About Us
Government free marriage is the idea that individuals of varying persuasions, religious affiliations and backgrounds can unite under the idea of removing government involvement from marriage. The angst that accompanies the right to define marriage is likewise destructive and divisive. To resolve the issue one needs to go to the heart of the issue…government intrusion.
The history of government’s involvement in permitting and defining marriage as an institution shows that it is a very recent development, and for long periods of time people entered these important private agreements with each either as individuals, or in cooperation with a religious organization, but entirely independently of the state.
Our contention is that a return to government non-involvement in permitting marriage (through licensing) or defining its acceptable character is a solution to this highly divisive issue that can unite the various parties involved. Government-imposed definitions and conditions on what is, by its inherent nature, a purely private agreement have had the effect of pitting against one another the societal factions in an antagonistic and bitter dispute to demand that government policy reflect their particular conception.
Our main contentions and objectives are as follows;
- Marriage, like any other contract, is an act of consent that derives from the individual, self-evident natural right to enter and form voluntary agreements.
- Government has no legitimate moral or practical basis for interfering in the private agreement of marriage as an imposed third party, either to prevent it based on a definition or to grant permission through licensing.
- Private religious institutions should be fully free to define marriage based on their unique moral or theological priorities, and use such definitions as a basis for determining the allocation of performances of religious ceremonies. They also should be fully free to make such definitions a basis for denial of religious agreements, services, ceremonies and even denial of fellowship in their private communities.
- Employers and other private institutions should be fully free to allocate benefits to employees or customers as they choose based on contract with those employees or customers. No requirement to provide benefits based on a particular definition of marital status can justly be imposed by government, nor should a requirement to deny such benefits because of the lack of a particular definition of marital status ever be imposed.
- Many private employers already allocate benefits voluntarily to domestic partners without government requirement to do so and without such partnerships yet being defined by state agencies as “marriage.” Activists who desire granting wider allocation of marriage-style benefits by employers should consider this trend and reassess their presumption that government definition and involvement is the best mechanism for the social change they desire to see.
- Laws defining marriage to strict parameters and definitions have the impact of granting courts determinative power in the issue, and when overturned establish a basis for involvement to impose a defining view of marriage contrary to the will of the legislative enactment. Activists who favor laws upholding traditional marriage should consider this tactical reality and reassess their presumption that legislative enactments will have the overall effect of advancing a traditional view of marriage.
Government-free marriage is a solution that can unite each of us in preserving our natural right of freedom from forceful imposition of a conception of marriage contrary to our own.
