03/03/11
There has long been a debate on the constitutional and moral rights of gay
marriage and what it would mean for this country. Many people believe that it is against
the constitutional rights to discriminate against the LGBT community. Where as there are
many for it, there are also many against it- believing that it is against their moral and
religious rights to allow same-sex marriages. I will be comparing two articles- one from
Time magazine and one from the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, both about
The article that I chose from Time magazine does differ from the Hardvard
Journal of Law article. The article from Time magazine, Obama Changes Course on
which President Barak Obama declared that he was reversing course on gay marriage and
that the government would no longer stand behind the gay marriage ban. It also spoke
about how while many stand behind this decision, some do not, and believe it to be a
complete violation of their morals and religious rights. The article Gay Sex and
Marriage, The Reciprocal Disadvantage Problem, and the Crisis in Liberal
Constitutional Theory by Louis Michael Seidman, is explaining why U.S. Chief Justice
Antonin Gregory Scalia is wrong to think that the case for gay rights is outside
constitutional argument, and Seidman goes further by discussing why the belief is still
held.
Where as the popular magazine article didn’t offer any solutions, it did tell what
was happening in our country. It does state that even just two years ago, announcing
marriage, it would have seemed unthinkable. It is possible that a solution is not needed,
and many would venture to say that Obama doing this is the solution, and the problem
was that the LGBT community was having their constitutional rights taken away by not
from the LGBT community. He states that they are being unfair to innocent gay and
lesbian citizens who want nothing more than to get on with their private lives. He thinks
that Justice Scalia and people like Pat Robertson, John Finnis or Pope Benedict XVI will
not be won over by any debates that go against their own moral grounds. He doesn’t
believe they will be wavered, but America will, something which Obama proved that we
are a changing, growing country by announcing this to the United States of America.
Both articles state that there should be changes in policies and laws. Times are
changing. With Obama’s announcement, there are already two ongoing federal lawsuits
that will be effected. DOMA is being scrutinized and will hopefully no longer allow
certain states from not recognizing a gay marriage. California’s Prop 8 is also going to be
be effected, it was a ban on gay marriage in the state of California, but a federal judge
agreed that the ban was violating the U.S. Constitution, and it is now tied up in appeals,
but with any luck, President Obama’s new announcement will change that and people
will become more accepting of others and allow them to be married. Many cases through
the years about gay marriage have been found unconstitutional, which is why there was
recently a repeal of the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy in the military which required gay
service members not to reveal their sexual orientation, and this law is no longer in effect
in the United States of America, because it was deemed unconstitutional, just like the ban
I believe that President Obama is taking a huge step in the right direction. He is
showing the American people what it really means to be united. We are one country, in
which everyone deserves to have the same rights. There was once a time where African
American’s did not have the rights that the European American’s did, and now as we
look back, we see it as barbaric, senseless, and heartless. One day, I believe that we will
look back and see how we treated the LGBT community as barbaric, senseless, and
heartless. The American people need to stand up for what is right, and that includes the
same rights for everyone, regardless of sexual orientation, race or creed. We need to
stand strong as a country, and treat each other with respect, the same way we teach our
In conclusion, both of the articles that I chose agreed on the fact that banning gay
marriage was unconstitutional. President Obama is doing what he can to correct this
issue, and hopefully, and the Harvard article agrees, everyone else will agree one day,
including those people who are so against it now. One day everyone can live in harmony
and we will accept each other, regardless of the things that we can’t change about
Works Cited
LindenBerger, Michael A. "Obama Changes Course on Gay Marriage" TIME. 24 Feb.
2011. Web. 3 Mar. 2011.
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2055213,00.html.
Seidman, Louis M. "Gay Sex and Marriage, The Reciprocal Disadvantage Problem, and
the Crisis in Liberal Constitutional Theory." Harvard Journal of Law & Public
Policy 31.1 (2008): 135-50.