A rchive Date
[ 01-07-2003 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ U.S ]

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/editorial/1973981

A desire to help save marriage, family

By WILLIAM SAFIRE

June 30, 2003, 7:25PM

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court has just slammed America's bedroom door. Sodomy - defined in the new 11th edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate as "anal or oral copulation with a member of the same or opposite sex" - when practiced between consenting adults, straight or gay, is none of the government's business.

Libertarian conservatives like me who place a high value on personal freedom consider Lawrence v. Texas a victory in the war to defend everyone's privacy. Homosexuals hail the decision as the law's belated recognition of fairness, which it is, but some would escalate that to American society's acceptance of their lifestyle, which is at least premature.

Traditionalist conservatives put forward a concern that officially decriminalizing sodomy might undermine state laws against adult incest (as between grown-up siblings). But that universal taboo is driven as much by the genetic dangers of inbreeding as by morality or law.

Of more immediate concern to traditionalists is the dramatic warning issued from the Supreme Court bench by dissenting Justice Antonin Scalia. He predicted that this legal triumph for gays would lead to the next big anti-discrimination item on the homosexual agenda: legal sanction of the marriage of two people of the same sex.

Scalia is right about that. We can now expect this question to be asked of every candidate for political office. Because polls will show a majority of voters are uncomfortable with the notion, the issue of same-sex marriage will be evaded or fudged by those primary candidates with an eye on the general election campaign. But the s-s-m issue is now seriously in play.

Don't underestimate the depth of feeling about this on the religious right. Not just fundamentalists, but many churchgoers and congregants see this as a perversion of the institution of marriage and an assault on our standards of morality. Branding them as mindless bigots for holding these views, or for daring to argue that a child's sexual orientation may be influenced by that of his or her parents, is unfair and divisive.

Sooner or later, one of our states - perhaps Vermont, which already has "civil unions," or Massachusetts or some other liberal bastion - will get in step with Canadian trends and make it legally possible for gays to marry, with all the tax breaks, insurance benefits and spousal visitation rights and protections that appertain.

What about all the other states that anticipated this cultural battle and passed laws refusing to recognize any such marriages? The coming dispute among states will go to the Supreme Court, and even if the next three appointees are Scalia clones, I'll bet the court will hold that the laws of one state that do not offend the U.S. Constitution must be recognized by all other states.

After that decision, some wedding guests will be hard pressed to forever hold their peace. One reason is that straight marriage is showing signs of strain. More nubile women are postponing weddings to pursue careers. More eligible men dither along into uncommitted cohabitation. More of our marriages are ending in divorce, as no-fault life doth us part. Now marriage isn't even between one man and one woman, the way it's been for thousands of years. Traditionalists despair: What's happening to the idea of the rock-solid, procreative, mutually supportive family?

Rather than wring our hands and cry "abomination!", believers in family values should take up the challenge and repair our own house.

Why do too many Americans derogate as losers those parents who put family ahead of career, or smack their lips reading about celebrities who switch spouses for fun? Why do we turn to the government for succor, to movie porn and violence for sex and thrills, to the Internet for companionship, to the restaurant for Thanksgiving dinner - when those functions are the ties that bind families?

I used to fret about same-sex marriage. Maybe competition from responsible gays would revive opposite-sex marriage.

Last week I misquoted Walt Whitman as writing "Very well then I am inconsistent." What he wrote, in

Song of Myself

, was "Very well then I contradict myself." Best of a torrent of corrections came from professor James Bloom of Muhlenberg College: "

Whitman knew that using an active-voice transitive verb always beats a copula-and-adjective-complement combo

Safire is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist of the New York Times, based in Washington, D.C.

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