In God's Name

I find it so incredibly disheartening the way God has been used in this country to condemn same-sex marriage; as though Almighty God advocates the denial of hospital visitation, the nonpayment of child support, or the refusal of spousal health insurance. I am deeply saddened that the religious opponents of marriage equality have apparantly failed to learn from our history, from the faithful loving couples of the past that have been denied the recoginition of marriage in the name of God-ordained Christian tenants.

"Such equality does not in fact exist, and it never can. The God of nature made it otherwise, and no human law can produce it, and no human tribunal can enforce it." (Scott v. State, 1869)

"[T]he natural law which forbids their intermarriage and the social amalgamation which leads to a corruption of races, is as clearly divine as that which imparted to them different natures." (Gibson v. State, 1871)

"It is an institution of God, and a very honorable state ... 'Thou shalt not,' said Abraham, 'take a wife unto my son of the daughters of the Canaanities,' ... The laws of civilization demand that the races be kept apart in this country." (Lonas v. State, 1871)

"The purity of public morals ... require that [the races] should be kept distinct and separate, and that connections and alliances so unnatural that God and nature seem to forbid them, should be prohibited by positive law, and be subject to no evasion." (Kinney v. Commonwealth, 1878)

"[Marriage] is a public institution established by God himself, is recognized in all Christian and civilized nations, and is essential to the peace, happiness, and well-being of society." (Frasher v. State, 1877)

"Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay, and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that He separated the races shows that He did not intend for the races to mix." (Loving v. Virginia, 1967)

The above quotes were taken from unjust U.S. rulings upholding bans on interracial sexual conduct and, by extension, marriage. Religious conservatives of the day (and others in the national majority) heralded such rulings as "common sense" and in accordance with God's will.

Today's religious conservatives would be wise to learn from the mistakes of their predecessors and not misuse fallible interpretations of scripture to inflict continued injustices upon future generations. Most of the quotes were drawn from "The Sexualization of Difference" by Josephine Ross (pdf) from the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review.