The National Organization of Marriage held a rally in Washington DC during the SCOTUS arguments regarding the legality of gay marriage. They were defending the view that marriage should be between a man and a woman. CSPAN carried coverage of the NOM rally here.
The problem with the whole line of reasoning used at this rally is that it is not defensible either on Constitutional, scientific, or Biblical grounds.
Bob Vander Platts, CEO -- National Organization of Marriage
Vander Platts said that there was a serious credibility problem with the SCOTUS as he accused them of usurping the role of the people and Congress. "Only We the People get to amend the Constitution, not the courts!" he shouted. He said that the court would be wise to uphold the Defense of Marriage Act, which he said Congress passed and was upheld by the wishes of the people. To do otherwise, he said, would amount to usurping the peoples' voice and would be the "height of judicial overreach." "Let the people have the right to vote!" he concluded.
The problem with his whole line of reasoning is that our Constitution most emphatically does not guarantee majority rule. Instead, it is designed to protect minorities against the tyranny of the majority. When the government fails to protect against the tyranny of the majority, then slavery and Jim Crow are the logical result. That is why Congress, the President, and the courts are in fact a check against the tyranny of the majority. That is how we got Brown vs. Board of Education, civil rights legislation, and other civil rights legislation passed in this country.
One of the centerpieces of debate over the Constitution, in fact, concerned the tyranny of the majority. Opponents were concerned that there were no guarantees that a majority would usurp power just like a King. That is why the Bill of Rights was included to create additional protections against the tyranny of the majority.
Bishop Harry Jackson -- High Impact Leadership Coalition
Bishop Harry Jackson started off by quoting Martin Luther King, "Let justice roll down like a mighty river." He said a prayer calling on God to arise and let his enemies get scattered. "Earthly wisdom comes from above," he said. He said that marriage was the institution that healed barriers in cities and that ghettos that embraced the concept of one man and one woman would be revitalized. He said that under every category from quality of life to being sexually abused, children of straight parents were better off than children of gay parents. This was a contention repeated throughout the day. However, that is not borne out by the scientific research.
The American Psychological Association summarized decades of research showing that children of gay and lesbian parents are just as healthy and well-adjusted as children of straight parents. The American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy came to the same conclusion. The Washington Post reported on a study by the American Academy of Pediatrics, which went over decades of research and came out in favor of legalizing same-sex marriages, saying that they would strengthen the family unit. A Boston researcher looked at studies of 500 different families and found that children of gays and lesbians were just as healthy and well-adjusted as children with straight parents. Four different professional research organizations in Minnesota, all working independently, came to the conclusion that children of gays and lesbians were just as healthy and well-adjusted as children with straight parents. They came out against legislation amending the Minnesota Constitution to ban gay marriage. They went further and said that same-sex couples were just as capable of forming life-long relationships as married couples.
Tammy Fitzgerald -- North Carolina Values Coalition
Ms. Fitzgerald's organization passed a marriage amendment to the North Carolina Constitution saying that the "only valid domestic union" was one between a man and a woman. It passed at the polls with a substantial majority of Democrats and Independents voting yes according to Fitzgerald. "We see that marriage comes from God," she said. Fitzgerald said that it was a matter of benefits to society; she said that children needed a mother and a father. By contrast, she said that by definition, a gay family was broken from the start. She said that it was a question of "securing the needs of the children." She said that it would be wrong of the Supreme Court to "upend" the voters' decisions and that the Supreme Court should not determine the outcomes of such debates like she said they did with Roe vs. Wade.
Although it was not mentioned in the Constitution, it was the clear intent of the Founders to create a society based on separation of church and state. The following are quotes from Madison:
- The civil Government, though bereft of everything like an associated hierarchy, possesses the requisite stability, and performs its functions with complete success, whilst the number, the industry, and the morality of the priesthood, and the devotion of the people, have been manifestly increased by the total separation of the church from the State (Letter to Robert Walsh, Mar. 2, 1819).
