it (a true ban, as I explain below... not simply "refusing to license"). Notice that the people who passed those laws did not also set up laws to ban same-sex couples from getting married – because such a thing had never been recognized in the first place. Indeed, in the case that shot down bans on interracial marriage – Loving v. Virginia, no mention is made of same-sex couples. Same-sex "marriage" is a modern invention modeled after marriage - which was not created by the state but merely recognized by the state - but missing the key element in marriage that is of the most interest to society. This modern invention is designed for the appropriation of government benefits (already provided to domestic partners in California and other places) and public affirmation (which should be up to the public).

If marriage is about forming a microcosm of society for the sake of perpetuating it – uniting both sexes that comprise all of society, giving children both a mother and a father legally bound to each other and to them, then "interracial" marriage is the same kind of voluntary association as any other marriage. However, two men or two women, of any race, are not. Skin color is incidental to marriage, while sex is inherent to it.  Thus, the comparison to same-sex "marriage" doesn’t hold up. "Interracial" marriage is how we got new citizens like Tiger Woods. Who has ever been conceived by sodomy between two men?

Today, people are able to live their lives together without a marriage license, while in the past, property owners and employers could refuse to deal with people who were "shacking up" and cohabitation could be prosecuted. Thus, a ban on interracial marriage was a form of segregation and a denial of the freedom of association. It was truly a ban. Now, people are free to cohabitate without social or legal repercussions, and keeping the bride+groom requirement in state marriage licensing and federal law will not keep them from doing so.

Having had wrong laws regarding marriage licensing in the past does not mean that all laws regarding marriage licensing are wrong. Most people calling for marriage neutering are in favor of some form of discrimination themselves when it comes to issuing marriage licenses. Everyone involved wants some form of discrimination, such as restrictions on the number of spouses, how closely related the spouses can be, and the minimum age to to marry.

Must a brideless or groomless sex-segregating couple be treated the same as a couple integrating and uniting  both of the sexes? Why, when so many laws treat different kinds of voluntarily associations differently?

In addition to rejecting the attempt to confuse the issue with a legitimate civil rights fight from the past, the African-American community should speak up in defense of their voting rights, and judges should recognize that marriage licenses are issued on behalf of the people of a state, and the people have the power to require that marriage be integrationist rather than segregationist.

*I maintain that we are all one race – human, and this “interracial” is an artificial term in this case, in my opinion.
(I originally posted this in a slightly different form as "The Race Card and Prop 8" on my previous blog.)

Neutering Marriage Devalues and Discourages Marriage

 ...and that is bad for children and therefore bad for society.



Some marriages are arranged. Most in our country aren't. Some are about love, some are about lust, some are about money. Some are about class. Marriage is about many things, but from a societal interest, it is – and always has been - about forming a microcosm of society for the purpose of perpetuating it. It is about joining the two sexes and providing any offspring with both a mother and a father – and that has been the universal core of marriage throughout all of human history.

In other words, licensed marriage on its most basic and level is about children.

But when laws are passed (or, in California and some other states, a court decision is issued) neutering marriage licensing, so that two men or two women can legally be designated as “married”, this is a statement that marriage, as an institution, can't be about children – because it takes both a woman and a man to make a child. Some marriages may be about children, but marriage in and of itself can't be about children - if there is a right for any two people to have a licensed marriage. Court rulings neutering marriage make the statement that licensed marriage is about feelings, or benefits, or hospital access, or any number of things that have been cited by marriage neutering activists - all of which can be addressed without a marriage license.

If marriage can't be about children, a disconnect is created in the public consciousness between marriage and raising children. Even libertarian atheist Tom Leykis, who insists that there is no benefit for a man to get married - that men can get everything they want without marriage - states that marriage benefits children. Do we really want official public policy that makes it clear that marriage is not about children?

Although we are already experiencing a significant level of illegitimacy (thanks to a disconnect between sex and marriage), divorce (thanks to a disconnect between commitment and marriage), blended families rife with jealousy, insecurity, and confusion, and a disconnect between coitus and reproduction (thanks to IVF), we still have a society that expresses that it is ideal to raise children within a marriage that created or adopted them and associates marriage with children. Except in gay circles, when someone says "We got married," one of the first questions people ask is "When do you plan on having children?" Paternity is, in many places, assigned to husbands by default when their wife births a child, even if she could have conceived the child by another man. Ex-husbands often pay child support for children that where there before he ever met their mother. Child support is expected from an ex-spouse even if the other ex-spouse is financially capable of providing for the child without assistance. Even many people who cohabitate and procreate out of wedlock get married, in large part, “for the sake of their children.”

