Jeff Kemp: Civil Marriage Supporter?

It seems like Jeff Kemp and Families Northwest had a lot to say against Civil Marriage for Same-sex couples when the State Supreme Court ruled on the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act.

 

In fact, among other heinous lies and distortions, the conclusion of Families Northwest amicus brief in Andersen vs. King County said:

In general, the more personal and intimate the adult relationship, the less likely it is to be regulated by law. This is true of very highly valued relationships (best friends) even when the relation involves substantial intimacy and caretaking (an adult son and his aging mother). Why is marriage then the exception? Marriage arises in every society, including our own, out of the need for a social institution that manages the reality that sex between men and women makes babies. Marriage laws are a society's way of recognizing that the sexual union of a man and a woman is unique, and laws governing marriage are oriented toward supporting its unique benefits to society and its children. Adults are free to live as they choose, but the Legislature is constitutionally entitled to prefer marriage, defined as the union of husband and wife, because it is the only relation which furthers the State's interest in (a) creating the next generation within (b) the ideal context for children. Marriage is the only kind of sexual union that is physically capable of uniting men and woman with the children their sexual unions often produce.

It seems clear that Families Northwest's position is that marriage and all the laws governing it are about the potential or actual conception and rearing of children.

To refresh your memory, the supreme court plurality ruling said the following:

But given the rational relationship standard and that the legislature was provided with testimony that children thrive in opposite-sex marriage environments, the legislature acted within its power to limit the status of marriage.

That is, the legislature was entitled to believe that providing that only opposite-sex couples may marry will encourage procreation and child-rearing in a “traditional” nuclear family where children tend to thrive.

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We conclude that limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples furthers the State’s interests in procreation and encouraging families with a mother and father and children biologically related to both.

But if Jeff Kemp's comment in the Bloomberg article on I-957 (which, in keeping with the Supreme Court ruling in Andersen, would require married couples to have children within three years or have their marriage annulled) is to be believed, he's had a change of heart:

''To throw away the model [marriage] because in some cases people don't have kids is an insult to humanity,'' said Kemp, a former NFL quarterback and the son of 1996 Republican vice presidential candidate Jack Kemp.

Exactly.

How much greater an insult to humanity is it, then, to limit access to marriage not just in cases where people don't have kids, but also in cases when they do?  This isn't just an insult to my humanity, or the humanity of every same-sex couple in Washington State, it is shameful and criminal injustice.