argument essay on gay marriage

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A theological approach that might open up the possibility for greater Christian acceptance of, and ecclesiastical approval for, same sex unions.

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The strongest argument against same-sex marriage: traditional marriage is in the public interest

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Opponents of same-sex marriage argued that individual states are acting in the public interest by encouraging heterosexual relationships through marriage policies, so voters and legislators in each state should be able to set their own laws.

Some groups, such as the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, cited the secular benefits of heterosexual marriages, particularly the ability of heterosexual couples to reproduce, as Daniel Silliman reported at the Washington Post .

”It is a mistake to characterize laws defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman as somehow embodying a purely religious viewpoint over against a purely secular one,” the bishops said in their amicus brief . “Rather, it is a common sense reflection of the fact that [homosexual] relationships do not result in the birth of children, or establish households where a child will be raised by its birth mother and father.”

Other groups, like the conservative Family Research Council, warned that allowing same-sex couples to marry would lead to the breakdown of traditional families. But keeping marriage to heterosexual couples, FRC argued in an amicus brief , allows states to “channel the potential procreative sexual activity of opposite-sex couples into stable relationships in which the children so procreated may be raised by their biological mothers and fathers.”

To defend same-sex marriage bans, opponents had to convince courts that there’s a compelling state interest in encouraging heterosexual relationships that isn’t really about discriminating against same-sex couples.

But a majority of Supreme Court justices and most of the lower courts widely rejected this argument, arguing that same-sex marriage bans are discriminatory and unconstitutional.

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An argument against same-sex marriage: an interview with rick santorum.

The debate over same-sex marriage in the United States is a contentious one, and advocates on both sides continue to work hard to make their voices heard. To explore the case against gay marriage, the Pew Forum has turned to Rick Santorum, a former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania and now a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Sen. Santorum is also the author of the 2005 book It Takes a Family: Conservatism and the Common Good , in which he makes the case for promoting families anchored by a married mother and father.

A counterargument explaining the case for same-sex marriage is made by Jonathan Rauch, a senior writer at The National Journal .

Featuring: Rick Santorum , Senior Fellow, Ethics and Public Policy Center; Former U.S. Senator

Interviewer: David Masci , Senior Research Fellow, Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life

In this Q&A: Why oppose gay marriage? The “go-slow” approach Child welfare Christian values

Question & Answer

Gay rights advocates and others say that gay and lesbian people want to get married for the same reasons that straight people do – they want to be in caring, stable relationships, they want to build a life and even start a family with someone else. Why shouldn’t they be able to do this?

See, I think that’s the foundational flaw with this whole debate. The law is as it has been for 200-plus years, and so the burden is on them to make the persuasive case as to why they should be married, not just for their benefit but for what the impact is on society and marriage as a whole, and on children.

I would argue that the gay community has not made the argument. They may have made the argument as to why they want it, but they have not made any arguments as to why this is beneficial for society. They have not made any argument – convincing or otherwise, that I’m aware of – as to what the impact would be on heterosexual marriages and what the impact would be on children.

They have no studies. They have no information whatsoever about what it would do to the moral ecology of the country, what it would do to religious liberty, what it would do to the mental and physical health of children – nothing. They’ve made no case. Basically the case they’ve made is, “We want what you want, and therefore you should give it to us.”

So you’re saying that advocates of same-sex marriage are not seeing the big picture?

Yes. I have a book that was written a few years ago called It Takes a Family . In that book I have a chapter on moral ecology, and I explain that if you go to the National Archives, you will come to a section that has, as far as the eye can see, rows and rows and rows of environmental impact statements, because we have laws in this country that say before you go out and you put in a bridge across a creek, you have to go out and see whether what you’re doing is disturbing the landscape there.

Yet when it comes to something that I happen to believe is actually more important than a particular plot of land – the entire moral ecology of our country, who we are as a people, what we stand for, what we teach our children, what our values and ethics are – people argue that we can build the equivalent of a strip mall without even thinking about what those consequences are.

Some people in favor of gay marriage have argued for a “go-slow” approach, acknowledging that we’re in largely unknown territory and that a majority of Americans are not yet comfortable with same-sex marriage. Does that attitude allay any of your fears?

No. They want the convenient accelerator of the courts to put this in play, and then they want the judicious temperament of the American democratic system to govern it. I don’t think you can have your cake and eat it too. Same-sex marriage advocates are not going to state legislatures, except in some cases for civil unions. They are using the courts.

If the courts are going to be your accelerator, then get ready for a ride. And if the courts ultimately say, “Marriage must be allowed between anybody and anybody,” the gay rights advocates are not going to say, “Well, you’ve gone too far.” No, I think the go-slow argument is there to make us feel better, but it doesn’t hold water.

Another argument made by gay rights advocates is that with or without marriage, gay families are already a widespread reality. They point out that we already have gay couples living together, some with children. And they ask: Isn’t it better that they be legally married to each other, if for no other reason than for the benefit and the welfare of the children?

The answer is no – because of the consequences to society as a whole. And again, those are consequences that they choose to ignore. What society should be about is encouraging what’s best for children. What’s best for children, we know, is a mother and a father who are the parents of that child, raising that child in a stable, married relationship, and we should have laws that encourage that, that support that.

What you’re talking about with same-sex marriage is completely deconstructing marriage and taking away a privilege that is given to two people, a man and a woman who are married, who have a child or adopt a child. We know it’s best for children and for society that men and women get married. We know it’s healthier. We know it’s better for men. We know it’s better for women. We know it’s better for communities.

What we don’t know is what happens with other options. And once you get away from the model of “what we know is best” and you get into the other options, from my perspective, there’s no stopping it. And also from my perspective, you devalue what you want to value, which is a man and woman in marriage with a child or children. And when you devalue that, you get less of it. When you get less of it, society as a whole suffers.

Do you feel confident that if same-sex marriage became the norm in our society that we would get less traditional marriage?

The answer is yes, because marriage then becomes, to some degree, meaningless. I mean, if anybody can get married for any reason, then it loses its special place. And, you know, it’s already lost its special place, in many respects, because of divorce. The institution of marriage is already under assault. So why should we do more to discredit it and harm it?

Stanley Kurtz of the Ethics and Public Policy Center has written extensively about this, about what the impact is in countries that have adopted same-sex marriage. We have, in fact, seen a decline in the number of marriages, a delay in people getting married, more children being born out of wedlock and higher rates of divorce. None of those things are good for society. None of those things are good for children.

But can you lay these changes at the feet of same-sex marriage?

Yes, I think you can lay them at its feet. Kurtz notes that the marriage rate in the Netherlands was always actually one of the lowest in the EU. And once same-sex marriage was put in place, it broke below the line.

As a person who has positioned himself as a defender of Christian values, why is gay marriage particularly opposed to those values?

Well, the laws in this country are built upon a certain worldview, and it is the Judeo-Christian worldview. And that worldview has been expressed in our laws on marriage for 200-plus years. Up until 25 years ago, we would never have sat here and done this interview. It would have been beyond the pale. And so it is clearly a dramatic departure from the Judeo-Christian ethic that is reflected in our laws that say marriage is a sacred union between a man and a woman.

When you look ahead, do you feel optimistic that your side in this debate will ultimately prevail?

What I’ve noticed about this debate is that fewer and fewer people are stepping up and taking the position I’m taking because they see the consequences of doing so. I don’t think there is an issue that is a tougher issue for people to stand up against in American culture today than this one, both from the standpoint of the mainstream media and the popular culture condemning you for your – they can use all sorts of words to describe you – intolerant, bigot, homophobe, hater. The other side takes it personally. And so it makes it very difficult for folks to stand up and argue public policy when the other side views it as a personal, direct assault on them. So it’s very, very hard for me to be optimistic when we have a battle of ideas and one side is universally hammered for being intolerant bigots and the other side is enlightened and tolerant – which I think is false, but it is the pervasive attitude.

We know that the American public doesn’t approve of same-sex marriage, but they are uncomfortable about it because, again, the public perception is if you feel that way, you’re a bigot or a hater. And if the culture continues to send that message, if our educational system sends that message, which it does, you know, eventually the culture will change and people’s opinions will change.

The push back is what most people know: that mothers and fathers bring something unique. I mean, I have six children. I know that two mothers would not be able to give to my children what a mother and a father can give to my children. For instance, my daughter’s relationship with men is, in many respects, formed by her relationship with me. There are volumes of evidence showing that if little girls don’t have a father, it impacts their ability as adults to bond with men in healthy relationships.

What do we know, really, about children raised by same-sex couples? We’re into, in many respects, an unknown territory. There is already a difficult environment for children in America today, at least from the traditional Judeo-Christian perspective. So I think this is a fight worth fighting, even if it’s not a popular fight.

This transcript has been edited for clarity, spelling and grammar.

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Table of Contents

What the data says about abortion in the u.s., 8 in 10 americans say religion is losing influence in public life, how people around the world view same-sex marriage, the pope is concerned about climate change. how do u.s. catholics feel about it, across u.s. religious groups, more see decline of marriage as negative than positive, most popular.

About Pew Research Center Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. It conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, media content analysis and other empirical social science research. Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. It is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts .

Home — Essay Samples — Social Issues — Gay Marriage — Debating Gay Marriage: Arguments for Equality and Traditional Values

Debating Gay Marriage: Arguments for Equality and Traditional Values

• Categories: Gay Marriage LGBT

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Words: 749 |

Published: Sep 7, 2023

Words: 749 | Pages: 2 | 4 min read

Table of contents

Chapter 1: arguments for gay marriage, chapter 2: arguments against gay marriage, chapter 3: implications for contemporary issues, conclusion: navigating a complex discourse.

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Arguments for Gay Marriages Opinion Essay

Introduction, gay marriages should be allowed.

