Ryan Anderson writes in National Review Online that "the Supreme Court announced disturbing decisions today on two important cases dealing with marriage law. The Court refused, however, to create a constitutional right to same-sex marriage":
Proposition 8
In its ruling on California’s Proposition 8, the Court declared that the citizen group that sponsored Prop 8 did not have standing to defend the constitutional amendment that millions of Californians voted to pass. The only reason this jurisdictional question was an issue is because the governor and attorney general of the state of California decided to not defend a law passed by the people of that state.
It is scandalous that the governor and attorney general refused to perform their duty. That abdication of their constitutional responsibility should not have prevented these laws from having a vigorous defense in court. This sets a disturbing precedent and distorts the balance of powers between the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government. It would allow the executive branch to effectively veto any duly enacted law simply by refusing to defend it against a constitutional challenge.
While the government of California through its inaction has tried to silence the voices of Californians, the Court has not created a right to the redefinition of marriage. Marriage laws in the states that tell the truth about marriage—that it is a union of one man and one woman to provide children with a mom and a dad—have not been struck down.
And we must now work to protect marriage laws in the 37 other states defining marriage as a man and a woman across the country.
More broadly, how can conservatism--whose rich intellectual foundation includes philosophers such as James Madison, Edmund Burke, and Adam Smith--win in an age when Glee and Lady Gaga carry the real cultural heft?
But the relevance of gender to marriage is the exact question we need to debate, not preemptively discard without discussion as advocates of redefinition seem to do.
Father’s Day was this past Sunday. As the father of six, I can’t imagine raising my children without their mother, my wife for life. We’ve been blessed with many children, and this gift has taught us much. One thing we’ve learned is that a mom and a dad aren’t interchangeable, and that kids deserve to be raised by them in the stability and security that only marriage can provide. Deliberately depriving a child of a married mother or father is a great injustice.
A team of British researchers, led by Susan Golombok, a professor of family research and director of the Centre for Family Research at the University of Cambridge, has found that children born with the help of a surrogate may have more adjustment problems – at least at age 7 – than those born to their mother via donated eggs and sperm.
“The love we commit to one another,” as such, is none of the government’s business. The government isn’t in the business of affirming our loves. Rather, it leaves consenting adults free to live and love as they choose.
