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Some of you may already have seen this, but I wanted to say something about this story about the difficulties of getting divorced after “marrying” someone of your own sex. Such a pretty pickle it is, too! Most of you probably see the problem already, but for those who don’t I’ll sum it up in a nutshell. Under the Federal Defense of Marriage Act, individual states are permitted to legalize same-sex marriage, but other states are not required to recognize these same-sex marriages. The result of this, obviously, is a class of people who are legally married in some states but not in others, and this makes for all kinds of legal messes, as for example when the couples in question want to divorce. A state that doesn’t allow same-sex marriage will naturally have no provisions for same-sex divorce. This really turns into a nightmare when it comes to tax returns, not to mention custody arrangements for children, many of whom have been co-adopted by both homosexual partners. And, for an even more colorful problem, I would ask: what happens when a person who couldn’t get out of a same-sex “marriage” wants to legally enter into a heterosexual marriage in a state that didn’t recognize their same-sex marriage in the first place? Will he then be legally married to different people in different states? Does that make him a bigamist?
The article ends with this paragraph:
Andrew Koppelman, a law professor at Northwestern University, published a book in 2006, “Same Sex, Different States: When Same-Sex Marriages Cross State Lines.” Koppelman urged states that oppose same-sex marriage to agree at least to perform divorces. “You have to have a way for people to get out of these things — otherwise, you have multiple claims on the same property and no protections for people entering into new marriages. I think states that try to adopt these rules refusing to recognize the marriages just haven’t thought it through.”
Well, somebody certainly hasn’t thought things through.
The most obvious lesson to take from this madness is that America needs an established norm for what qualifies as a marriage. It just doesn’t work to have different states establish different definitions. On the other hand, it isn’t fair to put the burden on those states that reject same-sex marriage to fix the problem. Why should every state in the union have to create a whole code of laws to deal with a bizarre anomaly instituted by just a few? More importantly, creating divorce laws for homosexuals would mean capitulating to the kind of slippery-slope effect that states like Massachusetts were hoping to create. Once you’ve got the divorce laws set up, you’re not many steps away from just allowing legal same-sex marriage. In people’s minds, a divorce implies that there was a marriage. Once the state starts divorcing same-sex couples, it won’t be long before the refusal to let them marry seems more like a technicality or even a joke.
Still, you do need some way to sort out the practical difficulties, and I therefore suggest a compromise, which I model on the Catholic response to same-sex “marriage”. From a Catholic standpoint, there obviously can’t be any same-sex divorce, because two people of the same sex could never be married in the first place. A person who has been in a same-sex relationship should repent and seek absolution, but if he subsequently wishes to marry, a prior same-sex civil union would not be an impediment, since it was never a real marriage in the first place. In a similar vein, I suggest that states who reject same-sex marriage could offer a legal procedure for dissolving a deviant sexual relationship that calls it by less misleading names. “Dissolution of Deviant Relationship” might do, or perhaps “Cessation of Deviancy.” The legislation offered under that name could take care of any necessary details (taxes, child custody, etc.) while expressing the state’s view of the relationships in question.
Obviously, this would cause serious offense among liberals of a certain stripe, and I should say right now that I don’t condone superfluous, hateful language about homosexuals. But this suggestion (even if it is a bit tongue-in-cheek) is not hateful. It is fitting. I do not think most liberals fully appreciate how deeply offensive it is to take the name of one of mankind’s oldest and most sacred rites, which is also a Sacrament of the Church, and attach it to an arrangement that has been almost universally acknowledged throughout Christian history (and in most other religions and cultures too) to be gravely disordered. To call the thing by its proper name in dissolving it would be the least we could do to repair the damage.
St. Louis-Marie de Montfort,
Pope St. Pius X,
St. Joseph,
St. Ambrose of Milan,
St. Thomas Aquinas,
St. Francis (and St. Clare),
St. Catherine of Siena,
St. Alphonsus Ligouri,
St. John Chrysostom,
The only way to deal with this is to send them back to the state in which they entered into this union.
