Supreme Court Same Sex Marriage Argumet

[Anima]

If I found something immoral, I wouldn't necessarily be opposed to it being law. It depends on what it is. It was a side comment, it wasn't supposed to be logical progression, but I understand how it was read that way. I didn't phrase it well.

There are plenty of things I find immoral which I would not want to be illegal.

However, can you give me an example of a law which most people would say is immoral? I would imagine that when this is the case, chances are, the law is going to change. Gay marriage being the perfect example! And I think you'd agree most people find child marriage extremely immoral and harmful, and while this is the case, it will stay this way.

Laws determined legality not morality. If we send someone to jail it is because they broke the law. What may be said is that laws tend to promote social cohesion not morality. This is not to say that ethics (manifested in law) and morality do not agree. It is only to say what is ethical is not moral.

1. I think we can all agree killing for any reason that is not necessity or insanity is immoral? I think we can all agree that killing of children is even more immoral than killing of adults (due to the "moral" innocence of children). So we may agree that a law that facilitates the act of infanticide is immoral.

2. Now let us say that a person has the ethical right to act without interference from the state. We would say a person may act in accordance with their whims without state interference except to a degree that is harmful to others. We would further stipulate that a person may not act to a degree or manner that is harmful to others which harms children and infants.

3. Roe V Wade is a law that allows that facilitates the killing of infants for the sake of privacy. Thus, the killing of infants is deemed ethical in regards to a private matter determined with one doctor while being the immoral killing of an innocent. I do not see us rushing to overturn this law anytime soon.

Someone (I forget who, sorry) already made the excellent point that there is a very clear way to remove child marriage from this, which is to agree that marriage requires consent. So those not permitted to consent to legal contracts, of this nature at least, should not be an issue. However, we're not allowing anyone new to be able to consent to marriage even, just removing an arbitrary restriction that a pair of people able to consent can be rejected as a pair but not individually.

Someone did bring this argument up. As was responded to them:

1. If the petitioners win their claim than marriage will become a Fundamental Right. The supreme court has ruled that a child under the age of 5 may not exercise a fundamental right on their own behalf and thus the state or parents are to exercise that right on their behalf (note that they do have the right!!) A child 5 years of age or older is considered competent to exercise a fundamental right on their own behalf.

2. A child may exercise the right to contract if they are considered competent in regards to the subject of the contract. Should a child decide they wish to exercise their fundamental right to enter into a marriage contract at the age of 5 they would be deemed competent to enter into such a contract on their own accord.

3. If petitioners win their claim marriage will also no longer be procreation centric, but will be recognition and dignity/security centric. Since the child is exercising a fundamental right the state may only restrict that right if it passes strict scrutiny. The first element of which is the state must have a compelling interest. I have asked before and I will ask again, WHAT IS THE STATES COMPELLING INTEREST IN DENYING A CHILD RECOGNITION OF AN ADULT/CHILD RELATIONSHIP THAT CONVEYS ADDED DIGNITY AND SECURITY TO THE CHILD?

If the state cannot answer then it cannot restrict the fundamental right.