Marriage not an unalienable right

I would like to respond to Eugene Robinson's editorial exalting the work of U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker in finding California's Proposition 8, which sought to ban gay marriage in the state, unconstitutional. Robinson states that Walker has changed the terms of this debate by framing marriage as a question involving "the most basic, cherished rights that the Constitution guarantees to all Americans."

I wholeheartedly agree with Robinson that gays and lesbians are full citizens of this country, and nothing less. But I disagree that marriage in this country has ever been an unalienable right of its citizens.

When two people decide to marry, they must obtain a marriage license from their state. In licensing agreements, the people involved must always comply with a set of qualifications in order to obtain the license in question. When a person wants to drive a car on our country's streets, highways and interstates, he is required to meet certain qualifications first. It is obviously in the very best interest of all citizens that there are prescribed and strict qualifications that candidates must meet for the safety of the driver and all other drivers on the road. Just as we would never say that any full citizen of our country has the right to obtain a driver's license, we have never said that any full citizen of our country has the right to obtain a marriage license.

If marriage is to be based instead on our "most basic, cherished rights that the Constitution guarantees to all Americans," then we must be prepared for many new definitions of marriage to come. Why can't a man who loves two women equally marry both of those women if they both consent? Why can't four people enter into marriage?

The voters of California have spoken. They want one of the primary qualifications for obtaining a marriage license to be the union of one woman and one man. Let us also never forget that in a democracy, government is "by the people and for the people."

Nancy Mau

Buffalo Grove