Why?  Because children do best with a both a mother and a father, even more so if they are married to each other, and it takes both a male and a female to create children. Whether by design or as a consequence of evolution, children do best in having both that male and female parental authority as a model and with whom to bond. That child will, throughout her life, interact with both males and females. Even if you believe that our existence and the way we reproduce are sheer meaningless accidents, that socialization is important to perpetuating society in the best conditions.

Most, if not all, of the people who deny this appear to be motivated not by what is best for children or society, but what is wanted by some homosexuality advocates, fornicators, and divorced people politically and socially. Someone who wants a child but doesn't have a spouse (of the opposite sex) will try to justify their actions, and those who think a marriage license will bring their relationship and themselves whatever (approval, benefits, etc.) they are seeking will likewise deny the importance of having both a mother and father (1).

If marriage is about children, then it ought to be restricted to the kind of unions that can produce children (2). If it isn't about children, then it should be about whatever else benefits society.  Marriage neutering advocates say that purpose is creating stability in "sexual" relationships.  But that is in conflict with their own insistence that sexual behavior between two consenting adults is a private matter in which the state should not be involved.

If we are going to continue down this path of neutered marriage licensing, we should expect higher illegitimacy rates and perhaps increased divorce rates and/or lower marital rates (3), because there will be less of an association between child-rearing and marriage. If marriage is not about children, then a husband should feel no guilt in leaving the mother of his child if he feels she has neglected her vows. If our statistical analyses do not make the distinction between bride-groom marriages and other unions, then we can also expect a statistical increase in "marital" domestic violence, substance abuse, infidelity, and physical and mental health issues, as these are acknowledged issues of increased frequency in the "homosexual community". That would be something else that would make licensed marriage less attractive, along with the presence of or desire for children being less of an incentive.

If we are going to continue down this path where marriage isn't about children, then we should at least be consistent and not assign default paternity to husbands, or require child support if the custodial parent earns enough to provide for a child, or require stepparents (almost always fathers) to provide child support in the event of a divorce. This can probably have applications to inheritance laws, too.

I agree that the government should not be policing the bedroom. I can understand why we have no-fault divorce laws. But the government does have an interest in licensing bride-groom marriage that it doesn't have with same-sex couples. Citizens are better off if they have been raised within a lasting marriage with both a father and a mother, and less likely to commit crime or be dependent on welfare. We must not yield this beneficial construct to be sacrificed on the altar of homosexual esteem for those who seem to neurotically need the endorsement of their relationships by others. We must not allow marriage to be devalued by denying the core universal thread that has made marriage what it is.

Marriage may be about love, but it is primarily about children, and giving them a mother and a father.

(1) Neutered marriage licensing under the guise that same-sex couples have a “right” to marry will make it impossible for adoption agencies, social workers, fertility clinics, laws, and courts to give any preference to bride+groom couples over same-sex couples in placing children (or academia or others from presenting bride+groom couples as the norm or ideal). The advocates of this “equality” cite flawed studies to support their claim that there is no difference to children if they are raised by two men, two women, or a man and a woman, as long as it is two "parents". There are two ways to demonstrate that this must be false: A) If “two parents”, regardless of sex, are better than one, then point out that surely three parents would be preferable to two, and four preferable to three, and so forth, and ask if preference should be given to the largest group parenting arrangement over “couple parenting”, and; B) The homosexual person knows there is a difference between men and women - and therefore mothers and fathers - when it comes to personal relationships. Otherwise, the homosexual personal could just as easily be attracted to someone of the opposite sex.

(2) Yes, not all bride+groom couples choose to or can create children, but they are the only kind that can without the aid of a third party, while no same-sex couples have ever been able to create children alone. Regardless, bride+groom couples still form a microcosm of society by uniting the sexes, and we do not check fertility status of marriage license applicants as that would be a violation of privacy.  Indeed, sexual orientation is not a criterion either.

(3) The countries that have neutered their marriage licensing tend to be countries where marriages don't last as long, fewer people bother to marry, and children are more likely to be born out of wedlock. Although correlation does not prove causation, it is clear that the culture of these societies don't esteem marriage or raising children within marriage as much as ours - should we be striving to be more like them when it comes to marriage licensing? Results from marriage neutering are likely to be generational, and since no country had neutered their licensing as of 15 years ago, we have yet to fully experience the social effects.

