Polygamy Law Found Unconstitutional. What’s Next?

Key parts of Utah’s polygamy law have been declared unconstitutional by a U.S. District Judge.  Judge Clark Waddoups issued a 91 page ruling in which he declared the “cohabitation prong of the Statute unconstitutional on numerous grounds.”  To clarify, polygamous marriage is still illegal, but Utah had also made it illegal to cohabitate with an adult who is not your legal spouse.  The ruling comes from a lawsuit filed by Kody Brown, who lives with four women and has a reality television show called “Sister Wives” on TLC.  Brown filed the lawsuit in July 2011 and argued that Utah’s law violated their right to privacy.  The lawsuit’s argument relied heavily on the 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down a Texas law banning sodomy, based on the right to privacy.  The law of unintended consequences rears its ugly head again.  After the ruling, Brown issued a statement through his attorney and said, “While we know that many people do not approve of plural families, it is our family and based on our beliefs.  Just as we respect the personal and religious choices of other families, we hope that in time all of our neighbors and fellow citizens will come to respect our own choices as part of this wonderful country of different faiths and beliefs.” 

While the Supreme Court decision used by the plaintiff to bolster his argument was not about gay marriage, I find it no small coincidence that it was still about a gay issue.  Several years ago, Rick Santorum was supremely skewered in the media and by leftists for saying that striking down sodomy laws would lead to legalizing polygamy.  While polygamous marriage may not be legal, the Utah County District Attorney has announced that his office would not file bigamy charges against any consenting adult polygamists unless violence, abuse or fraud was involved.  Brown and his ‘wives’ live in Utah County.  In effect, polygamy has become legalized as long as marriage licenses are not involved.  But, I’m sure all the same media and leftists who dismissed Santorum’s prediction will say he was wrong, simply because marriage licenses are not being issued.

When gay marriage was made legal in a lot of states there were many who asked what was next.  Polygamy?  Cousins?  Brother and sister?  Person and animal?  Scratch polygamy off the list.  While not completely legal, it has become just another immoral lifestyle that will draw no more attention than one man and one woman who are cohabitating.  So now, what is next?  How far will the ‘do whatever ever you want’ attitude go in our society?  This is exactly what people warned about in the past.  Once you start making immoral and licentious lifestyles legal, normal and acceptable, it will eventually follow that everyone living an immoral and licentious lifestyle will demand that theirs also be mainstreamed.  And who can blame them?