- Strongly guarded as is the separation between religion and & Gov't in the Constitution of the United States the danger of encroachment by Ecclesiastical Bodies, may be illustrated by precedents already furnished in their short history (Detached Memoranda, circa 1820).
- Every new and successful example, therefore, of a perfect separation between the ecclesiastical and civil matters, is of importance; and I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in showing that religion and Government will both exist in greater purity the less they are mixed together (Letter to Edward Livingston, July 10, 1822).
I must admit moreover that it may not be easy, in every possible case, to trace the line of separation between the rights of religion and the civil authority with such distinctness as to avoid collisions and doubts on unessential points. The tendency to a usurpation on one side or the other or to a corrupting coalition or alliance between them will be best guarded against by entire abstinence of the government from interference in any way whatever, beyond the necessity of preserving public order and protecting each sect against trespasses on its legal rights by others. (Letter Rev. Jasper Adams, Spring 1832).
- To the Baptist Churches on Neal's Greek on Black Creek, North Carolina I have received, fellow-citizens, your address, approving my objection to the Bill containing a grant of public land to the Baptist Church at Salem Meeting House, Mississippi Territory. Having always regarded the practical distinction between Religion and Civil Government as essential to the purity of both, and as guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States, I could not have otherwise discharged my duty on the occasion which presented itself (Letter to Baptist Churches in North Carolina, June 3, 1811).
The reasoning of the Founders was that if Christianity, say, were to become the official religion, then the next question would be what denomination the government should support. The end result would be religious strife, the same sort of thing that the American colonialists were fleeing from in Europe.
And Fitzgerald does not have the right to speak for children when they are perfectly capable of speaking for themselves. For every 11 year old girl that the National Organization of Marriage can produce speaking out against gay marriage, there are people like
Daniel Martinez-Leffew, the son of gay parents who is proud of his family and who wrote to Justice John Roberts asking him to legalize gay marriage.
Ruben Diaz -- State Senator (D-NY)
Diaz led an unsuccessful fight to stop the legalization of gay marriage in New York. "New York City, where I come from, is very liberal and you do what the majority says," he said. "They told me if you are a Democrat and you are anti-abortion or anti-gay, you will lose. I'm a Democratic Senator against abortion and same-sex marriages and I won the last election with 89% of the vote, to God be the glory!"
Jennifer Marshall -- Domestic Policy Studies Director, Heritage Foundation
Jennifer Marshall said that marriage reflected the "reality that children need a mom and a dad." She cited Jennifer Evans, the 11 year old who asked Minnesota legislators, "Tell me; which parent don't I need?" Marshall said, "The proponents can't answer that question." She said that "we have known from the foundations of history" that marriage was to be between a man and a woman. She admitted that people should be free to live and love as they choose, but that because of the status of marriage, the government should give it a "unique" status. She said that it was in the best interests of children and of "limited Constitutional government."
The whole premise of Evans' question is flawed. Nobody is seeking to separate families. The more we listen to such speeches claiming that the legalization of gay marriage undermines families, the more we wonder if certain people are using the gay rights movement as an excuse for their own marital problems. I am single, but if I were married, then I am responsible for the health of my marriage, not the gay couple moving into town. This is the exact sort of lack of personal responsibility that the right says they're against.
Rev. Wanda Rolon (Puerto Rico)
She quoted Matthew 19:5, in which Jesus said, "For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and unite with his wife and the two shall become one." Rolon continued, "Our fathers could never have imagined the threat to the marriage institution. They left us a legacy that we must defend." Rolon said that marriage was a "pillar of humanity" and that it was a basic right of children to have a mother and a father. "No society can ever reach its full potential without protecting traditional family values," she said. She said that marriage was an institution, not an equal right.
Rolon talked about a recent protest against gay marriage in Puerto Rico at which she said 200,000 people gathered in San Juan to defend traditional marriage. "They were defending the right of children to have a father and a mother," she said.
