How Should The Federal Government Define Marriage?

The concept of gay marriage, an issue that is surrounded with high levels of emotions on all sides of the debate, has come into even sharper focus this year due in large part to two cases recently argued before the Supreme Court, and the fact that the President of the United States has endorsed gay marriage.

There are many federal laws that rely on the definition of "marriage" and/or "spouse" (including laws relating to social security, taxes, immigration, employee benefits, etc.).  At present, federal law (the Defense of Marriage Act) defines "marriage" as "only a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife."  That same law also defines the word "spouse" as referencing only "a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife."

The main arguments in favor of gay marriage tend to focus on the right of homosexuals to be happy and to marry the person they love, and to be treated equally under the law.  But what we do not see is what supporters of gay marriage propose as the new definitions of "marriage" and "spouse" to be used in connection with federal laws like the ones mentioned above.

In order to understand whether redefining marriage is justified, workable, and generally a good idea, we need to know what the proposed new definition will be.  So for those who have declared your support for gay marriage, I have three requests that I respectfully ask you to address:

1) Please provide your proposal for the new definitions of "marriage" and "spouse" to be used in connection with federal laws that will include homosexual relationships.

2) If that definition is not also inclusive of all varieties of relationships (for example, incestuous relationships or polygamous relationships -- whether heterosexual, homosexual or bisexual) please provide the justification(s) for treating those relationships differently from typical heterosexual and typical homosexual relationships such that denying those people the "right to be happy, marry who they love, and be treated equally under the law" would be permissible.

3) If the definition of marriage is changed as you propose, will religious institutions be required to (a) recognize these new types of marriages (by providing equal benefits, etc.), and (b) perform marriage ceremonies for these new types of marriages.

The purpose of this blog post is to provide those in favor of gay marriage an opportunity to explain the full scope of what they want and why it is justified, and to allow those who either do not know what their position is or are against gay marriage to have an honest debate based on a clear understanding of what is at issue.  Please don't use this blog post as an opportunity for name calling and other juvenile attacks.