Marriage is an entity that provides for companionship among the partners. The two partners help each other in their daily activities. The foundation of any marriage is usually love and affection between the two partners. Gay marriage refers to a relationship between two individuals of the same gender. One party is the husband whereas the other is the wife. Such entities have been legalized in some countries whereas some countries totally consider them illegal.

There have been debates on whether gay marriages are acceptable or not. Historically, different cultures and nations have viewed same marriages in different ways. Some provide varied standards for female and male same sex relations. This topic is a concern in many countries including the US. Gay marriages have faced challenges from the codes of conduct of the community, culture and the known doctrines of religion.

However, I strongly feel that such opposition is baseless since marriage is a covenant between the two parties who have agreed to live together. Gay marriages is not all about sex but is based on affection and love. About 70% of the people in USA are opposed to such marriages, a scenario which should not exist (Sullivan, 2008). There are so many reasons as to why such marriages should be authorized.

First, marriage is an individual right. One can choose either to get married or not. Condemning such individuals is a total violation of human rights. This is also supplemented by the fact that these people have weighed the pros and the cons of their decisions and have come to the conclusion that their decisions are the best.

The spouse is also entitled to benefits accruing to a married couple. In the US, benefits like automatic inheritance of the spouse’s property upon death, being entitled to the pension of the spouse, domestic violence protection, medical scheme entitlement and bereavement leave are among the many privileges to such individuals.

Gay marriages are avenues to curb the population pressure on the scarce economic resources. This is because parties of the same gender cannot produce a viable offspring unless biological methods are employed. Such an idea can be best applied in underdeveloped countries where much of the people’s income is spend in providing food to their population. This eases the tension on the country’s resources and promotes their development.

Allowing such marriages tends to eradicate the discrimination that has been evident in the world. This will promote equality of humans of all calibers and provide an avenue for these talents to be tapped and nurtured in economic growth and development. It can be through erasing the prejudice that has for a long time restricted such individuals in their quest to secure some job opportunities as they are disqualified on social grounds.

Condemning gay marriages is a serious infringement of human rights. Such marriages also reduce the gender imbalances, polygamy and polyandry. This is due to the notion that people have to be married to a partner of the opposite sex.

Women can marry other women as men also do so. It reduces the rate of dependence on men by women and vice versa which leads to one-to-many relationships. Gay marriages also help in reducing the chances of transmission of sexually transmitted infections especially those whose etiology is by a chain of relationships.

Gay marriages are an avenue for people to exercise their rights of companionship. It reduces the chances of being unmarried in the society. Despite the fact that they have been opposed in the society and debates are there in place, I strongly feel that such arguments are baseless since even the opposite-sex marriages face so many challenges.

Sullivan, A. (2008). Same-Sex Marriage: Pro and Con . NY: Vintage.

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Gay Marriage Argumentative Essays Example

Type of paper: Argumentative Essay

Topic: Social Issues , Marriage , Relationships , LGBT , Gay , Love , Children , Family

Words: 1000

Published: 02/28/2020

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There are several arguments support promote and oppose the legalization of same sex marriage. The first argument which opposes same-sex marriage is that marriage has traditionally been instituted between one man and one woman. The tradition of one man and one woman marriage is the only correct legal relationship in human culture (Newton 49). This can be traced from the old English law where under God’s law where all marriages that are contracted by lawful persons in the face of the church, can consummate with bodily knowledge and fruit of children (Newton 49). However, the advocates of gay marriage argue that same-sex couples have the ability to maintain long and loving intimate relationships just like traditional couples and be allowed to get married. In fact, gay marriages do not pose any threat or harm to the community. Proponents of same sex marriage believe that every person, regardless of sex, race, gender or sexual orientation must be given the same freedom to marry. Same-sex marriages promote equality among same-sex couples. Hence, to disallow gay marriages constitutes a violation of the equal protection and due process clause of the Constitution. To restrict the benefits, protection and obligation of civil marriage to ordinary couples of one man and one woman violates the personal liberty and equality under the law. To allow the civil marriage to same sex couples will strengthen the importance of marriage to individuals and communities (Cahill 4). The present marriage laws which permitted the approval of same-sex marriages shows that Congress has taken a neutral stand on the sexual orientation of every individual. By allowing same sex couples to get married promotes equality of persons by treating everyone in a similar manner. The second argument is that opposes same sex marriages is that same-sex couples do not have the capacity to reproduce or bear children. It bears to stress that there are a number of infertile couples who are permitted by the law to marry despite their medical condition. Thus, the requirement to bear children must not be taken against same-sex couples for the reason that infertile couples are allowed by law to enter a valid marriage. The opposite-sex couples are not even compelled to go through fertility tests before they get married since it violates the right to privacy. Marriage must not be focused solely on the concept of procreation since not all traditional couples produce children. In fact, there are some infertile couples who get married and maintain loving relationship and live together perpetually. Same sex couples are capable to carry-on lasting relationships like ordinary couples. In fact, some of the infertile couples are allowed to adopt if they cannot bear children of their own. Hence, same-sex couples have the capacity to raise children in the event that they decide to adopt. Gay couples have the ability to provide the love, care and attention to adopted children the same way given by traditional couples. There is no fundamental difference between lesbians and gay men in comparison to people with other sexual orientations (Newton 52). The third argument is that the right to marry and to marry the person of one’s choice is a fundamental right and a necessary aspect of human happiness (Goetting 138). Allowing civil marriages to same sex couples shall strengthen the importance of marriage to the entire community. The freedom of choice and the right to privacy among individuals must be upheld and respected when it comes to personal decisions. In fact, marriage is considered as a civil right and civil unions that should be given to all members of society regardless of sex, age, gender and sexual preference. The fourth argument by the advocates of same-sex marriage is that to deny the gay couples to marry should result to the treatment of the gay couples as second class citizens. In the case of Goodridge v. Department of Health, it was well-settled by the court that the right to marry is a personal choice. Same-sex marriages must be recognized since prohibiting gay couples to marry will cause discriminatory treatment towards this particular class of people (Goetting 142). To disallow gay marriages will constitute to a discriminatory law that does not have a legitimate purpose should be considered merely as a bare desire to cause material and objective harm (Wolfe 95). The fifth argument is that advocates of same-sex marriage argue that marriage is an exclusive commitment of two people who vow to nurture, love and render mutual support to each other by bringing stability to society (Halkitis 1628). The given definition is also applicable to same-sex couples who have chosen to build a family of their own, adopt children, and by providing the same unconditional love, attention and affection that traditional couples can give to their children. The duty to raise and nurture children can be fulfilled by gay couples who can provide love and guidance to their adopted children in the best way they can. Finally, the support given by President Barrack Obama on gay marriages not only helps in advancing the civil rights of gay men. In fact, it will improve the health of the population. All gay men who choose to marry or not will reinforce the movement towards marriage equality. The enactment of this right will support the civil liberty and strengthen the social capital (Halkitis 1628).

Works Cited:

Cahill, Sean Robert.Same Sex Marriage in The United States: Focus On The Facts.Maryland: Lexington Books, 2004. Print. Goetting, Nathan. “Gay Marriage Is A Fundamental Right.” National Lawyers Guild Review 70.3 (2013): 137-144. Goodridge v. Department of Health 798 N.E.2d 941 (Mass. 2003) Halkitis, Perry N. “Obama, Marriage Equality, and the Health of Gay Men.” American Journal of Public Health 102.9 (2012): 1628-1629. Newton, David E. (2010). Same-Sex Marriage: A Reference Handbook. California: ABC-CLIO. Wolfe, Zachary. “Gay Marriage: Accommodationist Demands Expand the Conception Of Human Dignity.” National Lawyers Guild Review 70.2 (2013): 88-99.

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Writing a gay marriage argument essay – useful tips.

June 23, 2020

When asked to write a gay marriage argument essay , many students don’t know where to start or how to complete this assignment. That’s because homosexuality has always been a sensitive subject. For a long time, people have avoided dealing with this issue. Therefore, students should bear this in mind when writing an essay on this subject.

A gay marriage involves two individuals of the same sex. When writing an essay on gay marriages , students should keep in mind the fact that such marriages have always been frowned upon by most members of society. They should also avoid statements that may be considered offensive by some readers. What’s more, students should refute conflicting claims in their arguments.

Things to Know when Writing a Gay Marriage Argument Essay

Before you start writing a gay marriage argument essay , understand the restrictions that exist in different countries. In some countries, gay marriage is illegal. That means that the legal rights that people in such unions enjoy in some countries are limited. However, gay marriages have common features with heterosexual marriages in some countries.

For instance, people in same-sex unions have similar legal rules when it comes to property rights in some countries. That means they have the right to inherit property the same way couples in heterosexual marriages can. But, bear in mind the fact that there are restrictions when it comes to child custody when writing a gay marriage argumentative essay .

What’s more, people in gay marriages face restrictions on child adoption, surrogate motherhood, and artificial insemination. Essentially, an essay on gay marriage should be written with clear knowledge of facts, restrictions, and controversies that surround this union.

Perspectives of a Gay Marriage Arguments Essay

Just like with most argumentative essays, students have the freedom to choose their perspectives when writing about this subject. But, to make the write-up more interesting, you can include controversial points and support them with facts. For instance, if you opt to write a gay marriage persuasive essay , show how denying two adults their right to marry just because they are of the same sex is being biased.

On the other hand, talk about how marriage is traditionally and naturally a union of two adults of the opposite sex if you decide to write an essay against gay marriage . In that case, argue that the major purpose of getting married is to sire children. As such, gay marriage shouldn’t be normalized because it doesn’t serve this purpose since people of the same sex can’t procreate.

But, whether you decide to write a persuasive essay on gay marriage or talk against this union, make sure that you have enough supporting materials or evidence for your argument. What’s more, take a stance from the beginning by stating a strong thesis statement in the introduction.

