Christians, conservatives, and plenty of other people are worried about the state of marriage in America. Rightly so. As goes the family, so goes society. And as goes marriage, so goes the family. That's a scary thought, given the state of our unions these days.
For most social ills, there's little the government can do. Generally it helps most by removing the negative influences it's already exerting. In the case of marriage, the government has drained the act of marriage of solemnity and consequence through easy No-Fault divorce laws. People now view it as a temporary contract that's freely entered and can be freely left -- a bit like an Arminian view of salvation.
It seems to me that covenant marriage, as practiced in AZ, AR and LA provides a tangible step towards restoring marriage in America. Esssentially there are two tiers -- standard marriage, and "covenant." The Covenant variant requires pre-marriage and pre-divorce counseling, and severely restricts divorce. Either version can be freely chosen by the spouses-to-be, and "upgrades" are available. The beautiful thing about social pressure is this -- what guy wants to tell his fiancee that he wants the easily reversible model?
While not a panacea, it seems a hopeful step. I'm surprised there isn't more talk of instituting it through the initiative process. Dozens and dozens of initiatives get on state ballots each year. Wouldn't this be a more effective use of our political resources than some of the picayune things Christians get up in arms about?
Posted by Discoshaman at janvier 18, 2004 12:41 AM | TrackBack
I agree. When a friend of mine talked about this in an ethics class, one of his students said that given these two options she'd never think about marrying someone under the standard marriage model. She would take it that he didn't really intend to stay with her if he insisted on it.
The student happened to be a young black woman, which I think is significant given the number of black unwed mothers abandoned by fathers who won't raise their own kids.
One of the questions that will be raised by this is whether the temporary and merely legal contract of standard marriage is really marriage once the other kind is in place, and I think the answer is no. Then it starts to raise questions about whether this purely legal contract, if not really marriage after all, should be available to homosexuals. Some of the standard conservative arguments against legalizing gay marriage will no longer apply if the only thing gay people want is this standard marriage as opposed to covenant marriage. (It doesn't affect the moral issues -- just the legal ones.)
Posted by: Jeremy Pierce at janvier 18, 2004 09:19 PMJeremy-
Hiya!
"The student happened to be a young black woman, which I think is significant given the number of black unwed mothers abandoned by fathers who won't raise their own kids."
Exactly. Marriage is the world's greatest anti-poverty program, and one of the few truly effective ones. I read somewhere that children of single parents are 7X more likely to live in poverty.
"Some of the standard conservative arguments against legalizing gay marriage will no longer apply if the only thing gay people want is this standard marriage as opposed to covenant marriage."
It's an interesting argument, but I'm not sure. Either way, short of an amendment, gay marriage will reach us soon anyway.