On April 22, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution heard testimony on same-sex marriage and the legal threats it could pose to traditional marriage. This is the second of five hearings to examine issues around same-sex marriage. All but one witness spoke in opposition to same-sex marriage. The first hearing was held on March 30 (see The Source, 4/2/04).
Chair Steve Chabot (R-OH) reiterated his support for a Constitutional amendment defining marriage as a union between a man and woman. Referring to court actions in Massachusetts that could legalize same-sex marriage in that state, he argued that same-sex couples would flock to Massachusetts for marriage licenses, then attempt to have their marriages recognized in their own state of residence.
Questioning how same-sex marriage is a threat to traditional marriage, Ranking Member Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) stated, “I’ve been searching in vain for some indication of what might happen to my marriage, or to the marriage of anyone in this room, if loving couples, including couples with children, are permitted to enjoy the blessings of matrimony.” He went on to add, “There are many loving families who deserve the benefits and protections of the law…They are not aliens, they are not a public menace, and they don’t threaten anyone. They are our neighbors, our co-workers, our friends, our siblings, parents, and children. They deserve to be treated fairly. They deserve to have the same rights as every other family.”
Dwight Duncan, a law professor at Southern New England School of Law, examined the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)(P.L. 104-199), which denies federal recognition of same-sex marriages. He explained that DOMA attempted to establish “a sort of Maginot Line” by allowing states to ignore same-sex marriages allowed in other states. Mr. Duncan claimed that the Maginot Line would not hold because advocacy groups have already announced their intention to challenge DOMA on federal constitutional grounds as being inconsistent with the Full Faith and Credit and Equal Protection clauses of the Constitution. He also stated that DOMA is inadequate to protect the definition of marriage because “it assumes, as a practical matter, that American society can long endure two incompatible conceptions of marriage: one, recognized in thirty-eight states and the federal government, which assumes the natural link of marriage to procreation and mother-father parenting, and the other conception, prevalent in a few more liberal jurisdictions like Massachusetts in which marriage might be defined as a form of ‘friendship recognized by police.’”
Examining the impact same-sex marriage would have on children, Dr. Jill Joseph cited her experience as a pediatrician working with families in trauma settings. She described the distress expressed by parents when their child is ill or has been injured and noted, “For gay and lesbian families this situation carried additional and unnecessary stresses.” Dr. Joseph explained that in most states these couples face legal obstacles in securing benefits available to children of other two-parent families. She also noted that all hospital forms ask for the names of the child’s mother and father, adding, “There is no line on the papers for the names of two loving and now frightened mothers waiting for the surgeon, two worried fathers taking turns holding the oxygen mask.”
In her testimony, Dr. Joseph cited 23 studies published between 1978 and 2000 that examined the effects on children of being raised by gay or lesbian parents. Scientists who reviewed the literature concluded, “Children raised by lesbian mothers or gay fathers did not systematically differ from other children on any of the outcomes.”
Stanley Kurtz, a research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, summarized the findings of his article, “The End of Marriage in Scandinavia,” in which he attempts to prove, “The system of marriage-like same-sex registered partnerships established in the late eighties and early nineties in Scandinavia has contributed significantly to the ongoing decline of marriage in that region.” He argued that same-sex partnerships in Scandinavia heightened the separation of marriage and parenthood, referring to “secular opinion leaders” who he claims “pointed to same-sex partnerships to argue that marriage itself is outdated, and that single motherhood and unmarried parental cohabitation are just as acceptable as parenthood within marriage.” Mr. Kurtz contended that a number of factors leading to the decline of marriage in Scandinavia are already present in most Western countries, including contraception, abortion, women in the workforce, cultural individualism, secularism, and the welfare state. “Same-sex marriage has every prospect of being even more influential in America than it has already been in Europe,” he concluded, “A combination of the Scandinavian cultural pattern with America’s already high divorce rate would likely mean a radical weakening of marriage perhaps even the end of marriage itself.”
