Response to proposal to substitute state recognition of marriage with state recognition of marriage's rights, benefits, and duties

03/11/09 National Review:

"Kmiec and the editors of the Times join a long series of activists who insist on framing the same-sex marriage debate as a clash between civil liberties and religion. But that’s not what it is. This debate is about the substantive differences between same-sex marriage and traditional marriage, whatever they are called. The question is whether the substance of the traditional institution should be endorsed both by voluntary associations (including houses of worship) and by the state as the ideal union of adults and the ideal environment for childbearing and childrearing."

Even if one concedes writer Ryan T. Anderson's point that "[m]arriage exists as a natural, pre-political, and pre-religious institution based upon human nature and its fulfillment,"Anderson fails to explain why marriage, understood this way, requires state recognition to sustain or promote it.