Friday, May 09, 2008

Why is Polygamy Illegal?

By Wendy Kaminer,

        Why is polygamy illegal? Why don’t Mormons have a First Amendment right to enter into multiple marriages sanctified by their church, if not the state? There’s a short answer to these questions but not a very good one: Polygamy is illegal and unprotected by the Constitution because over 100 years ago, the Supreme Court decided it was “an offence against society.”   In Reynolds v U.S., the Court upheld the criminal conviction of a man convicted of taking a second wife in the belief that he had a religious duty to practice polygamy, a duty he would violate at risk of damnation. The Court compared polygamy to murders sanctified by religions belief – human sacrifice or the burning of women on their husbands' funeral pyres.

        Even in Victorian American, this comparison made little sense. (Most Victorian women, I suspect, would have chosen polygamous marriages over death by burning.) Today, the Court's analogy is as anachronistic as a ban on adultery. What’s the difference, after all, between an adulterer and a polygamist? And if it’s not illegal for a married man to support a girlfriend or two and father children out of wedlock with them, how can it be illegal for him to bind himself to them, according to the laws of his church? What’s the moral and practical difference between a man who maintains multiple families without the approval of any church and a man who maintains multiple families with his church's approval?

        "Polygamy encourages child abuse," people say, citing instances involving the marriage of older men to underage girls. Assuming that’s true, it still doesn’t justify categorical prohibitions on polygamy. Alcohol consumption may encourage sexual violence too. Should we prohibit its use, as members of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union demanded over 100 year ago? Or should we prosecute alcohol fueled rape cases whenever we find them?

        All things considered, it seems impossible to enforce polygamy prohibitions fairly and indiscriminately, without also enforcing archaic laws against adultery; and there’s no reasonable basis for banning polygamy, especially when it’s considered a religious obligation. No matter how distasteful some may find it, polygamy is simply not the equivalent of human sacrifice, and constitutional rights should not be determined by judicial hyperbole.

First Amendment | polygamy | religion

5/9/2008 3:26:13 PM by Wendy Kaminer | Comments [2] |
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Friday, May 09, 2008 4:42:39 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)

I am not a historian nor authority on polygamy. But I think you ignored one group of victims that might explain why a democracy cannot allow polygamy.

<i>What’s the moral and practical difference between a man who maintains multiple families without the approval of any church and a man who maintains multiple families with his church's approval? </i>

Answer: The other men who are left without a "legitimate" mate.

As long as the ratio of male to female is basically one to one, and as long as adultery is frowned on, then it seems difficult to see how a stable society can be formed with any significant amount of polygamy. (Assuming too that the number of gay males not interested in a heterosexual relationship is similar to the number of gay females also not interested in a heterosexual relationship....)

And using only the FLDS as my example (because I am not a historian), you can see that much of the child abuse that went on occurred to young men who were forced out of their society, and forced at a young age to find food and shelter for themselves.

An MD has noted that the children seized in the FLDS raid are apparently missing 38 males. What happened to these boys? For more, there is the Salon article on the Lost Boys of Colorado City.

The sexual forces within all humans are such that I don't know how a stable democratic society can be formed that systematically disenfranchises a large portion of its members from what society considers legitimate sexual relationships.

jerry

Thursday, May 22, 2008 8:04:40 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)

ITS JUST ANOTHER WAY FOR THE GOVERNMENT TO HAVE CONTROL OF ITS CITIZENS.I THINK ITS FUNNY HOW WE BAN AN IDEA THATS BEEN AROUND A THOUSAND YRS,YET WE HAVE IN OUR CONSTITUTION LAWS THAT ARE TO BE USED AND NOT ALTERED AND ARE ALTERED EVERYDAY.
WE ARE A MARTIAL COUNTRY,MORE SO THEN 10 YRS AGO AND 10 YRS BEFORE THAT.
FREEDOM TO OWN ARMS,FREEDOM OF SPEECH,FREDOM OF RELIGION,ALL BEING ALTERED AND CHANGED. IN SOME COUNTRIES THEY THINK AMERICANS ARE CRAZY FOR ONE WIFE AS WE THINK ITS CRAZY IF YOU HAVE MORE THEN ONE WIFE.I SAY LIVE AND LET LIVE STAY OUT OF PEOPLES BUSINESS.AS LONG AS NO ONE GETS HURT,WHY SHOULD WE CARE WHAT PEOPLE DO.PEOPLE ARE MARRIED AND CHEAT ON THEIR LOVED ONES EVERYDAY,AT LEAST IN A A MULTIPLE MARRIAGE THERE ISNT ANY SURPRISES.WE ARE A COUNTRY OF TOO MANEY LAWS,CHANGED AND ALTERED,AND MOST OF THEM JUST A BUNCH OF USELESS MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS LAWS.

ROBERT STEVENS

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