The antigay marriage measures in Arizona and Florida passed, and it looks like the Californian one will also pass. I cannot see how anyone can justify refusing a large minority the rights afforded the majority. There's a name for that.
I reiterate my modest proposal.
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I really thought it would be stopped in CA. In an ideal world, the SCOTUS would throw this down and rightfully so. Rights ought not be taken away by the state, but protected against those who would take them away.
I like your proposal.
Charles Stross's blog put it very nicely: any time you have a proposal to deny a particular group some right or privilege, ask yourself how it would sound if you replaced [the group, in this case, homosexuals] with 'blacks' or 'Jews.' If this was a proposition to reject black marriages, or Jewish marriages, the people behind it would probably be run out of town on a rail.
I am also horrified at the fact that these measures passed, but not the least pit surprised. The "people" never seem to choose in the favor of civil liberties and equal rights.
I don't like the reality, but I do look at this as fortunate. Fortunate meaning that now with 3 states banning gay marriage it will be forced to the US Supreme Court where a ruling will be made to affect all 50 states. I just don't see how the Supreme Court can do anything but allow it.
Lets hope so, at least.
As a non-gay non-American I was thinking about this the other day and wondering why America has so many crazy anti-gay bigots. Then I had to stop and remind myself that it was also America that gave the world the whole idea of gay rights. In fact America - at least in the big cities - is probably the country in the world where homophobia is least socially acceptable. So don't be too hard on yourselves about this issue.
I like your proposal, but I'd also consider John Cleese's: marriages should be renewed like dog licenses:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/celebritynews/3289060/John-C…
If wiki topic of 'marriage' is accurate, it appears that a religious marriage ( at least the catholics anyways) didn't really appear until after the Council of Trent in 1545. Prior to this it was more of a verbal agreement.
Gay couples can form contracts, wills, set up trust funds and assign general and medical POA just like anyone else. The activists here (Wisconsin) used to be quite blunt about tapping into the tax exemptions and other financial incentives that have been set up to protect classic "marriages." Its about the money.
John, in the case of California, civil union laws give all the legal rights of a married couple apart from the legal name of "marriage". And there is no civil law against churches performing a marriage ceremony for same sex marriages while the state only grants the status of civil union. In this case, you'll need to revise your argument.
It might be the same in other states, but I don't follow politics closely enough to know for sure.
I think James is right to suggest that each case needs to be addressed on its own; even if they all fall under the same genus, they are different species. California's is essentially a matter of legal definition: it eliminates the possibility of anything being counted for legal purposes under the definition of 'marriage' if it is not marriage of a man and a woman. It has no effect on civil union status or anything like it, and allows for the legislature to keep and make equivalent statuses as long as they are not called 'marriage'. Florida's, on the other hand, is entirely different. It doesn't define the term 'marriage' for purposes of law (which would have been a rather pointless constitutional amendment, since unlike California laws, Florida laws already restrict the term 'marriage' to marriage of one man and one woman); rather it says, and I quote, "no other legal union that is treated as marriage or the substantial equivalent thereof shall be valid or recognized." This is extraordinarily sweeping: it eliminates civil unions, domestic partnerships other than marriage, and makes it impossible, as long as it stands, for the legislature or the judiciary to provide any alternative to marriage, like civil unions. Arizona had had a measure that (mutatis mutandis) was similar to this in 2006; it was defeated (and was the only serious defeat ever for an initiative of this sort). This time around it was voting on a weakened version, more like the Californian version; but it's not the same context -- Arizona law, unlike California law, already restricts marriage to marriage of one man and one woman.
In any case, if I've got the tally right, we now have the following:
States with constitutional amendments expressly giving the legislature power to reserve the term 'marriage' to opposite-sex couples: 1
States with constitutional amendments restricting the term 'marriage' to cases involving one man and one woman: 10
States with constitutional amendments restricting the term 'marriage' to cases involving one man and one woman and prohibiting recognition of civil unions as more-or-less equivalent: 16
States with constitutional amendments restricting the term 'marriage to cases involving one man and one woman and prohibiting recognition of any other contractual relationship approximating marriage: 3