Professor Lund Calls Out Bogus Claims About Studies

I previously noted that there are some bogus reports on unreliable studies claiming that couples missing one of the sexes make even better parents than, you know, the kind of couple Nature or Nature's God made reproductive.

Professor Nelson Lund had a can't-miss piece in the Wall Street Journal about this. I suppose he can expect a severed unicorn's head in his bed? Or maybe lots of glitter? Maybe that savage bully fellow (hmmm.. what's his name...) could do a Google bomb on "Lund"? Oh, if the West Wing was still on, they could totally make up a character that is obviously Lund, then have the character say something Lund never said, then have the President totally knock that stawman down! But Law & Order: SVU is still on. They can make the character a pedophile or murderer. You know, all of the real honest and sensible ways of debating public policy.

The claimed right to same-sex marriage is not in the Constitution or in the court's precedents, so the court must decide whether to impose a new law making marriage into a new and different institution.

Yes. Neutering marriage replaces marriage with something else. When you take water bottles in your water bottle factory and fill some with water molecules and some only with hydrogen and some only with oxygen, you can no longer say you are selling water and be honest about it.

A significant number of organizations representing social and behavioral scientists have filed briefs promising the court that there is nothing to worry about. These assurances have no scientific foundation. Same-sex marriage is brand new, and child rearing by same-sex couples remains rare. Even if both phenomena were far more common, large amounts of data collected over decades would be required before any responsible researcher could make meaningful scientific estimates of the long-term effects of redefining marriage.

If the MNAs get their way. by the time the evidence is in, it will be too late to do anything about it.

Social-science advocacy organizations, however, have promoted the myth that a lack of evidence, so far, of bad effects implies the nonexistence of such effects. This myth is based on conjecture or faith, not science.

Science says the pairing of male and female is different from other pairings. Why is the Left suddenly anti-science?

The prominent National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study, for instance, relied on a sample recruited entirely at lesbian events, in women's bookstores and through lesbian newspapers. Other studies relied on samples as small as 18 or 33 or 44 cases. The effect of parenting by male homosexual couples remains in the realm of anecdotes. Most research has relied on reports by parents about their children's well-being while the children were still under the care of those parents. Even a social scientist should be able to recognize that parents' evaluations of their own success as parents might be a little skewed.

No, only a bigot wouldn't take a Leftist homosexual person's opinion as absolutely factual!

There has been only one study using a large randomized sample, objective measures of well-being, and reports of grown children rather than their parents. This research, by Mark Regnerus, a sociologist at the University of Texas Austin, found that children raised in a household where a parent was involved in a same-sex romantic relationship were at a significant disadvantage with respect to a number of indicators of well being—such as depression, educational attainment and criminal behavior—compared with children of intact biological families.

One might expect this work at least to raise a caution flag, but it has been vociferously attacked on methodological grounds by the same organizations that tout the value of politically congenial research that suffers from more severe methodological shortcomings. This is what one expects from activists, not scientists.

Even science must take a dive for the sake of Leftism's drive for esteeming homosexual behaviors. Go read the whole thing.

Deftly Defending DOMA

The fate of the federal Defense of Marriage Act, signed into law by Democrat President Bill Clinton with the backing of both Democrats and Republicans before any state had neutered marriage licensing, is currently in the hands of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Some conservatives reject the Constitutionality of DOMA based on federalism, which some of the Left have cited as well, inconsistent with most of their positions. I support federalism, too, but as we'll see below that doesn't mean DOMA is unconstitutional. I have wondered ever since DOMA has been an issue if, because some states mess things up, everyone else should be forced go along, especially given that there are many examples of states issuing other licenses and other legal designations that other states don't have to accept. A neutered license is no longer a "marriage" license, it is a "two people who are not legally married to others, of age, and not too closely related" license, and as such, should states be forced to recognize them?

I don't know of any legal analysts who expect such a move, nor do I think any notable briefs submitted to SCOTUS call for it, but although I recognize that certain powers are reserved to the state, I do think it is possible a credible case could be made that the right of a child to a mother and father could justify federal involvement in restoring bride+groom requirements to state marriage licenses.

For now, though, let's see what some others have said about why DOMA does pass the Constitutional test.

Is Your News Source Lying To You?

