“It could have been worse,” says Matthew Franck in today’s column . “That is what the defenders of conjugal marriage are saying after the brace of Supreme Court rulings issued yesterday on challenges to that truth that is as old as the human race, that marriage is between a man and a woman. The net effect of the rulings is further damage to marriage, and to the power of the law to uphold the truth about it.”
. . . one can tell, from Chief Justice Roberts’ dissent in United States v. Windsor (on the Defense of Marriage Act), that he almost certainly would have voted in Hollingsworth to uphold Prop 8 if the merits had been reached. But he was willing to hold—insisted on holding, for plausible reasons—that the role of a referendum proponent does not confer standing to represent the constitutionality of state law in federal court. And so he led a majority that frustrated the democratic process in California, and signaled new risks for such processes in the 26 other states that use the popular initiative. But that majority at least—it could have been worse!—declined to constitutionalize a spurious “right” to same-sex marriage.
Read the full column here .
Dear Reader,
Can I be direct with you?
War abroad. Socialists on the rise. AI upending human life. Endless uproar online. The modern attention economy doesn’t want readers — it wants users enslaved to the tyranny of the present.
First Things is the antidote: literary excellence, timeless truths, and a fixed point of reference in a culture that has lost its bearings.
But we can’t do it without readers like you.
Our goal: Raise $150,000 by November 1 to sustain First Things in the year ahead.
Your gift anchors readers in the permanent things.
Make your Fall Campaign gift now using the button below.
If you have any questions or would like more information, please contact Giovanni Del Piero, Director of the Editor’s Circle, at gdelpiero@firstthings.com or 212-627-1985.
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE
The Church in the Age of Therapy
In 1966, Philip Rieff wrote in The Triumph of the Therapeutic that “Religious man was born to…
Canada’s Deadliest Blind Spot
On September 20, the Daily Mail ran a story with the provocative headline, “Our 83-year-old Christian grandmother…
The Faithful Joy of Dolly Parton and Fulton Sheen
Dolly Parton and Fulton Sheen seem to have had little in common. She favored rhinestones; he wore…
