Defend Traditional Marriage In Washington
The Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance seeks to defend equal marriage in this state by challenging the Washington Supreme Court’s ruling on Andersen v. King County. This decision, given in July 2006, declared that a “legitimate state interest” allows the Legislature to limit marriage to those couples able to have and raise children together. Because of this “legitimate state interest,” it is permissible to bar same-sex couples from legal marriage.
The way we are challenging Andersen is unusual: using the initiative, we are working to put the Court’s ruling into law. We will do this through three initiatives. The first would make procreation a requirement for legal marriage. The second would prohibit divorce or legal separation when there are children. The third would make the act of having a child together the legal equivalent of a marriage ceremony.
“Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance.” [link to http://www.wa-doma.org/ no longer works]
Are they using ‘initiative’ in the sense of “initiative, referendum, and recall’?
Also…shouldn’t old people be barred, too? I mean, if two 75 year-olds get hitched, they clearly won’t be able to procreate or even adopt, I would say.
This may be on the radio soon – I’ve mentioned it to WOTMR.
http://www.wayofthemasterradio.com/
Love it. Celtic marriage in Ireland required pregnancy to prove the couple was suitable. 🙂
This seems like an absolutely disastrous idea. Maybe I’m panicking but it seems like the results could be catestrophic if this was passed and the courts did NOT act as the authors of it are hoping they would. It’s a hell of a lot to risk. Of course, this sounds especially frightening to me given the implications that something like this could have even if it’s only around temporarily until the courts go through the motions of striking it down. I’m the mother of a child with someone I never married and we haven’t been a couple in a little over a decade. My significant other and I have raised my daughter together for over six years, which is more than half of her life. I can’t get married because I am currently dying from cancer and if I did, then I’d be kicked off of the medicare program that I need to pay for my medical needs. If it were declared that any two people having a child together is the equivalent of having a marriage ceremony, then my ex-boyfriend would suddenly become my ex-husband which would entitle him to a lot greater standing in the family courts when it comes to who will have custody of my daughter when I die.
This is far too complicated for me to even wrap my brains around right now. There has got to be a better way!
Would this mean that anyone who had children with more than one other person would be jailed for bigamy?
See, this is what you get when you let liberals make laws. First they get rid of all the guns, and then they have to find some complicated legal solution to make pregnancy lead to marriage. Haven’t these guys ever heard of shotguns?