Whether is it supposed to be an objective news article or report, or whether is commentary or analysis, if the person you are reading, listening to, or watching is discussing the public debate and court arguments about neutering marriage, the federal Defense of Marriage Act, or California's Proposition 8 says any of the following, they are are most likely lying to you, whether out of appallingly unprofessional ignorance or dishonest advocacy:

"ban on gay marriage"
"ban on gay unions"
"illegal" in reference to homosexual relationships
"equal rights" or "civil rights" in regards to homosexual people
"The only arguments against gay/same-sex marriage are religious."
"The only arguments defending Proposition 8 or DOMA are religious."
"Their argument is that marriage is only about having children/reproduction/procreation."

Again, if you hear/read any of those, or their equivalents, the person is lying to you.

Here's the truth:

The California Marriage Amendment, voted in as Proposition 8, and similar legislation in other states, did not ban any marriages, unions, ceremonies, or relationships. It did not make any of those things illegal.

As it was before Proposition 8 or any of those other laws passed, a homosexual person has equal - the exact same - rights and access as a heterosexual person.

There are nonreligious arguments defending the Constitutionality, practicality, and importance of the bride+groom requirement in state marriage licensing.

The argument is not that marriage is only about having children. Read this very slowly if you have to: The argument is that since man+woman pairing is the only kind of pairing that can naturally (and "accidentally") create new citizens who do not consent to the situation in which they are placed, that kind of voluntary association is distinguishable from man+man pairing or woman+woman pairing and the state has more interest in man+woman pairings.

Whether someone wants to have children or not, plans to have children or not, has all of their reproductive system functioning or not are all private matters. However, because of science (don't be anti-science!) and thousands of years of experience the state knows a man+man or woman+woman union will never naturally or accidentally produce children, so they can be ruled out of this level of interest. One may ask, as Justice Kagan did, about a couple of 55-year-olds, but 1) the law doesn't know when any given couple will become jointly infertile, and 2) they are still the same kind of pairing that is reproductive. Checking a birth certificate or other official government documents to see if the sex-integration requirement (bride+groom) is met is simple and non-intrusive. Asking about plans/desires to have children or personal infertility is unnecessary and a violation of privacy.

We have repeatedly demonstrated the bias of certain news media personnel and organizations in these matters. I give my feedback to them. You should, too.

Previously:

Neutered Marriage Means Marriage Can't Be About Children

Neutering Marriage: Where We Are and What It Means

Manipulation & Misreporting of Polls to Advocate Marriage Neutering

Marriage Neutering and Newspeak

It's Not a "Ban on Gay Marriage"

Two comprehensive offerings:
Reviewing the Basics
Handy Dandy Marriage Neutering Plea Repellant

Bad Arguments For Neutering Marriage Licensing

I’m against changing marriage licensing so that legal marriage will no longer mean uniting the sexes. Some people claim to be in favor of “gay marriage”, but this is a misnomer. I'm in favor of gay marriage - my own marriage is quite gay, thank you. Changing the legal definition of marriage means forcing everyone to apply the title "marriage" to, and treat as marriage, sex-segregated or sex-exclusive or same-sex or single-sex or brideless and groomless unions. There would be no requirements that the participants actually be gay.

Originally inspired by a blog posting by Greg Koukl, I wanted to bring you some bad arguments for changing marriage licensing to license couples missing one of the sexes. Koukl has a more in-depth piece here

Keep in mind – marriage licenses are issued by the state, on behalf of the citizens of that state.

Here's a survey of some arguments we have heard from marriage neutering advocates as to why the Supreme Court of the United States should neuter state marriage licensing nationwide.

Manipulation & Misreporting of Polls to Advocate Marriage Neutering

All the cool people want it! All the young people want it! The majority of Americans want it! The momentum is unstoppable! It's inevitable!

How many times have you heard that in the debate about the neutering (abolishing) of state marriage licenses? Eager to advance the replacement of marriage with a a counterfeit, in-the-tank reporters and Leftist advocacy groups have touted polling that, according to them, shows a strong majority of Americans on their side of the issue.

However, if it was really true, they'd simply neuter marriage nationwide through direct popular votes on the state level, at least in states that have direct voting, and through state legislature in the other states and Congress nationally. For all of their bluster, there has only ever been ONE state (Maine) that has initiated the neutering of their licenses through a direct vote of the people, and that was done in the November 2012 election. For the other eight states and Washington, D.C., the process was initiated by judicial activism or radical action by the state legislature. This whole thing was initiated through judicial activism. Unfortunately, some people do throw up their hands and bow down before such activism, or before the radical agenda of their state legislature. 41 of the 50 states do NOT have neutered licensing, and most of them have recently, strongly, affirmed marriage as a bride+groom union, many by popular vote.