How to Write an Essay about Gay Marriage

A gay essay should have an introduction, the body, and the conclusion. Ideally, it should follow the same outline with argumentative essays on other subjects. Essentially, you should start this task by creating your gay marriage essay outline . This should serve as the skeleton of your write-up. It should show what you will include in the introduction, body, and conclusion parts of the write-up.

Here are the major sections to include in your essay:

Introduction- Your gay marriage essay intro should be informative. This is very important because you will be writing about a sensitive subject. Therefore, starting on a wrong footing can lead to a negative impression. It’s particularly important to start the essay with historical facts. Talk about the realities of this union, especially when writing a gay marriage pros and cons essay . What’s more, include a thesis statement towards the end of the introduction. This should present the main theme of the essay which should be the basis of the argument.

Body- The body of your essay is the place where you delve deeper into the argument. If you’re writing a gay rights persuasive essay , show the readers why they should support this union. Make sure that the readers will understand your reasons for being pro-gay marriages. You should also do the same when writing a gay marriage should be legal essay . Each point that you make in this section should support your thesis statement. And, it should stand in a separate paragraph.

Conclusion- Once you’ve presented your thesis in the introduction and supported it in the body, wrap up your argument nicely. If you’re writing a why should gay marriage be legal essay , recap some of the major points you used to support your thesis. However, don’t include new information in the conclusion. Instead, give readers something to think about and probably take the same stance with you.

Sample Topics for a Gay College Admission Essay

Perhaps, you’ve been asked to write an LGBT essay for your college admission. Maybe you need the inspiration to craft a topic for your gay adoption essay .

Here are some of the gay and LGBT essay topics to consider:

• What are the major challenges of legalizing LGBT marriages?
• Why gay couples should enjoy similar rights with heterosexual couples
• What will be the effects of the current increase in gay marriages on the next generation?
• Can parents prevent gay marriages by influencing their kids’ sexual orientation?
• Is gay marriage contradicted by the universal copulation laws?
• What are the major issues affecting modern LGBT marriages?

Essentially, it’s not a must that you write a why should gay marriage be legal essay . You can take a different perspective and discuss the major issues affecting the LGBTQ community. Take a stance on those issues and then support it with authentic facts. This implies that you should research extensively, analyze, and organize facts in ways that will convey your message to the reader. Make sure that the audience will be convinced to side with you after reading the essay. And, you can achieve this by presenting solid evidence to support the argument that you present in the form of a thesis statement.

You Can Challenge Both Sides

If asked to write the pros and cons of gay marriage essay , you must present the positive and negative aspects of this union. That means you have to show both sides of the coin to your readers. That means listing the contradicting aspects of the argument before taking a stance.

It’s, however, important to decide which side you will give more details based on your stance. For instance, if writing an LGBT rights essay, bear in mind the fact that allowing people in this union to exercise their rights in public may not go well with some people. Make sure that your readers understand how children from heterosexual families can be affected by exposure to the behaviors of partners in same-sex marriages.

In a nutshell, an argumentative essay on this subject requires you to delve deeper into the realities and what you believe in. You should also make your views about this topic known to the reader. But, originality is important. You also need to have valid supporting evidence because the audience won’t just accept what you say if you don’t have proof of it. Therefore, take your time to conduct extensive research before you write the essay.

Take a break from writing.

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Same Sex Marriage Argumentative Essay, with Outline

Published by gudwriter on January 4, 2021 January 4, 2021

Example 1: Gay Marriages Argumentative Essay Outline

Introduction.

Same-sex marriage should be legal because it is a fundamental human right. To have experts write for you a quality paper on same sex marriage, seek help from a trusted academic writing service where you can buy research proposals online with ease and one you can be sure of getting the best possible assistance available

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Paragraph 1:

Same-sex marriage provides legal rights protection to same sex couples on such matters as taxes, finances, and health care.

• It gives them the right to become heirs to their spouses and enjoy tax breaks just like heterosexual married couples.
• It makes it possible for them to purchase properties together, open joint accounts, and sign documents together as couples.

Paragraph 2:

Same sex marriage allows two people in love to happily live together.

• Homosexuals deserve to be in love just like heterosexuals.
• The definition of marriage does not suggest that it should only be an exclusive union between two people of opposite sexes.

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Paragraph 3:

Same sex marriage gives homosexual couples the right to start families.

• Gay and lesbian partners should be allowed to start families and have their own children.
• A family should ideally have parents and children.
• It is not necessary that the parents be a male and female.  

Paragraph 4:

Same sex marriage does not harm the institution of marriage and is potentially more stable.

• Legalization of civil unions or gay marriages does not  negatively impact abortion rates, divorce, or marriage.
• Heterosexual marriages have a slightly higher dissolution rate on average than opposite sex marriages.

Paragraph 5:

Opponents of same sex marriage may argue that it is important for children to have a father and mother for a balanced upbringing.

• They hold that homosexual couples only have one gender influence on children.
• They forget that that children under the parental care of same sex couples get to mingle with both male and female genders in various social places.

Paragraph 6:

Opponents may also argue that same-sex marriages reduce sanctity of marriage.

• To them, marriage is a religious and traditional commitment and ceremony.
• Unfortunately, such arguments treat marriage as a man-wife union only.
• They fail to recognize that there are people who do not ascribe to any tradition(s) or religions.
• Same sex marriage is a human right that should be enjoyed just like traditional heterosexual marriages.
• It protects the legal rights of lesbian and gay couples and allows them to actualize their love in matrimony.
• It enables them to exercise their right to start families and bring up children.
• It is only fair that all governments consider legalizing same sex marriages.

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Argumentative Essay on Same Sex Marriage

For many years now, same-sex marriage has been a controversial topic. While some countries have legalized the practice, others still consider it not right and treat it as illegal. Same-sex marriage is defined as a marriage or union between two people of the same sex, such as a man and a man. Some countries have broadened their perspective on this issue even though for many years, it has never been legally acknowledged, with some societies even considering it a taboo. The United Kingdom, Spain, France, Argentina, the Netherlands, and recently the United States are some of the countries that have legalized it (Winter, Forest & Senac, 2017). Irrespective of any arguments, same-sex marriage should be legal because it is a fundamental human right.

First, same-sex marriage, if recognized by society, provides legal rights protection to same sex couples on such matters as taxes, finances, and health care. If people live together in a homosexual relationship without being legally married, they do not enjoy the security to protect what they have worked for and saved together. In case one of them dies, the surviving partner would have no right over the property under the deceased’s name even if they both funded its acquisition (Winter, Forest & Senac, 2017). Legalizing same-sex unions would cushion homosexual partners from such unfortunate situations. They would have the right to become heirs to their spouses and enjoy tax breaks just like heterosexual married couples. Legalization would also make it possible for them to purchase properties together, open joint accounts, and sign documents together as couples.

Same sex marriage also allows two people in love to become one in a matrimonial union and live happily together. Denying homosexual couples the right to marry is thus denying them the right to be in love just like heterosexuals do. Moreover, the definition of marriage does not suggest that it should only be an exclusive union between two people of opposite sexes. According to Gerstmann (2017), marriage is a formally or legally recognized union between two people in a personal relationship. As per this definition, people should be allowed to marry once they are in love with each other irrespective of their genders. Reducing marriage to a union between a man and woman is thus a direct infringement into the rights of homosexuals.

Additionally, gay marriages give homosexual couples the right to start families. Just like heterosexual couples, gay and lesbian partners should be allowed to start families and have their own children. Essentially, a family should ideally have parents and children and it is not necessary that the parents be a male and female. Same sex partners can easily adopt and bring up children if their marriage is legalized and recognized by the society in which they live (Gerstmann, 2017). As one would concur, even some heterosexual couples are not able to sire their own children and resort to adopting one or even more. This is a right that should be extended to same sex couples too given that they may not be able to give birth on their own.

Further, same sex marriage does no harm whatsoever to the institution of marriage, and is potentially more stable. According to a 2009 study, legalization of civil unions or gay marriages does not in any way negatively impact abortion rates, divorce, or marriage (Langbein & Yost, 2009). This makes it quite uncalled for to argue against or prohibit gay marriages. In yet another study, only 1.1 percent of legally married gay couples end their relationships as compared to the 2 percent annual divorce rate among opposite-sex couples (Badgett & Herman, 2011). This implies that heterosexual marriages have a slightly higher dissolution rate on average than opposite sex marriages. It could then be argued that gay marriages are more stable than traditional man-woman marriages. The two types of marriages should thus be given equal chance because neither affects the other negatively. They also have more or less equal chances of succeeding if legally recognized and accepted.

Opponents of same sex marriage may argue that it is important for children to have a father and a mother. They may say that for children to have a good balance in their upbringing, they should be influenced by a father and a mother in their developmental years. Such arguments hold that homosexual couples only have one gender influence over the lives of children and that this is less fulfilling (Badgett, 2009). However, the arguments fail to recognize that children under the parental care of same sex couples get to mingle with both male and female genders in various social places. At school, the children get to be cared for and mentored by both male and female teachers who more or less serve almost the same role as parents.

Those who are opposed to same sex unions may also argue that such marriages reduce sanctity of marriage. To them, marriage is a religious and traditional commitment and ceremony that is held very sacred by people. They contend that there is need to do everything possible to preserve marriage because as an institution, it has been degrading slowly over time. Their concern is that traditional marriages are being devalued by same sex marriages which are swaying people away from being married and instead choosing to live with same sex partners (Nagle, 2010). It is clear here that such arguments treat marriage as a man-woman union only and are thus not cognizant of the true meaning of marriage. Moreover, they fail to recognize that traditions and religions should not be used against same sex couples because there are people who do not ascribe to any tradition(s) or religions.