Otherwise, there is no way but to start down that slippery slope.
The states that do NOT recognize such arrangements, could/should ignore them. Treat any biological children as being solely in the custody of the biological parent. There should also be precedent already set from “marriages” entered into in foreign countries, such as the non-recognized multiple wives of Moslems. Custody of adopted children presents its own problems which are routinely sorted through in similar situations.
There is no need to grant any kind of “divorce” — a situation which could and would be used to legitimize the arrangements. Even using the term “dissolving” would grant status. I believe that there currently exists at least one incident where one member of a lesbian “couple” moved to a state that does not recognize the legality of the “union.” She got sole custody of the child and married a man. She did not get a divorce. She may have problems if she ever goes back to the state where she lived with the other worman, but her real marriage is considered legit in her state of residency. The custody may differ from state to state. This happens quiet frequently to legitimatly married couples who get a civil divorce. It makes travel with the child or children risky, but people deal with this situation every day.
There really is no need to invent new law that would wind up legitimizing these relationships.
Thanks for the comment, Theophile. I think you’re probably right; I was in part just being snarky, and I do appreciate the point that legally dissolving same-sex relationships will probably legitimize them in the end. It is hard on the children to leave them in limbo like that… but then, life will be hard for those kids pretty much no matter what.
The biggest problem in my mind relates to the heterosexual (re)marriage. Right now, a legal heterosexual marriage in any state must be legally recognized by all states. That seems like a good thing to hang onto, but how can Massachusetts, for example, recognize a legal heterosexual marriage of a person who, under their law, is married already? It would be bigamy! I propose another alternative: states like Massachusetts can just legalize bigamy.
In any case, they created the problem. It should be their job to solve it.
This is the problem when we try to be “fair” or rather nice to everyone. We don’t want people to feel excluded, even when they break the rules or do something socially unacceptable. To be just does not mean not hurt feelings.
Having gone through a divorce (which was annulled another “fun” process), I am sympathetic to these people, but, as far as I’m concerned they went in with their eyes open, were consenting adults, and with the arrogance that the world would just change for them. The worse for them if they brought children into it, who I have way more sympathy for.
In our society today it has become much more about what is good for the adults, rather what is best for the children. What is good for ourselves rather than others is what is important in our narcissistic world we live in. Another fine outgrowth of the culture of death and materialism that we face today.
Thank you for that insightful comment. I think you’ve hit on the right point with what you say about the “arrogance that the world would change for them.” This is what’s so galling about that comment I quoted from the lawyer who says that anti-gay marriage states “aren’t thinking.” Obviously the presumption is that they’re the ones deviating from the norm, and that it’s therefore their job to rectify the situation. That’s all backwards.
You also make a profound point concerning the selfishness of the modern view of marriage and of life generally. I see this a lot when I argue with liberals about gay adoption. They usually start out by saying, “adoption agencies are supposed to do what’s in the best interests of the child, and if that means putting them with a homosexual couple, that’s what they should do.” I point out that it’s generally not in the child’s best interests; even if you think it’s fine for the kids to grow up seeing sodomy as normal, and even if you foolishly reject the argument that it’s good for a child to have both a mother and a father, the fact still remains that homosexual coupling is highly controversial in our society. Gay partners choose to be at the flashpoint of all this controversy, but their children don’t, and that’s a very heavy burden to lay on a child. Foster children deserve better than to be guinea pigs for liberal social engineering projects. And so (I contend to my liberal friends) heterosexual couples should at the very least be given priority by adoption agencies, if we really care about the good of the children.
It’s amazing how quickly the “good of the child” argument is suddenly dropped at that point, in favor of talk about discrimination and “equal rights.” (But how could anyone have a right to parenthood?) It’s easy to see whose good they’re really concerned about.