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To: JCBreckenridge

It didn’t define marriage. It banned polygamy. Big deal. It’s a state issue now, so you had better start fighting state to state.


142 posted on 01/20/2013 7:19:59 PM PST by GunRunner (***Not associated with any criminal actions by the ATF***)
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To: GunRunner

“In fact, according as monogamous or polygamous marriages are allowed, do we find the principles on which the government of [98 U.S. 145, 166] the people, to a greater or less extent, rests. Professor, Lieber says, polygamy leads to the patriarchal principle, and which, when applied to large communities, fetters the people in stationary despotism, while that principle cannot long exist in connection with monogamy. Chancellor Kent observes that this remark is equally striking and profound. 2 Kent, Com. 81, note (e). An exceptional colony of polygamists under an exceptional leadership may sometimes exist for a time without appearing to disturb the social condition of the people who surround it; but there cannot be a doubt that, unless restricted by some form of constitution,

“it is within the legitimate scope of the power of every civil government to determine whether polygamy or monogamy shall be the law of social life under its dominion”


144 posted on 01/20/2013 7:23:42 PM PST by JCBreckenridge (Texas is a state of mind - Steinbeck)
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To: GunRunner

Citing further from the decision:

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=98&invol=145

“Polygamy has always been odious among the northern and western nations of Europe, and, until the establishment of the Mormon Church, was almost exclusively a feature of the life of Asiatic and of African people.

At common law, the second marriage was always void (2 Kent, Com. 79), and from the earliest history of England polygamy has been treated as an offence against society.

After the establishment of the ecclesiastical [98 U.S. 145, 165] courts, and until the time of James I., it was punished through the instrumentality of those tribunals, not merely because ecclesiastical rights had been violated, but because upon the separation of the ecclesiastical courts from the civil the ecclesiastical were supposed to be the most appropriate for the trial of matrimonial causes and offences against the rights of marriage, just as they were for testamentary causes and the settlement of the estates of deceased persons.”

Insofar as one resides within the domain of the United States- one is bound by the laws thereof - the definition of marriage as one man and one woman stemming from the English common law.


145 posted on 01/20/2013 7:27:18 PM PST by JCBreckenridge (Texas is a state of mind - Steinbeck)
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To: GunRunner

“It’s a state issue now.”

Then provide evidence substantiating your opinion. And no, “Google search” isn’t proof.


146 posted on 01/20/2013 7:28:53 PM PST by JCBreckenridge (Texas is a state of mind - Steinbeck)
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