In the last few weeks, there have been reports of various polls claiming that clear a majority of Americans support the neutering marriage and polls touted by marriage neutering advocates claiming that 49% of Americans support marriage neutering. I wasn't a math major at the university, but 49% is not a majority (unless marriage neutering advocates have been allowed to redefine the word "majority" like they have "marriage" in some places).

The truth?

You're being lied to by marriage neutering advocates. Headlines about these polls are almost always highly misleading and the articles themselves may be misleading. When it comes to polling, the wording of the questions, the order of the questions, and who was polled, among other factors, can make a difference. At The Opine Editorials, we documented this repeatedly in our updates about poll dancing.

Even homofascist marriage neutering advocate blog Dog My Joe, by its own postings, admits this. A recent update there quoted Tony Perkins criticizing the Washington Post:

Why Just Two?

Many marriage neutering advocates tell us, even though they insist that marriage isn't about children, that all that matters is that a child has two parents in the home.


Where do they get this number?

Marriage Neutering and Newspeak

Marriage neutering advocates, especially those embedded in the MSM, have been very clever at their manipulation of the news and debate when it comes to their well-organized, well-funded, calculated effort to neuter marriage licensing nationwide and replace marriage with a counterfeit, further tearing down the strength of the family and devaluing both masculinity and femininity. Hedonists want this because they don't like anything that implies sexual morality. For the Leftists, this is a good thing because they think it will bring about more equality in outcomes and make people generally more dependent on the government. To Leftists, that some people have better families than others is unfairness that must be corrected by public policy. People relying on family first, ahead of government, might mean having to deal with people who know your moral shortcomings and your counterproductive habits, and that can be a real buzzkill.

They know they can't win using logic and sound reasoning, so they appeal to emotion and employ cultural subversion. They know the fact that men and women are different is inescapable, despite the long attempts by Leftist gender confusion advocates to assert otherwise. Even infants know men and women are different. Even the marriage neutering advocates at "Dancing With the Stars" always pair men with women, even going so far as to pair Chaz Bono with a woman because Chaz claims to be man now (though the emperor has no Y chromosome). Any person who has struggled with their sexual orientation and has identified themselves as "gay" or "lesbian" is demonstrating that there are important differences between men and women. Anyone who claims to have undergone a gender reassignment is making a claim that there is such a difference between men and women, that counseling, hormone treatments and surgeries are needed for them to change from one to the other.

Since men and women are different, the uniting of a bride and groom is objectively, demonstrably, and documentably different than the pairing two men or two women. This is why it is Constitutional (and important) to treat marriage differently from other kinds of voluntary associations, including what a minority of states and a few countries have falsely called "marriage" in their licensing.

In an effort to circumvent what should be self-evident truths to most people, marriage neutering advocates have misused language.

Let's clear up some terms.

Prejudice:

Is it Possible to Truly Achieve "Marriage Equality"?

Much of existing family law is predicated on marriage being something that involves both a husband and a wife, as it has been throughout history. If we are truly to have "marriage equality" so that the voluntary association of two men or two women must be treated, under law, exactly the same as natural marriage, I'm curious as to how this would work in the following areas:

Adoption – Same-sex couples would have just as much standing to adopt as a bride-groom couple, correct? Some people who devalue either masculinity or femininity, fatherhood or motherhood, and devalue sex-integration don't see this is a problem, but I think most people do, even if they support neutering state marriage licensing. This reality has meant that Catholic adoption agencies, in order to be true to their convictions, have had to cease operations in states with neutered licensing.

Paternity Assumption – In a bride-groom couple, for the protection of the child (and to keep the state from being on the hook for child support), the groom is considered the legal father by default of any child born to the bride. Would the non-carrying lesbian be considered the default parent of a child her partner carries, whether or not she agreed to the pregnancy, and regardless of how that pregnancy was accomplished? If not, then neither should a groom. Would a lesbian woman be held accountable if it turns out that her partner is secretly bisexual and turns up pregnant?

Child Custody - Women are often given preference over men in child custody matters, even when the man begs for custody. How would this work when it comes to same-sex couples who are being divorced? Would fathers being divorced from mothers gain more from this? Would the biological parent, if any, be favored? If not, what implications would that have when it comes to traditional stepfathers and stepmothers?