Same sex marriage is a human right that should be enjoyed just like traditional heterosexual marriages. It protects the legal rights of lesbian and gay couples and allows them the well-deserved opportunity of actualizing their love in matrimony. In addition, it enables them to exercise their right to start families and bring up children. Arguments made against this form of marriage, such as that it undermines traditional marriages, are based on opinions and not facts. Moreover, it is not important for a child to have a father and a mother because there are other places in which they actively interact with people of different sexes. As such, it is only fair that all governments consider legalizing gay marriages.

Badgett, M. V., & Herman, J. L. (2011).  Patterns of relationship recognition by same-sex couples in the United States [PDF]. The Williams Institute. Retrieved from https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/Marriage-Dissolution-FINAL.pdf .

Badgett, M. V. (2009). When gay people get married: what happens when societies legalize same-sex marriage . New York, NY: NYU Press.

Gerstmann, E. (2017). Same-sex marriage and the constitution . New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Langbein, L., & Yost, M. A. (2009). Same-sex marriage and negative externalities.  Social Science Quarterly , 90(2), 292-308.

Nagle, J. (2010). Same-sex marriage: the debate . New York, NY: The Rosen Publishing Group.

Winter, B., Forest, M., & Senac, R. (2017). Global perspectives on same-sex marriage: a neo-institutional approach . New York, NY: Springer.

Explore a persuasive essay about strengthening community handled by our tutors following the prompt provided.

Example 2: Sample Essay Outline on Same Sex Marriages

Thesis:  Same sex marriage, just like opposite sex marriage, should be legal.

Pros of Same Sex Marriage

Same sex couples are better at parenting.

• Children brought up by same sex couples do better in terms of family cohesion and overall health.
• Children under the guardianship of lesbian mothers perform better academically and socially.

Same sex marriage reduces divorce rates.

• The divorce rates in a state were reduced significantly after the state legalized gay marriages. Higher divorce rates were recorded in states where gay marriages are prohibited.
• Divorce is not good for family cohesion.

Same sex marriage increases psychological wellbeing.

• Bisexuals, gays, and lesbians feel socially rejected if society views same-sex marriages as illegal or evil.
• After some states banned this kind of marriage, bisexuals, gays, and lesbians living there experienced increased anxiety disorders.

Cons of Same Sex Marriage

Same sex marriages may diminish heterosexual marriages.

• It could be possible for children in homosexual families to think that same sex unions are more fulfilling.
• They might want to become homosexuals upon growing up.

For a holistic development, a child should have both mother and father.

• Absence of a father or a mother in a family leaves a gaping hole in the life of a child.
• A child needs to learn how to relate with both male and female genders right from when they are born.

Other non-typical unions may be encouraged by same sex unions.

• People who get involved in such other acts as bestiality and incest may feel encouraged.
• They might start agitating for their “right” to get married to animals for instance.

Why Same Sex Marriage Should Be Legal

Paragraph 7:

Marriage is a fundamental human right.

• All individuals should enjoy marriage as a fundamental right.
• Denying one the right to marry a same sex partner is akin to denying them their basic right.

Paragraph 8:

Marriage is a concept based on love.

• It is inaccurate to confine marriage to be only between a man and woman.
• Marriage is a union between two people in love with each other, their gender or sexual orientation notwithstanding.

Paragraph 9:

opponents of same-sex marriage argue that a relationship between same-sex couples cannot be considered marriage since marriage is the union between a man and a woman.

• However, this definitional argument is both conclusory and circular.
• It is in no way logical to challenge gay marriage based on this archaic marriage definition.

Same sex marriage should be legalized by all countries in the world. In the U.S., the debate surrounding its legalization should die off because it is irrelevant. People have the right to marry whoever they like whether they are of the same sex.

Same Sex Marriage Essay Example

The idea of same sex marriage is one of the topics that have been widely debated in the United States of America. It has often been met with strong opposition since the majority of the country’s citizens are Christians and Christianity views the idea as evil. On the other hand, those who believe it is right and should be legalized have provided a number of arguments to support it, including that it is a fundamental human right. This debate is still ongoing even after a Supreme Court ruling legalized this type of marriage. However, this debate is unnecessary because same sex marriage, just like opposite sex marriage, should be legal.

It has been proven through studies that same sex couples are better at parenting. A University of Melbourne 2014 study indicated that compared to children raised by both mother and father, children brought up by same sex couples do better in terms of family cohesion and overall health. Similarly, the journal  Pediatrics  published a study in 2010 stating that children under the guardianship of lesbian mothers performed better academically and socially (Gerstmann, 2017). The children also experienced fewer social problems.

Same sex marriages also reduce divorce rates. According to Gerstmann (2017), the divorce rates in a state were reduced significantly after the state legalized gay marriages. This was as per the analysis of the before and after divorce statistics. Likewise, higher divorce rates were recorded in states where gay marriages are prohibited. Generally, divorce is not good for family cohesion especially in terms of caring for children. Children need to grow up under the care of both parents hence the need for their parents to stay together.

In addition, same sex marriage increases psychological wellbeing. This is because bisexuals, gays, and lesbians feel socially rejected if society views same-sex marriages as illegal or evil. A study report released in 2010 showed that after some states banned this kind of marriage, bisexuals, gays, and lesbians living there experienced a 248% rise in generalized anxiety disorders, a 42% increase in alcohol-use disorders, and a 37% rise in mood disorders (Winter, Forest & Senac, 2017). In this respect, allowing such marriages would make them feel normal and accepted by society.

Same sex marriages may diminish heterosexual marriages and the longstanding marriage culture in society. Perhaps, it could be possible for children in homosexual families to think that same sex unions are more fulfilling and enjoyable than opposite-sex relationships. As a result, they might want to become homosexuals upon growing up. This would mean that standardized marriages between opposite sexes face a bleak future (Nagle, 2010). Such a trend might threaten to throw the human race to extinction because there would be no procreation in future generations.

Same sex unions also fall short because for a holistic development, a child should have both a mother and a father. Absence of a father or a mother in a family leaves a gaping hole in the life of a child. The two major genders in the world are male and female and a child needs to learn how to relate with both of them right from when they are born (Nagle, 2010). A father teaches them how to live alongside males while a mother teaches them how to do the same with females.

Further, other non-typical unions may be encouraged by same sex unions. If the marriages are accepted worldwide, people who get involved in such other acts as bestiality and incest may feel encouraged (Winter, Forest & Senac, 2017). They might even start agitating for their “right” to get married to animals, for instance. This possibility would water down and deinstitutionalize the whole concept of consummation and marriage. This would further diminish the existence of heterosexual marriages as people would continue to find less and less importance in them.

Same sex unions should be legal because marriage is a fundamental human right. It has been stated by the United States Supreme Court fourteen times since 1888 that all individuals should enjoy marriage as a fundamental right (Hertz & Doskow, 2016). In making these judgments, the Supreme Court has repeatedly stated that the Due Process Clause protects as one of the liberties the freedom to make personal choice in matters of marriage. The Court has maintained that this free choice is important as it allows free men to pursue happiness in an orderly manner. Thus, denying one the right to marry a same sex partner is akin to denying them their basic right.

People should also be legally allowed to get into same sex unions since marriage is a concept based on love. It is traditionally inaccurate to confine marriage to be only between a man and a woman. The working definition of marriage should be that it is a union between two people in love with each other, their gender or sexual orientation notwithstanding (Hertz & Doskow, 2016). Making it an exclusively man-woman affair trashes the essence of love in romantic relationships. If a man loves a fellow man, they should be allowed to marry just like a man and a woman in love may do.

As already alluded to, opponents of same-sex marriage argue that a relationship between same-sex couples cannot be considered marriage since marriage is the union between a man and a woman. Based on this traditional definition of marriage, they contend that gay and lesbian couples should not marry. However, as noted by Carpenter (2005), this definitional argument is both conclusory and circular and is thus seriously flawed and fallacious. It is in no way logical to challenge gay marriage based on this archaic marriage definition. That marriage only happens when one man and one woman come together in a matrimony is a constricted view of the institution of marriage. Moreover, there are no reasons accompanying the definition showing that it is the right one or should be the only one (Carpenter, 2005). Therefore, it should be expanded to include same-sex couples. The lack of reasons to support it makes it defenseless thus weak.

Same sex marriages should be legalized by all countries in the world. In the U.S., the debate surrounding its legalization should die off because it is irrelevant. People have the right to marry whoever they like whether they are of the same sex or not. Just like love can sprout between a man and a woman, so can it between a man and a fellow man or a woman and a fellow woman. There is absolutely no need to subject gays, lesbians, and bisexuals to unnecessary psychological torture by illegalizing same sex marriage.

Carpenter, D. (2005). Bad arguments against gay marriage.  Florida Coastal Law Review , VII , 181-220.

Gerstmann, E. (2017).  Same-sex marriage and the constitution . New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Hertz, F., & Doskow, E. (2016).  Making it legal: a guide to same-sex marriage, domestic partnerships & civil unions . Berkeley, CA: Nolo.

Nagle, J. (2010).  Same-sex marriage: the debate . New York, NY: The Rosen Publishing Group.

Winter, B., Forest, M., & Senac, R. (2017).  Global perspectives on same-sex marriage: a neo-institutional approach . New York, NY: Springer.

Example 3: Same Sex Marriage Essay

Same Sex Marriage Essay- Changing Attitudes on Gay Marriage. Discuss how the idea of gay marriage has changed over the last decade and show the progression of the movement.

Changing Attitudes on Same Sex Marriage Essay Outline

Introduction 

Thesis:  Gay marriage was regarded as an abomination in the early years, but in recent times the attitude of the society towards same-sex marriage is gradually changing.

In 1965, 70% of Americans were opposed to same-sex marriage.

• They cited its harmfulness to the American life.
• Prevalence of AIDS among gay people further increased this opposition.

Social gay movements contributed to change in the attitude of the society towards gay marriage.

