National Post (National Edition)
Why should government limit love?
In Utah, a bill decriminalizing polygamy has been endorsed unanimously by a state Senate committee and will now be voted on in the full chamber — but not everyone’s happy about it.
Critics are concerned the law will protect and provide affirmation for abusers, creating more suffering for victims, especially those born into polygamous families.
In Utah, those families are usually followers of the covenants of the Latter Day Saint (LDS) movement, even though the largest faction of that movement, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), no longer condones plural marriages.
Forgive me if you already know all this from watching Big Love or Sister Wives; the background seems too important to leave out on the assumption other people spend as much time in front of the television as I do.
Speaking of television, it has not only depicted benign and functional polygamous setups of the sort that might make the new bill sound reasonable; it has also helped educate people who have never set foot in Utah about the domestic violence and child abuse that have plagued polygamous communities there (and elsewhere).
So, there are at least two sides to the debate and far more people interested in it than just Mormons and Utahns. But ultimately, the Utah bill, which seeks to change polygamy from a felony to an infraction in that state, makes a lot of sense.
It feels draconian to hold a prison sentence of up to five years over consenting adults who think two (or three or four etc.) spouses are better than one, which is what Utah law currently does.
It also feels stupid to stick with a law that does not seem to be working very well, if at all. According to The Associated Press, there are currently about 30,000 Utahns living in polygamous communities. That’s a lot of potential felons apparently undeterred by existing regulations.
I think one of the most persuasive arguments in favour of decriminalizing polygamy is that it would make it slightly easier for people stuck in polygamous communities to report and shine a light on any abuses they experience — or to receive government support to ease poverty (for example, food aid for an infant that actually gets used to feed the infant). Or to get help getting out.
As Utah State Senator Deidre Henderson, who sponsored the new legislation, told NPR, severe laws have pushed polygamous families “into a shadow society where the vulnerable make easy prey.” Easing up on the punitive part of the equation could be an effective means of reducing some of the common harms of the practice.
No one is suggesting that polygamists who commit other crimes not be punished, or that they be punished less severely, for their additional offences: childbride marriages and fraud, for example, would still be vigorously prosecuted. In fact, the Utah bill increases the penalties for bigamy if it takes place in concert with a serious crime, such as abuse.
Angela Kelly, the director of a non-profit group working to end polygamy, spoke about the bill on a Salt Lake City Fox affiliate. “To make this an infraction?” she said. “You’re essentially saying this is an OK lifestyle.”
Not so. There are plenty of full-out legal lifestyles that are anything but OK.
Alcohol being legal doesn’t make it all right to become an alcoholic.
Staying awake for days on end playing video games in your basement is legal and an extraordinarily bad idea.
We must remember that illegal actions are the exception — ideally they’d be restricted to acts of force and fraud. All the remaining actions out there are by no means to be understood as universally government recommended. Or to be automatically classified as moral or smart or admirable.
And while we’re on the subject of the important point that government does not have the last word on what is right or wrong, aside from its interest in protecting vulnerable people from crime and abuse, government really doesn’t have much business setting arbitrary rules for who can enter into romantic partnerships it will recognize. Look at its track record. Heterosexual marriage has generally been considered OK, sure. Marrying someone of a different race? Not legal in all the states of the U.S. until 1967. And marrying someone of the same sex? Not legal in Canada until 2005 and not legal in all the United States until 10 years later.
We have moved past the notion that government should be allowed to decide what makes a marriage. Procreation? Honouring tradition? Romantic love? It’s not the state’s purview to choose.
So, why should we continue to allow it to dictate how many people may be involved either?