Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
In her thought-provoking post about marriage (below), Rachel Lu contends that gays should accept civil unions rather than marriage. Like Rachel, I'm a supporter of traditional marriage, but I'm increasingly of the opinion that the best policy for the state to follow is not to make marriage universal, but to make civil unions universal. In other words, get the state out of the marriage business.
The real sticking point in the marriage debate is not economic, it's cultural. In California, for example, the civil partnership law confers the same benefits as marriage (even Judge Vaughn Walker conceded the point), but the plaintiffs in the Prop 8 case insist that the state must refer to their relationship as "marriage." But marriage is an ancient term in our civilization; it's a religious sacrament, and the state has no business, you might say, monkeying around with centuries of tradition.
Agreed -- so why give the State the power to define "marriage" in the first place? Granted, the state must (I think) have something like marriage, for purposes of tax filing, survivor's benefits, intestate succession, and the like. Civil unions do that. So why not get rid of state marriage licenses, and create a civil union regime that would be open to same-sex couples? If you want to get married, go to a church. Sort of like the formalities around birth: the state issues a birth certificate, but you go to church or temple to arrange baptism or bris.
I know there are counter arguments; that's why I'm posting this here. Hit me with your best shot -- as the man said. What do you think?
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Comments:
Mar '12
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
What about children? Will there be no standardized laws that place obligations on people who have children? There are two different types of benefits that go to spouses. Some are based on equality--such as hospital visitation rights. But some presume the old fashioned family, where one stays at home raising children. Absent that assumption, nothing justifies special tax rates, pension benefits, etc. for the non working half of the couple.
Mar '11
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
I am uncomfortable with the idea of elevating civil unions above marriage so that marriage is one of the things a civil union can be.
Aug '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Why is including an item in a category the same thing as elevating the category above the item?
Much of the time, the more exclusive something is, the more elevated it is. The world's top ten violinists (assuming people could agree on such a thing) are included in the category of all violinists, but it doesn't therefore follow that the category of all violinists is elevated above the world's top ten violinists.
Jul '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Adam, your proposed solution breaks down the first time a defender of traditional marriage refuses to recognize someone else's civil union on religious grounds. (Refuses to rent them an apartment, won't lend them a banquet hall for their reception, or some such.) The complainants will ask the state to step in, and it will, on their side. Some nice judge will find the religious objection baseless and mean-spirited and brush it aside. All the protections formerly afforded to marriage will be transferred to civil unions. Marriage as we have known it will be relegated to the status of a quaint ceremony practiced by a few weird traditionalists and hardened bigots.
This notion that we can just "get the state out of the marriage business" is, I'm afraid, simply a fantasy. Even if we could, sooner or later it will be asked back in.
Mar '11
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Right now marriage is something all its own. Some want to include their arrangements in the category of marriage. To agree to flip that concedes the argument to the some. In fact, the argument that marriage is unique would no longer hold water. The reply would simply be "yes, it is one of the many unique civil unions".
Apr '12
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Does the US government not automatically define a relationship where two people live together over a year as cohabitation and then required to come under the laws of marriage? Canadians get less benefits when married. Retired people often think of divorcing so as to boost government pensions. So it is about taxing, pensions, and then all the hospital visitation etc.
Aug '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Bearing in mind that I'm trying to be as ploddingly logical as possible...
Two points in a Euclidean plane uniquely determine a line. The fact that these points also determine an infinite number of curves (one of which is the line) in the plane (in the sense that an infinite number of curves can pass through these two points) doesn't make the line any less unique.
People who try to refute the uniqueness of one thing by pointing to the uniqueness of other things, or to the inclusion of a unique thing in a laxer category aren't making much of an argument.
Nov '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
I agree that SSM is not about equal rights but about legitimization. But it is also about delegitimization of marriage, something that many liberals, particularly feminists, have been hot to do for many decades now. We mustn't forget that there is a multitude of motivations behind this movement.
From my perspective, I can't see how we can win on the current path. Perhaps through vigorous public debate and political activism it is possible to roll back some of the SSM laws, but at what cost? I can only see the battle becoming higher pitched, and however it comes out, Marriage is sure to be trampled underfoot.
Adam's solution, however, is an end run. It will have the unfortunate circumstance that some marriages will be considered valid in some places and not in others, even as some churches do not recognize all other churches' baptisms. But presumably one's legal rights would be constant, for any married couple would certainly also have civil union status. So one's legal status would be three-tiered: single, "unified" and "married". Marriage would only require sanction by a recognized religious organization. Suits me.
Mar '12
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Let me try to address the marriage/civil union issue without reference to religious tradition or authority. The libertarian view is: 1 man and 1 woman is an arbitrary limitation; the state shouldn't privilege it over any other combination humans may call a loving relationship.
Basically, the legal treatment of marriage in its manifold applications (joint treatment of taxed income for bracket purposes, intestate widow election, privilege against testifying, adoption and visitation, common law marriage, presumption of legitimacy/child support obligation) is recognition that the biological union of a single male and female represents the best evolutionary adaptation to the problems of raising human children, particularly in a temperate zone. The cultural success of the Northern European and Northern Asian cultures relative to other cultures without that model (e.g., polygamy prevalent in Middle East and Africa) suggest that the 1 man/1 woman model of child rearing is not simply an arbitrary arrangement, to be discarded in favor of any combination of men or women.