• Gay movements increased the exposure of members of the society to gay marriage while showing their sufferings.
• Through social movements, the society saw the need for equality and fair treatment of gay persons.

Political movements in support of gay marriage have as well contributed to change in the attitude of the society towards gay marriage.

• Political bodies and politicians pushed for equality of gay people in efforts to garner political mileage.
• The influence of politicians changed the attitude of the society towards gay marriage.

The incidence of gay people, particularly in the United States has contributed to change in the attitude of the society towards gay marriage.

• Increase in the number of gay persons pushed people into accepting gay marriage.
• The media contributed in gathering compassion from members of the society by evidencing the sufferings of gay people.

The judiciary upheld the legitimacy of same-sex marriage.

• In 2014, 42 court rulings were made in favor of gay marriage.
• There are more than 30 states today with policies in support of same-sex marriage.

The increased push for the freedom of marriage contributed to changing the attitude on gay marriage.

• The Supreme Court ruling in 1987 that stopped governments from restricting the freedom of marriage worked in favor of same-sex marriage.

Paragraph 7: 

Supporters of same sex marriage have also increasingly argued that people should be allowed to marry not necessarily based on their gender but on the love between them.

• Restricting marriage to a union between heterosexual couples only creates a biased view of human sexuality.
• An adult should be allowed the freewill to seek for the fulfillment of love by starting a relationship with a partner of whichever gender of their choosing.

Gay marriage has been the subject of social, political and religious debates for many years but over the past two decades, the attitude of the society towards same-sex marriage has changed. Social gay movements and increased incidence of gay people has compelled the community to accept and tolerate gay marriages. The judiciary has as well contributed to this change in attitude by pushing the freedom and right to marriage.

Changing Attitudes on Same Sex Marriage Sample Essay

In the early years, gay marriage was an abomination and received criticism from many members of society. The principal reason as to why many people in society were objected to gay marriage was that it went against religious and societal values and teachings (Decoo, 2014). However, over the past three decades, the perception of society towards the practice has changed. The degree of its social tolerance and acceptance has gradually improved. In the 2000s, numerous social and political lobby groups pushed for a change in insolences towards gay marriage (Decoo, 2014). Though these lobby groups have tried to advocate for the rights of gay people, their principal focus was to change people’s attitudes towards homosexuality.

According to a study conducted in the year 1965 investigating the attitudes of Americans towards gay marriage, seventy percent of the respondents were opposed to the idea of same-sex marriage citing its harmfulness to the American life. Most Americans felt that the practice went against the social and moral values of the American society. In the years between 1975 and 1977, the number of Americans who were not objected to gay marriage increased (Decoo, 2014). However, this number decreased in the years of 1980, when the prevalence of AIDS among gay people hit alarming levels. In the years that followed, the attitudes of the American society towards gay marriage rapidly changed.

The rise of gay social movements has contributed significantly to a change in attitude of the society towards gay marriage. In the early years, people were not exposed to issues of same-sex marriage, but the gay social movements focused on increasing the exposure of gay marriage, while advocating for their equal treatment (Keleher & Smith, 2018). These movements were able to reveal the injustices and unfair treatment that gays were exposed to, and how such unfair treatment tarnishes the image of the society (Keleher & Smith, 2018). The movements persuaded the society to embark on ways of addressing injustices meted out on gay people. Through highlighting these injustices, members of the society acknowledged the need for reforms to bring about impartiality and non-discrimination in marriage.

Political movements in support of gay marriage have as well contributed to changing the attitude of the society towards the practice. As a matter of fact, one of the strategies that gay social movements employed in their advocacy for gay rights were political maneuvering (Demock, Doherty & Killey, 2013). The lobby groups approached aspiring politicians, who would advocate for equal rights of gays to garner political mileage. With time, politicians would use the subject to attack their competitors who were opposed to the idea of same sex marriage (Demock, Doherty & Killey, 2013). This increased political support for gay marriage influenced members of the society into changing their attitude towards the same.

The ever increasing number of gays, particularly in the United States, has contributed to a change in the attitude of the world society towards gay marriage. As the number of gays increased in the U.S., it became hard for members of the society to continue opposing this form of marriage (Demock, Doherty & Killey, 2013). Many families had at least one or more of their family members who would turn out to be gay. The perception of gay people by such families would therefore change upon learning that their loved ones were also gay (Demock, Doherty & Killey, 2013). The media also played a significant role in gathering compassion from the members of the society by portraying the injustices that gay people experienced (Demock, Doherty & Killey, 2013). The society would as a result be compelled to sympathize with gays and lesbians and thus change their stance on same-sex marriage.

Further, the judiciary has also contributed to the change in the attitude of the society towards gay marriage. There were states in the U.S. that initially illegalized same sex marriages, prompting gay people to file discrimination lawsuits (Coontz, 2014). Reports indicate that in the year 2014, there were more than 42 court rulings that ruled in favor of same-sex couples (Coontz, 2014). Some critics of same-sex marriage termed these rulings as judicial activism. They argued that the judiciary was frustrating the will of the American society, which was opposed to same-sex marriage (Coontz, 2014). Following these rulings and the increased advocacy for equality and fair treatment of gay people, some states implemented policies is support of same-sex marriage (Coontz, 2014). Today, the entire United States treats the practice as legal, as was determined by the Supreme Court back in 2015.

The increased push for the freedom of marriage has also contributed to changing the attitude on gay marriage. In the early years, there were states, especially in the United States, that opposed interracial marriages, so that a white could not marry an African-American, for instance (Coontz, 2014). In the years before 1967, there were states that restricted people with tuberculosis or prisoners from getting married. Other states also discouraged employers from hiring married women. However, in 1987 the Supreme Court ruled that state governments had no right to deny people of their freedom of marriage (Coontz, 2014). When such laws were regarded as violations of human rights, gay people also termed the restriction of same-sex marriage as a violation of their liberty and freedom to marry.

Supporters of same sex marriage have also increasingly argued that people should be allowed to marry not necessarily based on their gender but on the love between them and their decision as two adults. According to such people, restricting marriage to a union between heterosexual couples only creates a biased view of human sexuality. For example, they point out that this extreme view fails to acknowledge that gay couples also derive fulfilment from their romantic relationships (Steorts, 2015). They additionally contend that an adult should be allowed the freewill to seek for this fulfillment by starting a relationship with a partner of whichever gender of their choosing. Whether they love a man or a woman should not be anybody’s concern. The argument also notes that gay couples who have come out clearly demonstrate that they are happy in their relationships.

Gay marriage has been the subject of social, political, and religious debates for many years but over the past two decades, the attitude of the society towards it has significantly changed. Social gay movements and increased numbers of gay people has compelled the community to accept and tolerate the practice. The judiciary has as well contributed to this change in attitude by pushing the freedom and right to marriage, thereby finally making the practice legal in the United States.

Coontz, S. (2014). “Why America changed its mind on gay marriageable”.  CNN . Retrieved June 23, 2020 from  http://edition.cnn.com/2014/10/13/opinion/coontz-same-sex-marriage/index.html

Decoo, E. (2014).  Changing attitudes toward homosexuality in the United States from 1977 to 2012 . Provo, UT: Brigham Young University.

Demock, M., Doherty, C., & Kiley, J. (2013). Growing support for gay marriage: changed minds and changing demographics.  Gen ,  10 , 1965-1980.

Keleher, A. G., & Smith, E. (2008). Explaining the growing support for gay and lesbian equality since 1990. In  Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Boston, MA .

Steorts, J. L. (2015). “An equal chance at love: why we should recognize same-sex marriage”.  National Review . Retrieved June 23, 2020 from  https://www.nationalreview.com/2015/05/yes-same-sex-marriage-about-equality-courts-should-not-decide/

Our article explores the intricacies of same-sex marriage discourse, offering a debated essay with a structured outline. Explore our speech writer generator free tool and create a good speech.

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Stephen Breyer to the Supreme Court Majority: You’re Doing It Wrong

By Louis Menand

One day in 1993, Stephen Breyer, then the chief judge of the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, which sits in Boston, was riding his bicycle in Harvard Square when he was hit by a car. He was taken to Mount Auburn Hospital with broken ribs and a punctured lung. While he was recovering, he was visited by three White House officials. They had flown up to interview him for a possible nomination to the United States Supreme Court.

The vetting went well enough, and Breyer was invited to Washington to meet the President, Bill Clinton. Breyer’s doctors advised against flying, so he took the train, in some discomfort. The meeting with Clinton did not go well. According to Jeffrey Toobin’s “The Nine,” a book about the Supreme Court, Clinton found Breyer “heartless.” “I don’t see enough humanity,” he complained. “I want a judge with soul.” Breyer was told to go home. They would call.

He knew that things had gone poorly. “There’s only two people who aren’t convinced I’m going to be on the Supreme Court,” he told a fellow-judge. “One is me and the other is Clinton.” He was right. The phone never rang. The seat went to Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

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Ginsburg was a cool customer, too, but she knew which buttons to push. In her interview with Clinton, she talked about the death of her mother and about helping her husband get through law school after he was stricken with testicular cancer. Clinton loved catch-in-the-throat stories like that. Ginsburg was confirmed by the Senate 96–3.

A year went by, there was another Supreme Court vacancy, and Breyer was again in the mix. His candidacy was pushed by Ted Kennedy, with whom he had worked as the chief counsel of the Senate Judiciary Committee when Kennedy was its chair. Clinton really wanted to nominate his Secretary of the Interior, Bruce Babbitt, but Babbitt faced opposition from senators in Western states, and Breyer seemed politically hypoallergenic.

So Breyer was chosen. Still, the White House did not do him any favors. Clinton’s indecisiveness was an ongoing story in the press—it had taken him eighty-six days to pick Ginsburg—and the news coverage made it plain that Breyer was not his first or even his second choice. The White House counsel, Lloyd Cutler, told reporters that, of the candidates being considered, Breyer was “the one with the fewest problems.”

