The Star Chamber pronounced this past week that the Constitution forbids the federal government from defining marriage -- merely for the federal government's own internal workings, mind you -- as Western civilization has defined it for thousands of years. On its face this is shocking enough, but it is all the more shocking when you consider that the Supreme Court previously upheld a federal law that imposed criminal penalties on people who attempted to live out novel interpretations of "marriage." I think the framers of the Constitution would likewise feel startled to learn that the document they labored to create could be so radically altered without an amendment. But thinking is a dead pursuit, and people who cheer this decision do so on an emotional impulse without pausing to consider that allowing government to unilaterally change the supreme law of the land is extremely dangerous. Surely such people see no connection between the DOMA decision and phenomena such as NSA spying, drone attacks against American citizens, or undeclared wars, but the connection indeed exists, and such people have enabled the genie to slip free of its bottle. In so doing, they have waived their right to invoke the Constitution against the federal government ever again.
All the more offensive is where the Star Chamber failed to act, namely in refusing to defend the sovereign will of the people of California against their own state government and a tyrannical Ninth Circuit. In America the people are supposed to be sovereign, and the people of California declared that they do not wish to embrace homosexual marriage, a declaration well within their sovereign rights and the American experience. Other states have decided to embrace homosexual marriage, as is their sovereign right too, but it appears that sovereignty is allowed only if it upholds what the elites deem correct (similar to the world stage, where national sovereignty is allowed unless those who assert it displease the federal government, whereupon they are sanctioned, bombed, or invaded). As I've discussed here previously, there is no credible or even sane way to read the Constitution as forbidding the people of California from ordering their affairs in this manner; what is truly insane is to read the Constitution as forcing them against their will to bless an institution as sacred, a despicable crime that blends servitude with sacrilege. Their own representatives in the state government refused to uphold their wishes when the usual suspects attacked them in the federal courts, and the Star Chamber latched onto this dereliction of duty as a pretext to deny review. [Note -- Proposition 8 still lives, however, because other states can enact the same measure and try their luck with the federal judges in their neck of the woods, leaving the issue for future argument before the Star Chamber.]
At the end of the day, though, it makes little difference because marriage does not even exist as an institution in this country anymore, so the homosexual lobby is about to unveil a corpse bride. Sorry, but the heterosexuals already trashed it before you could. Marriage was designed as an enduring institution to grant security for the people entering it and stability for the society around it, yet marriage now grants security and stability to no one. Modern marriage is simply cohabitation/fornication, for the ostensibly lifelong arrangement can be canceled with impunity at the whim of either party and inflict devastating results on the other, on the children, and on the society that must pick up the pieces. For those who quail that marriage might trap people against their will, they forget that taking the vows is an act of the will, so honoring them upholds freedom and its counterpart, responsibility. This is the philosophy underlying all contracts, i.e., you have freedom of contract because you are presumed responsible and will be held responsible upon your breach. Modern marriage absolves the promisor of responsibility and, bizarrely enough, often punishes the promisee when the promisor breaches. If you disagree with holding a promisor's feet to the fire, you merely have proclaimed that you are irresponsible and that your promises cannot be trusted. Proud of yourself?
History has shown that most people can endure hardship and poverty. It also has shown, and is showing again in spades, that most people cannot endure ease and wealth. Under the latter circumstances people lose their moorings and go freaking nuts, simply because there is nothing to stop them. But the Titanic still sinks no matter how loudly or boldly the band plays on.
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