The meaning of marriage : family, state, market, and morals

The movement for same-sex marriage has triggered an unprecedented crisis in the social norms and laws governing marriage. All great civilizations have sought to unite, in the institution of marriage, the goods of sexual intimacy, childbearing and childrearing, and life-long love between adults. But the last five decades have witnessed the erosion of marriage as a public institution in the developed world. The separation of the goods previously united in marriage has led thoughtful people to question why marriage should be denied to homosexuals. This volume brings together the best of contemporary scholarship on marriage from a variety of disciplines—history, ethics, economics, law and public policy, philosophy, sociology, psychiatry, political science—to inform, and reform, public debate. Rigorous yet accessible, these studies aim to rethink and re-present the case for marriage as a positive institution and ideal that is in the public interest and serves the common good. The essays in this volume were presented to an audience of scholars, journalists, public policy experts, and other professionals, at a conference sponsored by the Witherspoon Institute. The authors are among the most eminent authorities on marriage and public policy in the English-speaking world. Sacrilege And Sacrament / Roger Scruton -- What About The Children? Liberal Cautions On Same-sex Marriage / Don Browning And Elizabeth Marquardt-- Changing Dynamics Of The Family In Recent European History / Harold James -- Why Unilateral Divorce Has No Place In A Free Society / Jennifer Roback Morse -- Framer's Idea Of Marriage And Family / David F. Forte -- Family And The Laws/ Hadley Arkes-- What's Sex Got To Do With It? Marriage, Morality, And Rationality / Robert P. George -- Soft Despotism And Same-sex Marriage / Seana Sugrue -- (how) Does Marriage Protect Child Well-being? / Maggie Gallagher -- Current Crisis In Marriage Law, Its Origins, And Its Impact / Katherine Shaw Spaht -- Suffer The Little Children: Marriage, The Poor And The Commonweal / W. Bradford Wilcox. Edited By Robert P. George And Jean Bethke Elshtain. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 255-301) And Index. Sacrilege and Sacrament by Roger Scruton What About the Children? Liberal Cautions on Same-Sex Marriage by Don Browning and Elizabeth Marquardt Changing Dynamics of the Family in Recent European History by Harold James Why Unilateral Divorce Has No Place in a Free Society by Jennifer Roback Morse The Framers’ Idea of Marriage and Family by David F. Forte Family and the Laws by Hadley Arkes What’s Sex Got to Do with It? Marriage, Morality, and Rationality by Robert P. George Soft Despotism and Same-sex Marriage by Seana Sugrue (How) Does Marriage Protect Child Well-being? by Maggie Gallagher Current Crisis in Marriage Law, its Origins, and its Impact by Katherine Shaw Spaht Suffer the Little Children: Marriage, the Poor and the Commonweal by W. Bradford Wilcox This volume brings together the best of contemporary scholarship on marriage from a variety of disciplines, history, ethics, economics, law and public policy, philosophy, sociology, psychiatry, political science, to inform, and reform, public debate. Rigorous yet accessible, these studies aim to rethink and re-present the case for marriage as a positive institution and ideal that is in the public interest and serves the common good. The essays in this volume were presented to an audience of scholars, journalists, public policy experts, and other professionals, at a conference sponsored by the Witherspoon Institute. The contributors are among the most eminent authorities on marriage and public policy in the English-speaking world