Hugh: "No one was looking? Are you kidding?"
Posted on 05/26/2008 8:42:15 PM PDT by Jim Noble
I believe that in the US, laws against polygamy have become unenforceable while no one was looking.
Consider the following:
1) Polygamists, for the most part, are not legally married (they do not have multiple marriage licenses obtained by fraud). Therefore, they are simply cohabiting, in some states illegally.
2) Even states where cohabitation is still illegal, such laws are never enforced.
3) Clearly, there are men in these communities who father babies with multiple women. Just as there are in Detroit, Baltimore, Houston, and Los Angeles. This is not a crime per se.
4) So, what is different about these people and every Baby Daddy in America is that they are practicing (freely) their religion. A law which makes cohabitation and being a Baby Daddy illegal, based solely on your religion, is facially unConstitutional.
5) After Casey, Lawrence, and Goodridge, what possible basis exists for enforcing laws against polygamy? After all, according to the US Supreme Court, "At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life."
Polygamy will be legalized in the next 24 months, if these FLDS folk have lawyers of minimal competence.
Not necessarily even then. I think that someone under the age of consent can still legally marry with parental approval in some, if not most, states.
Nah, weakening divorce law broke the dam many years ago. What's the real difference between polygamy and serial marriage?
To make matters even more complicated, from what I can gather, the FLDS men and women do not even cohabitate. From what I saw on TV, for the most part the women live with the children kind of like in dorms. Some of the individual families, I believe, lived in separate homes. So if the State of Texas thinks it is going to prosecute for polygamy, I think they are going to have one heck of a hard time.
I think the judge, CPS, law enforcement THOUGHT they were going to look like heroes barging in there with guns and a great show of force because most people were going to shout, “Hallelujah, now those dang religious perverts are going to get what’s comin’ to ‘em - yahoo baby!”
Too bad the anti FLDS zealots forgot to study and Constitution.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FN_QG1UqHLs
Yes, exactly.
You can SAY that "polygamy" is illegal, but as long as the men don't get more than one marriage license (at a time), don't have sex with underage women, and don't exceed the average number of Baby Mamas in Detroit, I don't see how the law can be enforced.
You certainly can't prosecute Fundamentalist LDS people who do this and let all the other ones go.
I think at age 15 teenagers can marry with parental consent in TX. The State of TX needs to pull its head out of its rear-end and start following the Constitution. An entire community was condemned on the basis of a false report. At the time law enforcement personnel could not find the “victim” and/or the perp at the ranch, they should have backed off.
The one thing that is the most outrageous to me is that they held, and are still holding, adult women against their will. That is frightening to me, not to mention rounding up all the innocent little children, dumping them in a coliseum, then in creepy foster homes. It makes my skin crawl.
Is this my America?
Gay marriage killed hope of one man, one women. It’s a natural progression from there.
Hey, give ‘em a break!
At least this time they didn’t incinerate a bunch of kids to save them!
“You certainly can’t prosecute Fundamentalist LDS people who do this and let all the other ones go. “
Furthermore, do you recall the pro-life folks who tried to hold Planned Parenthood accountable for aborting teenage girls who had been impregnated by older men? Good grief - the weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth - PRIVACY PRIVACY PRIVACY. That investigation was shut down dead in its tracks. There is a double standard so high and wide, it just stinks. At least the FLDS people weren’t having abortions!!!
Yes.
After our 'betters' read 1984, thinking it was a manual...
“At least this time they didn’t incinerate a bunch of kids to save them!”
The day they rounded up all those kids at gunpoint, was the day their worst nightmares came true. Those kids will suffer PTSD for the rest of their lives.
The Thought Police are alive and well and living in Texas. I really wish they hadn’t used Baptist buses to round up all the FLDS kids! Whose bright idea was that - Huckabee?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FN_QG1UqHLs
You imagine very mild nightmares.
No, its not enforceable. The “underage” thing is (parental consent applies to a marriage, and these aren’t legal marriages). Thats about it. And thats about as far as the public ought to have any interest, that and the issue of force, where force is an element in maintaining control.
Texas over-reached. But where they can prove under-aged relationships, they may still have a case. And thats the only area where there is a public safety issue.
My understanding is that the guys have one “legal” wife, theoretically that one could be underage with parental approval.
BTW, what is the government doing in the deciding who can get married business in the first place?
Isn’t marriage a religious imperative?
Hugh: "No one was looking? Are you kidding?"
I think you’ll have to go back a long way to get to a time when marriages weren’t registered with the civil authorities.
And while marriages at an early age have been legal forever with parental consent (you don’t have to go back many generations to see very young brides in most families) I don’t think you’ll be able to defend under-aged non-marriages of the kind we’re talking about.
Unofficial polygamy among adults is beyond the reach of civil law. But the catch is “adult”.
Wow, seven boobs in one picture, and all of them phony.
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