THEY SAY: Don’t force your morality on me.
THEY SAY: Baking the cake/ taking the photos of a gay wedding is not endorsing gay marriage, it is just a contract
QUOTE: We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice… (Preamble to the U.S. Constitution)
QUOTE: [T]he legitimate powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions (Danbury Baptists Letter)
QUOTE: Freedom is the power, rooted in reason and will, to act or not to act, to do this or that, and so to perform deliberate actions on one’s own responsibility. (Catholic Catechism)
QUOTE: When the first word link is forged, the first speech censured, the first thought forbidden the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably. “The Drumhead” (ST: TNG)
I SAY: The Supreme Court of the United States declared homosexual marriage a Constitutional right. However, in declaring something Constitutional or unConstitutional, they are invoking the Founding Fathers. They are saying that they believe the original drafters of the Constitution would hold this opinion on the matter at hand. The Supreme Court (SCOTUS) has severely strayed from this. While letters such as Jefferson’s letter to the Danbury Baptists is not part of law, it does offer insight to what the Founding Fathers were thinking when they drafted the Constitution. After all, Jefferson was one of them.
However, declaring such a right is holding an opinion, which Jefferson denounced. The “insurmountable wall” was to protect the Church from the government, not the other way around. However, this is not to say that the Church was to be superior to the Government, rather it is to say that the Church should be able to voice its opinion free of government interference. The people at large should be free to accept or reject the proclamations of the Church. It is the job the SCOTUS to preserve and promote discussion, not to make decisions of law like this.
If not this, then how should the government be run? By for and of the people. The roll of the SCOTUS is to mediate between Congress and the President, not make moral proclamations. The proper place for the development of laws should be Congress or referendums of the people. However before SCOTUS ruled, different states had referendums both endorsing and opposing gay marriage. We cannot say “the will of the people be done” supporting one referendum while denouncing another. To do this is to chain us all. The issue of homosexual marriage is a States' rights issue as much as it is about marriage itself.
If not this, then how should the government be run? By for and of the people. The roll of the SCOTUS is to mediate between Congress and the President, not make moral proclamations. The proper place for the development of laws should be Congress or referendums of the people. However before SCOTUS ruled, different states had referendums both endorsing and opposing gay marriage. We cannot say “the will of the people be done” supporting one referendum while denouncing another. To do this is to chain us all. The issue of homosexual marriage is a States' rights issue as much as it is about marriage itself.
Government may prevent, permit, or promote an action. The proper role of the Court is to prevent slander or defamation of character in order to help promote insightful discussion in the public forum while permitting gay marriage. To do this while the public debates and discusses how the law should be read is the true role of the Courts in this country.
If baking the wedding cake or doing the photoshoot is just a contract (and not an endorsement of gay marriage) as they say, then why is it so important that the cake be made by that baker or the pictures taken by that photographer. After all, it is just a contract. The courts failed the public by ignoring this question in favor of making the moral judgement. The proper ruling would have been to protect the business while saying that the gay couple held the right to contract with a business willing to do the service.
As a different example, I love my Easter ham. It is my favorite meal of the year. However, should I protest in the streets when a jewish deli won’t sell me my ham? Or, would the more mature response be to go purchase my ham from a business that will. I could even buy from the jewish deli products which they do sell.
The reason laws are to come from the Congress is to help insure that different perspectives are voiced and recognized. We are a Nation established for “rule by for and of the people.” In order to achieve this ideal, we need to make the people the central source of developing laws. Any “advancement” which our society makes, should come from the people, not the social engineering of the Courts.
No comments:
Post a Comment