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Same-Sex Marriage Amendment
After thousands of same-sex marriages were performed in San Francisco, New Paltz, NY and other places, conservatives are pushing for a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage in the U.S. Constitution and in all state constitutions. The proposed amendment, House Resolution 56/Senate Resolution 26, would restrict marriage to “a man and a woman,” and bar unmarried couples from “marital status or the legal incidents thereof." This proposed amendment would define marriage by religious, rather than civil/secular terms, and violates the letter and spirit of the U.S. Constitution's First and Fourteenth Amendments.
Dear [ Decision Maker ] , We condemn the proposed amendment banning same-sex marriages, and we call for the legalization of same-sex marriages in a way that would respect marriage as a social institution, but also promote the values of church-state separation, religious freedom, and equal rights. It could be done quite simply, by expanding the definition of civil marriage to include same-sex couples. The proposed amendment violates the First Amendment by defining marriage by explicitly religious terms. It also violates equal protection of the law by explicitly restricting civil rights according to sexual preferences. I urge you to vote against this proposed amendment and to support equal rights for all who wish to love each other and raise families.
Sincerely, |
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"The new proposed constitutional amendment wending its way through Congress is an affront to equal protection, and violates the First Amendment by defining marriage by religious, rather than secular terms," says David Koepsell. “Equal protection under the Constitution demands that any two people who wish to enter into a marriage should be able to do so, even while the free exercise clause allows any church not to be forced to conduct such a ceremony.”
“Sacramental matrimony is marriage in the eyes of a church; civil marriage is a governmental function,” says
“Civil marriage, gay or straight, is a perfectly reasonable solution,” says DJ Grothe, the Council’s National Field Director. “The suggestion of individual states creating ‘civil unions’ is a poor substitute for a nationally-recognized civil marriage, which comes with well over a thousand federal benefits and responsibilities that state-sanctioned civil unions don’t afford.”
The proposed constitutional ban on same-sex marriage would be an explicit establishment of a civil institution by religious terms, and would be an unprecedented narrowing of rights which ought to be afforded to all citizens.
The Council for Secular Humanism is a 501(c)(3) non-profit educational organization promoting rational inquiry, secular values and human development through the advancement of secular humanism. The Council, publisher of the bimonthly journal Free Inquiry, has a Web site at www.secularhumanism.org.