By extending the same legal privileges accorded to marriage to other unions of 2 or more humans, the northern temperate zone states are undermining the evolutionary basis of their own survival and prosperity.
Mar '11
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Midge, I agree with what you are saying but to accept Adam's proposal is to essentially shelve that argument.
May '12
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
I think the assumption that the vast majority of those married with children have a stay-at-home parent is a little dated.
http://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/families_households/cb09-132.html
Mar '12
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Pygmy Hippo: But even many working mothers plan career choices (e.g., school teacher rather than lawyer) that trade maximum income for flexibility and time off for kids. Much of this discussion shows precisely how the notion of civil unions erode the support for the traditional family model, by making it seem just one arbitrary choice (1 man/1woman, have/not have kids), rather than the biological basis for the whole society's existence and prosperity. The libertarian answer is always: get rid of any favoritism/state support for private decisions; equality of treatment is the only value.
Jul '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Great idea. Wish I'd thought of it.
Jun '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
KC Mulville:
I'm "evolving" on my opinion of civil unions - away from them.
I agree KC, I think North Carolina got it exactly right:
The state should formally recognize one type of union: marriage between husband and wife. All other forms of partnerships, including same-sex couples who wish to form a household and live together, should be dealt with under private contract law.
Jun '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Defenders of marriage are oft derided for calling ourselves such. "Marriage isn't under attack," we are assured, and then asked "how does allowing same-sex couples to marry affect your marriage?"
And yet here we have a proposal to abolish marriage laws entirely and replace them with some ill-defined novelty known as "civil unions," put forward and entertained by conservatives, no less. That most certainly would affect existing marriages.
Hence I rest my case that marriage is in fact under attack, and does indeed require defenders.
Aug '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Yabbut...
Having a strategy for shelving an argument isn't always useless. (In fact, it's a coping strategy for all sorts of "disordered thinking" -- addiction, depression, compulsion... -- particularly when the disorder is not in the inherent logic of an idea, but rather its helpfulness).
And at least some social conservatives apparently believe shelving the argument might be the best available option:
R. Craigen:
From my perspective, I can't see how we can win on the current path. Perhaps through vigorous public debate and political activism it is possible to roll back some of the SSM laws, but at what cost? I can only see the battle becoming higher pitched, and however it comes out, Marriage is sure to be trampled underfoot.
So... to shelve or not to shelve? Evidently people can agree with shelving without being libertines or cultural relativists. Else Prof Craigen here faces the embarrassing situation of not actually existing.
Edited on June 17, 2012 at 12:29amAug '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Robert Mitchell:
Basically, the legal treatment of marriage in its manifold applications... is recognition that the biological union of a single male and female represents the best evolutionary adaptation to the problems of raising human children.
By extending the same legal privileges accorded to marriage to other unions of 2 or more humans... states are undermining the evolutionary basis of their own survival and prosperity.
Normative arguments based on winning evolutionary adaptations are always tricky.
I agree that legal tradition does correctly identify one-man-one-woman as a winning evolutionary adaptation for raising kids in an advanced culture. But if it's a winning evolutionary adaptation, why does it need legal recognition, much less enforcement, in the first place?
To fix this argument, it is necessary that the rules enforcing one-man-one marriage, not just the adaptation of one-man-one-woman marriage itself, be the winning evolutionary adaptation. That may be the case, but it is also a trickier case to make.
Edited on June 17, 2012 at 12:25amAug '10
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Midget Faded Rattlesnake
Having a strategy for shelving an argument isn't always useless. (In fact, it's a coping strategy for all sorts of "disordered thinking" -- addiction, depression, compulsion... -- particularly when the disorder is not in the inherent logic of an idea, but rather its helpfulness).
Saying that shelving an argument can be a reasonable strategy is also not the same as saying that not shelving the same argument is an unreasonable strategy. Just in case I didn't make that clear the first time.
Mar '12
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
The trouble with commenting on an ipad. Hard to write and proofread on that thing (especially on this site). But, as Robert Mitchell notes, and as I think the context makes clear, I was saying that many of the benefits that go with marriage, in law, nowadays, are built on the presumption of the old fashioned couple, with kids, and with the mother at home. Absent those, there is no justification for such benefits. That may very well apply across the board today.
That point stands, as does the question of whether the law ought to place standard responsibilities on people who bring children into the world. That last bit could lead us back to a post-modern form of marriage.
Pygmy Hippo
I think the assumption that the vast majority of those married with children have a stay-at-home parent is a little dated.
http://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/families_households/cb09-132.html · 6 hours ago
Mar '12
Re: Weekend Question: How About Civil Unions for Everybody?
Following this logic, is something I have been drafting and tossing aside for the better part of a decade years--only give the classic benefits of marriage (such as pension benefits, presumptive rights in estate law, etc., to the long-term spouse in a couple with children).
That, combined with legal obligations placed on all people who have children, may be the direction we ultimately go--unless we eliminate all such special treatment. But given the birth dearth, my guess is that giving benefits to parents, in our tax law and other places, will endure.