An Interesting Idea Indeed - Privatize Marriage
January 25th, 2006 | by Paul Merda |Yup! Get the government out of the marriage business completely. As it stands it is a government monopoly with a one-size fits all attitude.
“Subject to certain statutory constraints, businesspeople have long been free to form whatever sort of partnership they felt appropriate to their needs. Why not make the same possible for marriage, which is a partnership based on one of the oldest types of contractual relationships?”
I am on board, although it is just a bit radical it fits into my idea of marriage anyway….. Every marriage is a deal and every deal is different.
One Response to “An Interesting Idea Indeed - Privatize Marriage”
By ken grandlund on Jan 25, 2006 | Reply
I’ve been thinking along these same line today.
Marriage is really three different things, depending on your point of view, you may accept any or all three: partnership, love, spiritual bonding.
Government can regulate partnership through contract law, but it must be non-prejudicial and apply the rules equally to all people.
Individuals can regulate love through the way they treat each other without regard to gender.
Religion can profess spirituality and proscribe moral rules according to their belief and have no mandate to be equitable to everyone.
I think that government should get out of “marriage” all together and only regulate interpersonal commitments as a business partnership, contracted like any other business. All people should be able to enter into this legal agreement regardless of gender, provided they meet societal age restrictions. (Age restrictions not entirely arbitrary, but determined by the cultural norms for an average individuals ability to take care of themselves.) Call it a personal union agreement or other such legalese.
Marriage should be a term applied only by the church(es) who can determine who they want to bestow that label to.
Legally, all people entered into personal agreements would be referred to as spouses. THe terms wife and husband could be used as each person determines, but would have no legal basis.