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Tuesday, November 03, 2009
Phyllis Schlafly :: Townhall.com Columnist
Obama Makes Polygamy a 21st-Century Issue
by Phyllis Schlafly
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No sooner had we celebrated the exit of Barack Obama's green jobs czar, Van Jones, because of his Communist connections, another off-the-wall administration embarrassment surfaced. President Obama nominated for commissioner of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) a woman who signed a radical manifesto endorsing polygamy.

Arguing
with Idiots By Glenn Beck

We thought our nation had settled the polygamy issue a century and a half ago, but this nomination makes it a 21st century controversy. Obama's nominee for the EEOC, a lesbian law-school professor named Chai R. Feldblum, signed a 2006 manifesto endorsing polygamous households (i.e., "in which there is more than one conjugal partner").

This document, titled "Beyond Same-Sex Marriage: A New Strategic Vision for All Our Families & Relationships," argues that traditional marriage "should not be legally and economically privileged above all others." The American people obviously think otherwise, and current laws reflect our wishes.

Feldblum is not the only pro-polygamy Obama appointee. His regulatory czar, Cass Sunstein, wrote a book in 2008 called "Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness," in which he urged that "the word marriage would no longer appear in any laws, and marriage licenses would no longer be offered or recognized by any level of government."

Sunstein argues that traditional marriage discriminates against single people by imposing "serious economic and material disadvantages." He asks, "Why not leave people's relationships to their own choices, subject to the judgments of private organizations, religious and otherwise?"

Sunstein also suggests "routine removal" of human organs because "the state owns the rights to body parts of people who are dead or in certain hopeless conditions, and it can remove their organs without asking anyone's permission."

The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was passed in 1996 by overwhelming majorities in Congress and signed by President Bill Clinton. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has identified more than 1,000 federal laws that are based on the traditional definition of marriage, including the tax laws that permit married couples the advantage of filing joint income tax returns and the Social Security benefits awarded to fulltime homemakers, both very popular federal laws.

The peculiar push to recognize polygamy as just another variety of marriage is a predictable and logical corollary of the political movement to recognize same-sex marriage. If our government cannot define marriage as the union of one man and one woman, it follows that there can be no law against the union of a man and several women.

For years, polygamy, even though it is totally demeaning to women, has been embraced by the powerful American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Polygamy is one of the many controversial issues that were not raised during ACLU lawyer Ruth Bader Ginsburg's so-friendly Supreme Court confirmation hearings. Continued...

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About The Author

Phyllis Schlafly is a national leader of the pro-family movement, a nationally syndicated columnist and author of Feminist Fantasies.
 
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Feldblum is right
I tend to agree with Feldblum. If we removed all references to marital status from federal and state laws, we could then stop all the purely semantic squabbling about whether a civil union is the same as a marriage, whether marriage is for opposite-sex couples only, and how many partners one can have. Gay couples who want religious ceremonies can already have them if they want, so let's just give "marriage" back to the churches. Consider everyone single for purposes of inheritance, taxes, immigration, adoption, Social Security and all other areas of the law that favor married people.

Marriage is no longer necessary for establishing paternity, and the courts settle custody and property questions whether couples are married or not. Let the clergy decide who can be married in the eyes of the church. In the law, everyone would be equal.

As for polygamy, that door is already open — we just call it adultery. Even though a person can be legally married to only one mate, there are no laws against adultery (except in military justice) and nothing to prevent a person from living with, and bedding with, as many people as he or she wants. Polygamy is not often prosecuted because only one “wife” is actually the legal spouse. Unless there’s welfare fraud or a wife who has been coerced or is under age, there’s no crime.

Through the ages various societies have more often accepted polygamy than required monogamy. (Solomon was said to have 700 wives and 300 concubines.) Marriage “norms” have included arranged marriages, “purchased” wives, child marriages, forced marriages of widows to their brothers-in law — and, yes, same-sex marriages in medieval Japan and China, and among native tribes in Africa and the Americas. There is really no such thing as "traditional" marriage.

And so the homosexuals

in Maine have attempted to use government to force their
way into a straight celebration. Now they're upset
that the straights used government to kick them out.

Jews don't ask for a Jew friendly Christmas or Easter.
They've got their own celebrations and institutions.

In light of the Maine vote, isn't it time for adults
with homosexuality to concoct their own celebration.
The homosexuals I know are very bright and creative.
Let us now create a word for man/man commitment.
And a word for woman/woman commitment.
Like always, in Maine, marriage is a multi-gender endeavor.

I am unaware of any regular people demanding entrance to a homosexual organization or institution. Why do folks with homosexuality so frantically desire the approval of the straights?
Why do they lack self confidence on such a grand scale?
Imagine Christians demanding a Christian Hanukkah party. Wouldn't that be pathetic?
What's wrong with this element of the homosexual community? Why are they so pathetic?
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