Love and Marriage, Love and Marriage...

According to most observers today, President Bush’s speech in support of a constitutional amendment to ban homosexual marriage smacked of a desperate attempt to mobilize the conservative base of the Republican Party with an issue near and dear to their hearts. Many religious conservatives have adopted prohibiting gay marriage as a legislative goal. Predictably, several Republican senators lined up to support the effort, despite an extremely small chance of the bill ever seeing the light of day.

I am somewhat torn between how best to argue my opposition to this amendment. As a conservative Christian, I find the homosexual lifestyle repugnant. Many conservatives, this author included, are tired of the radical gay agenda being forced upon society in the name of diversity or equality. Thanks to activist judges and the US Supreme Court, homosexual behavior is now constitutionally protected. What goes on behind closed doors between consenting homosexual adults is their own affair according to the law. Thus, I consider the moral argument compelling, yet moot for the sake of discussion.

I’d prefer to dissent based on general conservative principles. I doubt many will be fooled by the play to the conservative base today. Liberal senators like Chuck Schumer (D-NY) have already cried foul and quickly criticized the Bush administration. The US Senate, hamstrung by ineffective leadership, has produced an impotent immigration bill, neglected some desperately needed tax reform, and has wasted time and money on a mind-boggling scale.

Why make banning homosexual marriage a priority when there is so much more productive governing to be done? The goal of conservatism is to make government smaller and less invasive on the lives of American citizens. This is a fairly libertarian response to the gay marriage issue – primacy of a citizen’s private, personal activities with limited government interference. The time is now for conservative leaders to take control, stop the moderate waffling, eliminate bloated entitlements, and advance the agenda to which they were elected. Banning gay marriage, while agreeable on its face, ranks fairly low on the urgency scale. Has our society continued its drift into questionable morality? Absolutely. Look at the “wholesome” films spawned in Hollywood. If you think Brokeback Mountain was simply a gay cowboy movie, you’re naïve or completely missing the point. Ultimately, Conservatives should look locally to seek the results they desire.

Although I oppose gay marriage, I don’t want my elected officials legislating for legislation’s sake, especially on issues that are ultimately symbolic. From a purely states’ rights perspective, what on earth do we need a constitutional amendment for when marriages are “regulated” (for lack of a better description) by the states themselves? Radical homosexuals want to redefine moral norms advocated by citizens that have lasted for several millennia. The extremist element of the gay lobby gets the press because they scream the loudest, and again, the useful idiots of the mainstream media are happy to oblige. Men should not be married to other men, nor women married to other women, and legally defining marriage as a permanent union between a man and a woman should certainly fall within the realm of an individual state’s powers. If Congress wants to support the states’ initiatives, it has the constitutional power to limit the lower courts’ jurisdiction on specific matters. Pass a law specifically addressing the desired definition of marriage, and protect that legislation from liberals whose sole means of advancing their agenda involves an end-run around the electoral will of the people by exploiting judicial activism. To keep the ACLU in check, legislators should avoid specific religious implications to hopefully preclude any establishment issue lawsuits.

What will become of this issue is uncertain. What is certain, however, is the need for our elected officials to produce tangible results that actually mean something to the public. Symbolic acts that pander to limited constituencies cloud the reality of a majority party whose accomplishments have been mediocre at best and ineffective at worst.