Clinton announced the selection without even waiting for Breyer to come down from Boston. When Breyer did show up, a few days later, he said, “I’m glad I didn’t bring my bicycle down.” Famous last words. In 2011, he broke his collarbone in another biking accident near his home in Cambridge, and in 2013 he fractured his right shoulder and underwent shoulder-replacement surgery after crashing his bicycle near the Korean War Veterans Memorial, on the National Mall. He was seventy-four. You have to give him credit. He gets right back on the horse.

Since his appointment to the Court, Breyer has published several books on his jurisprudential views. His latest is “Reading the Constitution: Why I Chose Pragmatism, Not Textualism” (Simon & Schuster). It sums up his frustration with the court that he just stepped down from.

Clinton was not the only person who read Breyer as a technocrat. People felt he lacked a quality that Clinton could apparently summon at will—empathy. “He’s always been smarter than most of those around him,” the Yale constitutional-law professor Akhil Amar explained to a reporter, “so he’s had to learn how to get along with other people.”

That was his reputation at Harvard Law School, too, where he taught administrative law for many years before becoming a judge. “Breyer’s basic social instincts are conservative,” a Harvard colleague, Morton Horwitz, told the Times . “His legal culture is more liberal, and his very flexible pragmatism will enable him to give things a gentle spin in a liberal direction. But he’s a person without deep roots of any kind. He won’t develop a vision. . . . The words ‘social justice’ would somewhat embarrass him.”

It’s true that Breyer has a professorial presentation. He is cosmopolitan and erudite. He travels to other countries and is interested in their legal systems; reporters like to drop the fact that he has read “À la Recherche du Temps Perdu,” in French, twice. He is also, for a judge, relatively wealthy. His wife, Joanna Hare, a clinical psychologist at Dana-Farber, is the daughter of an English viscount.

Before joining the Court, Breyer showed few signs of being a social-justice warrior. He has, like the President who appointed him, neoliberal inclinations. He was instrumental in creating sentencing guidelines for federal judges that he later conceded were too rigid. He wrote a book on regulatory reform. And one of his proudest legislative achievements was working with Kennedy to deregulate the airline industry.

But he has an admirable temperament. Toobin called him “the sunniest individual to serve on the Supreme Court in a great many years.” Seated on a bench next to a lot of intellectual loners—Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, David Souter, Ginsburg herself—Breyer became a consensus seeker, if not always a consensus builder. He believed in reasoned discourse.

He had also learned, from watching Kennedy do business in the Senate, that compromise is how you get things done in government, and he understood that on an ideologically divided court the power is in the middle. Being a split-the-difference centrist, like his predecessor Lewis Powell, and like the Justice he was closest to, Sandra Day O’Connor, suited his personality, too.

Breyer loved the job and was reluctant to announce his retirement, throwing liberals who feared another R.B.G. fiasco into a panic. He stepped down at the end of the 2021-22 term, in time for President Joe Biden to put one of Breyer’s former clerks, Ketanji Brown Jackson, on the Court. Breyer is now back where he started, as a professor of administrative law at Harvard. Happily for the law school, there are now many dedicated bike lanes in Cambridge.

Horwitz was not entirely right about what George H. W. Bush called “the vision thing.” Beneath Breyer’s pragmatic, let-us-reason-together persona is the soul of a Warren Court liberal. The Warren Court is where Breyer’s judicial career began. After graduating from Harvard Law School, in 1964, he clerked for Justice Arthur Goldberg. It was, he said, “a court with a mission.” The mission was to realize the promise of Brown v. Board of Education.

Brown is Breyer’s touchstone. He calls the decision “an affirmation of justice itself.” Brown was decided in 1954, and it governs only segregation in public schools. This is because the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of “the equal protection of the laws,” the right under which Brown was decided, is a right that can be exercised only against states and their agencies. But Breyer understands Brown in a broader sense. He believes that the reasoning in Brown leads to the condemnation of any and all discrimination that is within the reach of government to eliminate.

Extending the spirit of Brown is what the 1964 Civil Rights Act was designed to do. The act was signed into law in July, just as Breyer was beginning his clerkship, and it did something that Congress had tried once before, in 1875: make it unlawful for public accommodations like hotels, theatres, and restaurants to discriminate on the basis of race. In 1883, in a blockbuster decision, the Supreme Court had thrown out that earlier act as unconstitutional. It ruled that the government cannot tell private parties whom they must serve.

Title II of the Civil Rights Act once again prohibited discrimination in public accommodations on the basis of race, color, religion, or national origin. But how are privately owned businesses like restaurants within the reach of the state? In October, 1964, three months after the act was signed into law, that question came before the Court in two challenges to the constitutionality of Title II: Heart of Atlanta Motel v. U.S., concerning a motel in Georgia that refused to serve Black travellers, and Katzenbach v. McClung, concerning a restaurant in Birmingham, Ollie’s Barbecue, that refused to seat Black customers. (They could use a takeout window.)

The Court ruled that Congress gets its power to ban discrimination in public accommodations from the commerce clause in Article I of the Constitution. (“Congress shall have power . . . to regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.”) This holding required the Court to find that the Heart of Atlanta Motel and Ollie’s Barbecue were, in fact, part of interstate commerce. And the Court so found.

Since the motel was patronized by people travelling from one state to another, and since the ingredients for some of the food served at Ollie’s came from outside Alabama, the Court held that the motel and the restaurant were part of commerce “among the several states” and therefore within the power of Congress to regulate. The Court declared the 1883 ruling “inapposite and without precedential value,” and the decision in both cases was unanimous. Breyer thinks that they were the most important rulings of his clerkship.

There was another case with far-reaching effects that was decided during Breyer’s clerkship: Griswold v. Connecticut. The plaintiffs, Estelle Griswold and C. Lee Buxton, opened a Planned Parenthood clinic in New Haven and were arrested for counselling married couples about birth-control devices, which were illegal under the state’s anti-contraception law. Griswold and Buxton argued that, since the law was unconstitutional, they could not be prosecuted for advising women to break it. In a 7–2 decision, the Court agreed. What constitutional provision did the Connecticut law violate? The right to privacy.

Justice William O. Douglas wrote the opinion of the Court, and it is a classic of judicial inventiveness. Nowhere does the Constitution mention a right to privacy, but Douglas proposed that “specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance.” By this jurisprudential alchemy, the First, Third, Fourth, Fifth, and Ninth Amendments could be interpreted as defining a “zone of privacy” whose penumbra would extend to the marital bedroom.

Douglas concluded his opinion with an encomium to marriage. He got quite worked up about it. “Marriage is a coming together for better or for worse, hopefully enduring, and intimate to the degree of being sacred,” he wrote. “It is an association that promotes a way of life, not causes; a harmony in living, not political faiths; a bilateral loyalty, not commercial or social projects. Yet it is an association for as noble a purpose as any involved in our prior decisions.” Douglas was sixty-six. A year after Griswold, he divorced his twenty-six-year-old third wife, Joan Martin, to marry Cathleen Heffernan, who was twenty-two.

Griswold became a key precedent in two landmark cases: Roe v. Wade, decided in 1973, and Obergefell v. Hodges, the same-sex-marriage case, decided in 2015. “The right of privacy,” Harry Blackmun wrote for the Court in Roe, “is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.” In Obergefell, Anthony Kennedy, also writing for the Court, quoted Douglas’s reflections on marriage in their entirety and added some emanations of his own. In addition to a privacy right, he declared, constitutional liberties extend “to certain personal choices central to individual dignity and autonomy, including intimate choices that define personal identity and beliefs.” (In a dissent, Scalia said that he would “hide my head in a bag” before putting his name to some of Kennedy’s prose.)

The shape of Breyer’s Supreme Court career therefore has an emblematic significance, because it was bookended by two decisions that undid much of what the Warren Court achieved in Heart of Atlanta and Griswold. Breyer’s first major dissent came in 1995, in U.S. v. Lopez, a commerce-clause case; his last was in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Organization, the decision that overturned Roe v. Wade.

Lopez turned on the constitutionality of the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990, which made it a federal crime to possess a firearm in a school zone. In a 5–4 decision, the Court rejected the government’s argument that the act was a legitimate exercise of Congress’s power under the commerce clause. It was the first time since 1936 that the Court had struck down a federal law for exceeding the commerce-clause power.

Much of the New Deal was made possible by the commerce clause. In his dissent, Breyer noted that more than a hundred federal laws include the phrase “affecting commerce.” How many was the Court bent on invalidating? Some, anyway. Five years later, in U.S. v. Morrison, the Court threw out provisions of the Violence Against Women Act on the ground of commerce-clause overreach.

Breyer’s dissent in Dobbs, in 2022, was joined by Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor. The privacy right in Roe “does not stand alone,” they wrote. “The Court has linked it for decades to other settled freedoms involving bodily integrity, familial relationships, and procreation. Most obviously, the right to terminate a pregnancy arose straight out of the right to purchase and use contraception. . . . They are all part of the same constitutional fabric.” They wondered, again, how much the Court was prepared to unravel. In his concurrence, Thomas suggested that the Court might want to reconsider Griswold and Obergefell.

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What happened? Breyer has an explanation, and he lays it out in the new book. He thinks it’s all a matter of interpretation.

As Breyer points out, a majority of the Court now subscribes to the interpretive methods known as textualism and originalism. Textualism and originalism tend to be run together as types of what used to be called “strict construction” (a term that seems to have fallen out of use). But there is a difference. Textualism is primarily a way of interpreting statutes, and originalism is a way of interpreting the Constitution.