The question is, if marriage as defined as being between a man and a woman is such a sacred institution, then why did the Founders not see fit to include it in the Constitution? They did not give much direction either in their writings or in the Constitution. So what we have is the principles that are in the Constitution. The first is the separation of church and state that we already discussed. The second is Freedom of Assembly; the government has no legal right to tell you who you can or can't assemble with. That would seem to include two people who decide to live together. The next is the right to privacy -- who people decide to live with is none of the government's business. Then, there is the equal protection clause -- all people must be treated equally. It is not what Rev. Rolon says about marriage because her word is not the law of the land. It is what the Constitution says is the law of the land. The rights not specifically given to the federal government are reserved for the states. That would mean that states have broad discretion over marriage. However, states cannot pass laws regarding marriage that are contrary to the Constitution under the Supremacy Clause. That would rule out laws discriminating against gay marriage.
Allison Howard -- Concerned Women for America
Howard talked about the horrors of divorce. "Ask a girl who never had a father or a boy who never had a mother," she said. She said that 40 years ago, the country was having a healthy debate about abortion when the SCOTUS stepped in with Roe vs. Wade and legalized it. "Nine men in black robes decided the fate of 50 million babies," she said. She said the end result was "countless women hurting physically and spiritually" from abortions and that laws needed to take into account all people including the born and the unborn. Linking back to the topic, she said, "We don't need another Roe vs. Wade."
There was an undercurrent of anger and resentment against Roe, which legalized abortion. But Howard was conflating two different things -- gay marriage and divorce. While divorce can be very painful, as noted above, contrary to stereotypes, children of gay parents are just as healthy and well-adjusted as children of straight parents.
The problem is that the whole ideology presented here is contrary to the Constitution, the Bible, and science. We presented the science about gay children above. And we find it telling that not one of the speakers for the National Organization of Marriage made reference to the Constitution, which is the law of the land. Instead, they appealed to "natural law." Whose "natural law?" We fail to find such a standard promoted by the Constitution.
And finally, let's discuss this issue from a Biblical perspective. Fundamentalists like to cite the passages like the one referenced above and the ones denouncing the graphic sins of the time, men lusting after men. The passage from Romans is typical:
For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave
thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts
were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.
24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In
the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and
were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts
with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their
error.
I speak for myself here. If I, as a straight male, were to start engaging in sexual activities with other men, then I would be under the wrath of God. The lesson here is don't try to be something you're not and don't try to make God what he is not. But if God makes people gay,
like research suggests,then it is not our place to argue with God or judge other people. We can only speak for ourselves. God is sovereign; he can make people in whatever way he sees fit.
The problem is that too much of the time, the church has lost sight of the fact that it is to be salt and light of the earth. Instead, the church has too often become a propaganda outlet for the Republican Party instead of being an independent voice representing the teachings of Jesus to our policy makers. God is not a Democrat or a Republican. During the last election, we could have made a Biblical case for voting for Obama, Romney, Gary Johnson (Libertarian), Jill Stein (Green), or Virgil Goode (Constitution).
But the unique nature of the early Christian church was that people came to embrace its message willingly, not by compulsion of arms. That was something that was rare back in ancient times. The Old Testament taught that the Messiah would spread his message not by might nor by power but by his spirit. And Isaiah proclaimed the Messiah as the Prince of Peace.
Therefore, it is not appropriate for the church to appeal to the government to force Jesus' message on the masses any more than it would be appropriate for our Islamic leaders to lobby for the establishment of Shariah Law. It is not the government's job to enforce the morality of the church. For certain church leaders to demand that the government outlaw abortion or same-sex marriages on moral grounds shows the very sort of dependance on government that the Republican Party says that they are against. If the church is to win the debate on any issue, they must do so in the public square, not by begging the government to do by compulsion what they cannot accomplish by persuasion.