Prop 8 Pros And Cons

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Nov. 11 will forever be remembered as a new era in American history: an age of equality, an age of hope and an age of unlimited possibilities. And an age of continued discrimination and hate. This past Election Day, Americans seemed to finally have put race behind them when they elected Barack Obama for the virtue and ability of the man irrespective to the color of his skin. But, waking up the next morning, my heart broke when I heard that Proposition 8, which redefines marriage as the union of man and woman in the state of California, passed by the narrowest of margins. Perhaps the most disturbing part of the passage of Proposition 8 is the fact that one minority group voted against another. According to exit polls, Prop 8 was largely…show more content…
One group of proponents of the bill argued that the California Supreme Court did not have the right to rule the ban on same-sex marriages unconstitutional earlier this year. They said that Prop 8, rather, would ensure that the issue be democratically decided upon. But our founding fathers didn’t build this nation on a system of complete democracy, fearing the excess of the masses against minority groups. Instead, they created an electoral system and different branches of government to uphold the ideals of the constitution. This first camp ignores the historical dangers of allowing the majority to vote on a minority’s civil rights. It’s amazing how easily they can forget the masses’ support of discrimination and segregation just decades…show more content…
Couples must register for marriage licenses at City Hall, and many individuals meet with lawyers and financial planners to hammer out the technical aspects of the union. While most states offer civil unions to same-sex couples, this practice does not provide the same legal protections and affords couples at least a thousand fewer privileges. If the government is going to be involved in marriages (tax-breaks anyone?), it must be held to the same standard of equality that every other aspect of government is put under and be readily available to everyone. After all, don’t we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? In his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote, “(An) injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Proposition 8’s prejudice is a threat to the entire American legal system and its ideas of equality and hope. God knows we don’t want that

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