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The California Legislature has passed a law giving gay couples the same right to marry that straight couples enjoy. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has threatened to veto the bill on the (ironic) grounds that the courts should decide this instead of the people’s elected representatives. (It’s ironic as conservatives opposed Massachusetts giving all its citizens the right to marry, because it was the courts and not the legislature which determined that all Massachusetts couples enjoyed the same right to marry under the Massachusetts Constitution.)
Today, I will debate Brad Dacus, President of the Pacific Justice Institute, who supports the current official government discrimination against gay people who want to marry each other.
According to Dacus, “As president of Pacific Justice Institute, I am proud to lead an organization whose purpose is to assist those in the battle for our religious freedoms, sanctity of life, parental rights and other civil liberties. PJI has the necessary, broad-based network in place to support attorneys, individuals, churches and organizations in this fight.”
There are many questions to ask Dacus. Does he get a thrill from making gay couples miserable? Does he want their children are mistreated by the State? Does he favor hospitals keeping people from visiting a dying partner/spouse of 50 years? Does he support a heavy unequal tax burden against gay people that does not apply to straights? (Is this a “sin tax”?)
Does Dacus believe straight people are morally superior to gay people? That there should be classes of citizenship? How does he feel about adulterers (violators of the Seventh Commandment of the Ten Commandments) being allowed to marry? Is there any principled reason to allow adulterers to (re)marry but deny marriage rights to a monogamous couple of 50 years?
In sum, when is it proper for the Government be able to dictate its adult citizens’ private sex lives? And if the Seventh Commandment is not public policy, why should any part of the Bible that discriminates against law-abiding Americans be enforced?