Child Support – Would the spouse who is not biologically related to the children still be forced to pay child support? It happens with bride-groom couples, but couldn't someone argue that they've never engaged in reproductive behavior and thus shouldn't be saddled with child support? If so, how could that argument be accepted while treating a groom being divorced from a bride equally (or will courts be forced to admit that homosexual sodomy and heterosexual coitus are not equivalent - and invade our bedrooms)? If there are two men, and one turns out to be bisexual or donates sperm, resulting in a pregnancy, is the other man's income to be included in figuring child support as happens when a bride and groom marry? (Yes, sperm donors have been held liable for child support.)

Abortion Rights - One woman gets pregnant, there is a split, the other woman - who has paid for the reproductive medical treatments, perhaps donated the eggs, and wants the children - sues to block abortion. Currently, a wife can get an abortion even if her husband objects. Will "gay rights" trump abortion rights? Oh, I can see the dilemma now! I suspect abortion rights will win that battle, especially if feminists realize that men could also use any precedent set.

Community Property was based on the idea that a marriage was creating a cooperative microcosm of society with a division of labor, more likely than not to raise children biologically related to both spouses, thereby perpetuating society. In order to treat all couples equally, would the concept of community property be diminished?

Alimony – Largely based on community property and division of labor, the concept has lost some importance with the equal access of women to the workplace. Again, would the concept of alimony be weakend? Surely, a man should not have to pay alimony because he married a woman while another man avoids paying it because he married another man? That wouldn't be equal.

Marriage Statistics - Would government agencies be allowed to collect, compile, and release statistics that distinguish between natural and neutered marriage? If not, marriage statistics could show marriage as being less favorable than they have in the past in terms of longevity (of the participants as well as the marriage), fidelity, domestic violence, poverty, mental health, positive effect on children, etc.

What has changed in Massachusetts and states that have subsequently neutered their licenses, and is the law still catching up? I don't see how we can neuter marriage licensing nationwide without it changing marriage for all, even those bride-groom couples who have been married for decades.

Remember – true equality works both ways. If highly noisy, persistent, and effective activist groups accomplish their goal of neutering marriage nationwide, what happens if they need to direct their energies to something new, especially if they discover things about state-licensed marriage that are not friendly to their subculture? I think we could kiss goodbye any hope of moving away from no-fault divorce. It would not surprise me if the "equality" groups were to subsequently demand taxpayer funding on-demand for all third-party reproduction. After all, many bride-groom couples can conceive for free. Shouldn't we correct this "inequality"?

I do not believe that the voluntary association of a man and a woman is the same kind of voluntary association as two women or two men, and I do not see a moral or legal obligation for the state to treat all three as the same. I see a state interest in licensing and encouraging natural marriage that is not met in either of the other two kinds of unions. It is obvious to me that what keeps same-sex "marriage" and natural marriage from being equal has less to do with state licensing requirement and more to do with the nature of the sexes and the differences between them.

The rights of children must be protected, as they do not consent to the circumstances of their birth, or the relationships their parents have. Whether marriage neutering gains or loses ground, we still have third-party reproduction, and something else should be put in place to protect the right of a child to both her mother and her father. Of course there will be instances in which, for the child's protection, access to one or both of her parents would have to be restricted or terminated, and redirected to an adoptive mother or father. But third-party reproduction has already deprived, by design, children of a mother or a father, and neutering marriage can only reinforce that.

Finally, is it really equality if there are still people who are prevented from marrying the other adults they love due to the circumstances of their birth or their sexual orientation? There are polyamorists who swear they are just as much polyamorist as they are gay, and cousins, who certainly didn't choose the circustances of their birth, who are not allowed to marry in many states. If marriage is based on the desires/feelings of the adults rather than the kind of union that can be procreative, what is the basis for limiting marriage licensing to just two particpants, or denying marriage licenses on the basis of consanguinity? Or, is marriage really based on the amount of hounding done by a lobby group?

(This is a modified version of a posting I originally published at The Opine Editorials.)

Someone Voted on Their Marriages

Some marriages were ruled to be shams. How is that possible? Read about it over at The Opine Editorials.

Federalism and Incrementalism

A law professor wrote in the Los Angeles Times today, essentially bemoaning the existence of state governments and civil unions, because they made for "confusing" laws on marriage, divorce, and government benefits. I take a look and his commentary over at The Opine Editorials.

Single-Issue Temporary Federalists

Ah, the DOMA hearing. A discussion about DOMA is one of the only times you'll ever hear a lot of these people talking about the role of states. I believe in the sincerity of the ones who are consistent federalists. So many of the others, the moment you talk about states doing something independently of the federal government or different from each other, accuse you of wanting to bring back slavery.

Go to the Opine Editorials to read my analysis of the coverage by the the Los Angeles Times.