Polygamy and Civil Unions

By: TK Polevoy
Same sex civil unions are now legal in all fifty states in the United States of America.
But, if we had to vote to legalize same sex marriage, I would vote for it.
The first reason is that they have the right to marry on the basis of equality. If straight or
interracial marriages are legal , why not same sex? They are humans and have human rights
according to the US Constitution and International Law. This gives same sex couples the right to
get married legally and not be threatened or denied marriage licenses. Another reason is that we
have a separation of church and state in our country. Religious beliefs should not be in our laws.
Thus, if people are religiously opposed to same sex marriage, they have the right to have that
opinion but they do not have the right to make it a law in our country. Lastly, if same sex
marriage is legal, it can help with the crisis of orphans and kids that need to be adopted. Since
same sex partners cannot have their own children, they can adopt and help reduce the crisis of
adoption in our country. To conclude, same sex marriage does no harm and is actually a benefit
to our country. They are receiving the rights that they deserve from the constitution, and that the
separation of church and state makes it, that banning same sex marriage is going against that
philosophy.
The book defines polygamy as, The practice of having more than one husband or wife
at the same time. (Strong & Cohen, 2014, p. 9). If I had the chance to vote to legalize polygamy,
I would vote no. This would be due to legal issues and not moral standing.
The possible legal issues would lead me to vote no. Some questions that raise concern to
me are: Do all parties in the marriage get the marriage rights? What happens with child custody
during divorce? How about if someone dies in the marriage, who gets the inheritance? How do
you make sure all parties are consenting? I have so much more questions regarding the legal

issues. The legal process will be very hard to determine all these rights for marriage and would
take many years to figure out. Also it would be hard to determine what is equal of sharing rights
and what is not. If somehow lawmakers made a very detailed bill of how this would work and it
seems fair and just, I would possibly vote yes. To conclude, the legal issues of polygamy and
how complicated the bill would be, would leave me to vote no.

Strong, B, & Cohen, T. F. (2014). The marriage and family experience: Intimate
relationships in a changing society (12th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.