Textualists ask what the words of a statute literally mean. Information like legislative history or social-science data is largely irrelevant. Textualists don’t ask, “What would Congress have us do?” They just say, “What is the rule here?” and try to follow it.

Originalists, on the other hand, ask what the Framers would have them do. Originalists can consult the records of the Constitutional Convention (which are hardly comprehensive) and documents like the Federalist Papers (which is a collection of op-eds). But they claim to stick to the “original public understanding” of constitutional language—that is, what the words meant to the average voter in the eighteenth century. They do not invent rights that the Framers would not have recognized, as originalists think Douglas did in Griswold.

More recently, originalists have looked to something called “history and tradition,” highly malleable terms—whose history? which tradition?—by which they tend to mean things as they were prior to circa 1964. Writing for the Court in Dobbs, Samuel Alito explained that the decision turned on “whether the right at issue in this case is rooted in our Nation’s history and tradition.” The constitutional right to abortion was then fifty years old. For women likely to rely on it, the right had existed for their entire lifetimes. But what mattered to the originalists was whether women could rely on it in the nineteenth century.

The use of race as a plus factor in college and university admissions is even older. The practice dates from the late nineteen-sixties, and has been ruled constitutional by the Supreme Court three times: in 1978, in 2003, and in 2016. But the majority had little trouble wiping it out last term, in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard. It is a bit brazen to be shouldering aside precedents under the banner of “tradition.”

Breyer sums up textualism and originalism as attempts to make judicial reasoning a science and to make law a list of rules. In our system of government, the Constitution is the big trump card. But it doesn’t come with a user manual. The document is basically a list of clauses—the commerce clause (sixteen words), the equal-protection clause (fourteen words), and so on. And the Constitution gives the reason for a clause only twice: in the patent-and-copyright clause in Article I and in the right-to-bear-arms clause in the Second Amendment. (We could add the preamble, the “We the People” clause, which gives the rationale for having a written constitution in the first place, a novel idea in 1787.)

Some constitutional clauses, like the requirement that the President be native-born, are rules, but many, like the equal-protection clause (the only reference to equality in the entire document), are principles. They do not mark out bright lines separating the constitutionally permitted from the constitutionally forbidden.

Courts, however, are obliged to draw those lines. Judges cannot conclude that the law is a gray area. Textualists and originalists believe that their approach draws the line at the right place. Breyer thinks that the idea that there is a single right place, good for all time, is a delusion, and that his approach, which he calls “pragmatism,” is the one best suited to the design of the American legal system. Pragmatism makes the system “workable” (a word Breyer uses many times) because it does not box us into rigid doctrines and anachronistic meanings.

Pragmatist judges therefore look to the law’s purposes, consequences, and values. They ask, “Why did the lawmakers write this? What are the real-world consequences for the way the Court interprets it? And what are the values that subtend the system of government that courts are a part of?” These are questions that literal readings can’t answer.

An originalist like Scalia, for example, thinks that the “cruel and unusual punishment” clause in the Eighth Amendment makes unconstitutional only punishments that would have been considered cruel and unusual in 1791, the year the amendment was ratified. In 1791, people were sentenced to death for theft. If we said that seems cruel and unusual today, Scalia would say, “Fine. Pass a law against it. But the Constitution does not forbid it.” When he was asked what punishment the Framers would have considered cruel and unusual, Scalia said, “Thumbscrews.”

To this, a pragmatist judge would say, “Then what is the point of having a constitution?” The words “cruel and unusual” were chosen by the Framers (in this case, James Madison, who drafted the Bill of Rights) because their meanings are not fixed. And that goes to the purpose of the clause. The Constitution does not prohibit cruel and unusual punishment because cruelty is bad and we’re against it. It prohibits punishment that most people would find excessive in order to preserve the public’s faith in the criminal-justice system. If we started executing people for stealing a loaf of bread today, the system would lose its legitimacy. Surely an originalist would agree that the Framers were big on legitimacy.

The same is true of many other clauses—for example, the free-speech clause in the First Amendment. Free speech is protected not because it’s a God-given right. It’s protected because, in a democracy, if you do not allow the losers to have their say, you cannot expect them to submit to the will of the winners. Free speech legitimizes majoritarian rule.

Breyer’s book is organized as a series of analyses of some twenty Supreme Court cases, most of which Breyer took part in during his time on the Court. Some are major cases, like District of Columbia v. Heller, in which the originalists found a right to possess a gun for self-defense in the Second Amendment, which says nothing about self-defense. (“Some have made the argument, bordering on the frivolous, that only those arms in existence in the eighteenth century are protected by the Second Amendment,” Scalia wrote in the Court’s opinion. Hmm. What happened to the Thumbscrews Doctrine?)

Other cases are perhaps less than major, like Return Mail, Inc. v. United States Postal Service, which answered the question of whether the federal government is a “person” capable of petitioning the Patent Trial and Appeal Board under the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act. (It is not.) Breyer explains how originalists and textualists decided each case and how he, as a pragmatist, decided them. His book is accessible, rather repetitive, and neither theoretical nor technical. It is addressed to non-lawyers.

It also seems weirdly naïve. Or maybe purposefully naïve. In most of the cases Breyer discusses, where there was disagreement on the Court it resulted not from differences in interpretive methods but from differences in politics. In almost every case, the originalists and textualists came down on the conservative side, restricting the powers of the federal government and expanding the powers of the states, and the pragmatists and “living constitutionalists” (another term that’s now largely avoided) came down on the liberal side.

What is naïve is to believe that the conservative Justices—which means, on the current Court, the six Justices appointed by Republican Presidents, though they are not always on the same page—would decide cases differently if they switched to another method of interpretation. Judicial reasoning doesn’t work that way. Judges pretty much know where they want to come out, and then they figure out a juridically respectable way of getting there.

Why would Breyer want to ignore, or seriously understate, the part that political ideology plays in Supreme Court decisions? The answer lies in an earlier book, “The Authority of the Court and the Peril of Politics,” based on a lecture he delivered at Harvard in 2021. It’s all about legitimacy.

Legitimacy is why the Warren Court was on a mission in 1964. The Supreme Court’s reputation—you could say its mystique—is all that it has. It cannot tax or spend. Only Congress can do those things, and only the President can send in the Army. When Southern school districts ignored Brown and refused to integrate, the Court was in danger of being exposed as a paper tiger. It was crucial, therefore, that everyone believe that the Justices were not making law, only finding it. The Constitution made them do it. That was the Court’s claim to legitimacy.

Breyer thinks that the Court still operates this way. All Justices, he says in “The Authority of the Court,” “studiously try to avoid deciding a case on the basis of ideology rather than law.” The reason that “different political groups so strongly support some persons for appointment to the Court and so strongly oppose others” is that people “confuse perceived personal ideology (inferred from party affiliation or that of the nominating executive) and professed judicial philosophy.”

But Presidents and Senate majorities certainly think they are appointing Justices who share their political beliefs, even when they profess to be simply looking for the most qualified jurist. Sometimes Presidents are wrong. Earl Warren, appointed by Dwight D. Eisenhower, no enthusiast of race-mixing, is a famous example. But that is not because Warren was apolitical. Warren was a Republican politician. He had been elected governor of California three times and had run for Vice-President on the ticket with Thomas E. Dewey, in 1948. For Warren, the political constituency that mattered when he became Chief Justice was not the President or Congress. It was the public.

He could see that, in the postwar era, public opinion was likely to favor expanded liberties—the United States was presenting itself, after all, as the leader of the free world—and although his court may sometimes have got a few paces ahead of public opinion, it was largely in step with the times. It was a liberal era. We are not living in a liberal era anymore, and the Court reflects this.

Politics is the art of governance. The Supreme Court is a branch of government, and is therefore a political body. Its decisions affect public life. If by “political” we mean “partisan,” we are still talking about governance, because partisanship is loyalty to a political ideology, normally instantiated in a political party. Politics, therefore, cannot not be partisan. Partisanship is how politics works. Even when politicians say, “This is no time for politics,” they are saying it for partisan reasons. They are saying it because it is good for their side to say it.

What makes the Court different from other political actors is stare decisis, the tradition of respecting its earlier decisions, something Congress does not have to worry about. There is no rule against overturning a precedent, though. So why has the Court been traditionally reluctant to do so? Why does Thomas’s suggestion that it might be time to overrule Griswold and Obergefell seem so radical? It’s because the Court’s legitimacy is intimately tied to the perception that, in making its rulings, it looks only to what the Constitution says and what the Court has previously decided. When the Court overturns a case, it has to make it appear as though the decision was wrong as a matter of law.

This is why Breyer insists that it’s all a matter of legal forensics, of what interpretive lenses the Justices use. He wants to preserve the authority of the Court. He wants to prevent the Justices from being seen as the puppets of politicians.

His toughest moment on the Court, for this reason, must have been Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District, decided in 2007. In that case, the Court struck down a Seattle policy of using race as a factor in assigning students to high schools with the aim of attaining rough racial balance.

It was the kind of policy that the Court had approved a number of times since Brown. Now, in an opinion by John Roberts, the Court declared that it had had enough. Roberts ended with a memorable line, no doubt saved up for the right occasion: “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.”

After Roberts announced the Court’s opinion, on the last day of the term, Breyer delivered a speech from the bench. “Bristling with barely concealed anger,” according to an account by the legal scholar Lani Guinier, he accused the Court’s Republican appointees of voting their policy preferences. “It is not often in the law that so few have so quickly changed so much,” he said.

In 2019, Breyer’s speech from the bench was published as a pamphlet by Brookings. The title he gave it was “Breaking the Promise of Brown.” ♦

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By Amy Davidson Sorkin

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By Stephania Taladrid

Argumentative Essay On Gay Marriage

Being married has always been something I have thought about since I was a little girl. From that time on, I have always seen and been taught that marriage is between a man and woman. With the way that society is changing every day, it now views many things differently than it did years ago. Recently, there has been a breakthrough on the idea of homosexual marriage, and all 50 states have agreed to allow two people of the same sex to get married. Homosexual marriage is becoming more widely known, but it is not really something I have ever imagined to be such an issue.

