REVOLUTION BY FIAT: Charles Krauthammer

Not again. We are the only Western country to have legalized abortion by judicial fiat rather than by democratic approval of the people or the legislature. Are we going to do it again with gay marriage?

We know what short-circuiting democracy does. Thirty years after Roe v. Wade, abortion still brings masses of demonstrators into the streets. Roe v. Wade, Ruth Bader Ginsburg once said, "halted a political process that was moving in a reform direction and thereby, I believe, prolonged divisiveness and deferred stable settlement of the issue."

A similar "reform direction" on homosexuality has been underway for years. There is no doubt that increasing tolerance of homosexuality, reappraisal of marriage and common sympathy for fellow citizens would have led inexorably to the spread of civil unions (which I favor) -- and, as they became customary and were evaluated in the light of experience, perhaps to broad acceptance of gay marriage as well.

Instead, the courts have once again been commandeered to impose a revolution from on high. ...

Wedge? Marriage has been around for, oh, 5,000 years. In every society, in every place, in every time it has been defined as an opposite-sex union. Then four robed eminences in Boston decree otherwise. With the stroke of a pen, they radically redefine the most ancient of all social institutions. And then those not quite prepared to accept this undebated, unlegislated, unvoted, unnegotiated revolution are the ones accused of creating a political wedge! ...

I welcome the debate on the constitutional amendment because it will shift the locus of this issue from unelected judges to where it belongs: the House and the Senate and the 50 state legislatures. In the end, however, I would probably vote against the amendment because for me the sanctity of the Constitution trumps everything, even marriage. Moreover, I would be loath to see some future democratic consensus in favor of gay marriage (were that to come to pass) blocked by such an amendment.

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posted by Eve at 4:56 PM | link

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