For kicks, and to make sure that I don’t just buy libertarian “indoctrination” without listening to the opposition, I’m on the Heritage Foundation e-mail list. Today, I received an entertaining article on the PolicyWire. Marriage Amendment Protects Federalism by Edwin Meese III. The sad thing is, it’s not intended to be entertaining. But, when error is so rampant in a document it’s hard not to find it to be somewhat amusing. The problem, of course, is that, like many on the right (and left for that matter), Meese doesn’t realize any difference between social institutions and government institutions. After all, how could any social institution exist without government force ensuring it? The answer, as all libertarians know, is simple. Incentives. There are incentives that exist that encourage people to engage in socially beneficial actions. (For details regarding the family in particular, Hoppe’s Democracy: The God That Failed has some great sections.)
Even (no, especially) the most religious conservatives would have to concede, that, if the Bible is true, then marriage predates the State. After all, the words of Scripture themselves state that Adam and Eve were married (Gen. 2:25 call Adam and Eve “the man and his wife”). And this happened in some mystical way that didn’t require a government’s rubber stamp of approval. So much for the argument that a fundamental social institution requires government enforcement. But, Meese doesn’t rely on this bad argument, he adds a few more to it. He states, “A highly integrated society such as ours—with questions of property ownership, tax and economic liability, inheritance, and child custody crossing state lines—requires a uniform definition of marriage.”
Excellent point. Property ownership, tax and economic liability, inheritance and child custody also shouldn’t be government issues. Like all issues, these should be left up to the free actions of individuals. It seems to me that the rule would be simple in a free society. You walk out on your family, you walk out on your right to the family’s property. (Think of this analogy: You walk out on your job. Do you have a right to your paycheck? Of course not, barring some previous arrangement, like a prenup.) It seems to me that this rule alone would strengthen marriage far more than any nominal legal definition would. Child support payments are another issue that should be considered, of course. This too, should be left to private contract. Let the marriage partners agree to what would happen in that case, and hold them to it.
An oversimplification? Actually, I don’t think it’s any worse than our current system. It’s far less arbitrary, and probably just as likely to find the “deadbeat Dads” that try to hide. Meese then moves to the real point: “In order to guard the states’ liberty to determine marriage policy in accord with the principles of federalism, society as a whole must prevent the institution itself from being redefined out of existence or abolished altogether.” Of course, this only makes sense if “society as a whole” really means “the federal government”. After all, if “society as a whole” (in the real sense) doesn’t want marriage anymore, it has a simple solution: people stop getting married. If it wants to prevent it from being “redefined out of existence or abolished”, then people get married. Simple as that. The only way marriage can truly be “redefined out of existence or abolished altogether” is if a coercive institution does so. This coercive institution, as we all know, is government.
If you’re a cultural “conservative” (I am) who believes in the sanctity and importance of marriage (I do), there is only one rational conclusion that can be drawn from Meese’s article. Marriage is most endangered when it rests in the coercive hands of the State.