Personally, I think that it is not an acceptable way of life to be married to someone of the same gender. With the way that people are voicing their opinions on certain topics, such as racial issues, by either protesting or posting on social media, is not what we should do to try and come to an agreement on this issue. Rather, we should all have the right to vote, and we need to gather thoughts on the question of why homosexual marriage is becoming a way of life. Also, we need to ask what has motivated the beginning of this idea.

Because I know that the United States is founded on freedom and religion, Thave the right to have my view recognized as a Christian person, and to follow the law of God through the bible. My reasoning for not agreeing with the idea of legalizing the marriage of same sex couples is because this country is founded on religion, and my faith is something that I live by every day. Although some may not believe certain religions, I believe that marriage should be heterosexual because they can produce children.

God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them,” this verse tells us that God created man and woman, and he created the woman so that they could be together and create children (“Genesis 1:27”). There is not an exact definition for marriage, because most websites all have different views, and are all becoming changed because of the way society is taking on the subject. I have been raised in a religious household, and the reasoning behind my strict opinion on this topic is due to that.

There are other religions that people follow, such as Jewish and Islamic. The Jewish church also varies in its approach to samesex marriage. “The Islamic faith openly rejects homosexuality, citing the story of Lot in Sodom as a condemnation of homosexuality (“History and Debate of Gay Marriage”). ” The following statement made does not bring religion into the idea of gay marriage, “Roughly half of all states prohibit first cousins from marrying, and all prohibit marriage of closer blood relatives, even if the individuals being married are sterile.

In all states, it is illegal to attempt to marry more than one person, or even to pass off more than one person as one’s spouse (Kolasinksi, Adam). ” This shows that although a big part of the disagreement may be solely about religion, the state’s argument before the passing of the law had moral reasoning behind it. Quite a few other religions are against the topic of homosexual marriage, so the idea that just Christians are openly against the idea is incorrect. If two people of the same gender wed each other, then that means that their ability to produce children is obsolete.

Two people that are married may not be capable to produce children due to medical reasoning or issues that they cannot control, which may be a problem but there are other ways to be able to have children if they decide to take that option. Sometimes in peoples’ marriage they decide that they do not want children, but for this instance, I am taking a stance from the people that do want children because they can conceive them properly. For those that are non-believers in Christ this question also raises concern, for example a website says, “The most common non-religious argument against gay arriage, of course, is that gay parents cannot naturally reproduce, and that reproduction ensures the continuation and viability of the existence of the state. This comes the closest to meeting the criterion of a state interest that is not connected to religious belief (Bierma, Nathan). ”

In the bible it states “God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground. God’s plan for creation was for men and women to marry and have children. A man and a woman would form a “one-flesh” union through marriage (Genesis 2:24), and they with their children become a family, the essential building block of human society (“What does the bible say about family? “). ” There are multiple issues with gay marriage, and one of them is that it is becoming more acceptable. The more people that go out and get married, or date the opposite sex, may start to persuade it as another way of life for others if they see that society is accepting it.

Just because it has become a law that is acceptable to do, does not mean that it is the right thing to do. It is not morally permissible to marry someone of the same gender. In Leviticus 20:13 it says “If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them (King James Version Bible, Lev. 20:13). ” The more people that chose to go out and marry someone of the same sex, then eventually it could start to become a social norm.

We could possibly live in a country where that has become superior and that can affect the United States in a terrible way. I do agree that the laws cannot be strictly from the bible and other religions, and some laws for instance, like this website gives us examples of other issues that we have in today’s culture, “Theft is also forbidden by the Bible, but regardless of that, the state has an interest in protecting property rights. I’m not saying the Bible isn’t a good lawbook (Bierma, Nathan). ”

This example of theft and others such as murder are problems that we face very day and the laws that we have made for those convicted are not like what it says in the bible. One thing I do agree with is that love is love and whoever you fall in love with is the person that you want to be with. When in a relationship, you are the one to support the other person through thick and thin no matter the circumstances. If someone falls in love with another person of the same gender, then that love is strongly held between the two of them. People think that it is acceptable because they fall in love with each other, and that love is what holds them together.

Loving someone full heartedly is a rare thing and having the opportunity to love someone or something is a beautiful moment, although for me it is hard to imagine the love that someone could have towards the same gender as what others have for the opposite gender. There are many laws and regulations that the people of the United States have to follow with them being federal or state laws. The law that is in place now makes it legal to marry the same gender. Same sex marriage is something that would had not been acceptable even up to just fifteen years ago.

I believe that the law of God is one to follow because the commandments you must follow to reach the Kingdom of God do not necessarily align with this way of life. The laws of the state are sometimes not politically correct, but we still have to abide by them since they are the laws. Some states like North Carolina, as well as other states, have laws that are put in place that have no moral reasoning. For example, it is a felony to steal more than $1000 of grease (“Big Government. Small Brains. Dumb Laws. “). Nonetheless, we must follow them or suffer the consequences.

In conclusion, I do not agree with the law to allow same sex marriage and my opinion is strongly influenced by my religion. Although I was raised on Christian values, some do not have the opportunity to explore and learn about the religion. Having all of these laws passed lately about the bathroom issues between transgender, lesbian and, gays is becoming a big issue. The way that the state is handling the issues is something that is going to be impossible to please everyone because of the way we are all raised and strongly opinionated.

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• Gay Marriage In Shakespeares Romeo And Juliet Essay

A viral essay about marriage spawned thousands of hate clicks — and exposed a harsh reality

M arriage is having a moment in American discourse. TikTok videos extol the virtues of being a stay-at-home wife and mother who also feeds chickens, makes sourdough bread and has five children.

Magazines and newspapers are filled with articles and columns exhorting people to just suck it up and marry . Or even offer up marriage as the solution to the inequality in our nation . And these stories are focused on women, because it’s young women who are more likely to opt out of marriage and it’s older women who are divorcing their husbands .

Recently, an essay published in New York Magazine’s The Cut even argued for marriage as a feminist reclamation. Marriage, as the author described it, is a protectorate, wherein she is taken care of and pampered. It truly sounds nice given the level of exhaustion American women are experiencing, after carrying the weight of cognitive and domestic labor , and doing the work of the social safety net . But it’s worth pointing out that gilded cages are still cages. 

The “just get married” discourse feels like a tightening rope around women who are already seeing their rights reversed through the rollback of Roe. Women who saw the vast lack of a social safety net during the pandemic and saw America take back whatever advances we made that helped families, while rolling out the war machine. Women are dying because we don’t have choices. Still, the answer that is shouted back at us is “just marry.”

But marriage has never been a safe space for women. And any argument that marriage provides comfort and equality under the benevolent protectorship of a husband isn’t borne out by the history of marriage — or the reality of it.

Even now, with all of its supposed advantages, marriage can be a trap for women, who are more likely than men to experience physical and emotional abuse in marriage. And nearly 20% of marriages involve violence . In 2021, 34% of female murder victims were killed by their intimate partner, compared to only 6% of male murder victims.

Marriage as an institution has been more about keeping some people out and locking others in. Founded on the laws of coverture, historically in marriage a woman’s identity was subsumed under her husband. But, of course, this relative safety of the marital relationship was only afforded to wealthy women. Poor people, the enslaved, queer or disabled people have been historically excluded from the benefits of marriage. Enslaved women , often forced into marriage, only kept those relationships at the whims of their enslavers, and were subject to sexual and racial violence as a result. Today, mass incarceration that targets Black men makes keeping a marriage together harder . Additionally, staying together as a family becomes difficult when the child welfare system targets Black families . And for centuries, until 1967, when the Loving v. Virginia Supreme Court ruling legalized interracial marriage, marriage was a means of policing racial purity. Also, it wasn’t until 2014, when the Supreme Court ruled in Obergefell v. Hodges, that gay marriage was made equal in the United States. People who are disabled were excluded from marriage because historically they were often institutionalized. Today, people who are disabled are often barred from the institution of marriage because they can lose access to life-saving benefits .

And you don’t have to look too far back in American history to see how wives were viewed under the law. It wasn’t until 1993 that marital rape was finally outlawed in all 50 states. 

In response to these statistics, critics often accuse women of simply choosing to marry the wrong person. As if you can choose your way out of systemic inequality and an institution that was founded on the fundamental loss of personhood. In sum, marriage never has been, nor ever will be, a form of freedom. 

It’s tempting, in a world beleaguered by a pandemic, where women still earn less than men, and where there is no affordable childcare, to see marriage as an appealing way of opting out of the ceaseless grind of capitalism. Better to work for a man who loves you rather than "the man," the logic goes. But it’s an upsetting logic, presuming that marriage is still the work of a woman, rather than a partnership of equals. Plus, that logic doesn’t parse. All it does is economically isolate women. A wife is far more likely to be abused by her husband than a stranger, and stay-at-home moms are more likely to be depressed and anxious .

In “The Second Sex,” Simone de Beauvoir argued that marriage is premised on a man treating a woman as a person enslaved while making her feel like a queen. She also notes, “It is more comfortable to endure blind bondage than to work for one’s liberation; the dead, too, are better suited to the earth than the living.” Beauvoir’s words feel like a face slap from the past, reminding modern women how long we’ve been struggling to be free from the unpaid labor of marriage and how much farther we have to go. Freedom isn’t found under the guardianship of a marriage, it’s found when we are seen as equal partners and given equal opportunities to earn money and control our bodies and our destinies.

Partnership, when executed with mutual respect, can be amazing. But marriage as an institution has never been about a woman’s freedom. And it won’t be until we have full equality.

This article was originally published on MSNBC.com