Sen. Santorum Scrum

For those who follow the political scene by now have heard the flap over Penn. Sen. Santorum's remarks. My feelings are mixed. Having been influenced by Dennis Prager who often makes the point that there is a difference between what is moral and what is legal, I find that Sentorum is off base. However, he remarks do raise legitimate questions as to what degree personal morality should be governed by public law. Marriage is a personal matter but it has legal definitions. As it is right now, polygamy is illegal. However, if we define public law based on what consenting adults can do or desire to do, there would be no prohibition to polygamy. The same would be true of incest.

Many thoughts have been expressed on this issue and I've clipped a couple of items that sort of made sense to me.

Here is a clip from Volokh

[Eugene Volokh, 5:26 AM]
GOD AND CAESAR: I have often heard it said that the Ten Commandments are an important part of the foundation of American law, and I think that's true to a point. But here's a quick question for you: How many of the Ten Commandments are actually implemented as legally binding obligations under modern American law? (To avoid confusion, let's focus on the list in Exodus, chapter 20, King James Version, available here.)
It turns out that the answer today is pretty much 3.
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Even if one thinks that the Bible is a proper source of legal guidance, a Biblical prohibition of something is not itself a sufficient reason for secular law to prohibit it, too -- as even many of the Commandments (which some say are among the most fundamental of the Biblical rules) demonstrate. There still has to be a second step of the argument: Not just that the Bible prohibits it, but that this prohibition is also one of the rules that should be imposed by secular law as well as religious law, as opposed to one of the many rules that should only be imposed by religious law. Those who want not just to live their lives by the Bible, but also order the secular law (at least in part) around the Bible must be able to explain why some particular provision that they suggest should be enforced (say, the prohibition on homosexuality) is more like "thou shalt not kill" or "thou shalt not steal" (for which we should be accountable to Caesar as well as to God) rather than like "thou shalt not covet" or "thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image" (for which we are accountable solely to God, coupled perhaps with the informal judgment of the community of the God-fearing).
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Then there is this from Postrel:

A liberal society ought not to use criminal sanctions to punish actions merely because a particular religion, or even many religions, may deem them sinful. Eating live animals and shellfish--hence, eating oysters--is a sin in my religion, it's damned gross, and it can kill you. But I don't want to make eating oysters a crime.
Written by Virginia - Thursday, April 24, 2003

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As it stands, I believe as a matter of personal morality that marriage is between one man and one woman and that should be the legal definition and should be defended. However, we do live in a society where other arrangements exist but they shouldn't be called marriage. Should we use the force of public law to discourage those other arrangements? Probably not.