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Inspired by recent adoptions of same-sex marriage, From Sodomy Laws to Same-Sex Marriage provides international perspectives on the legal and social history of same-sex relationships from the early 19th century to the present. Its emphasis is on areas where the impetus for change has been most noticeable: Europe, the Americas, and Australasia. From Sodom and Gomorrah to Britain's sodomy laws and continental Europe's abhorrence of sexual acts 'against nature', the history of same-sex love traditionally ranged from fire and brimstone maledictions to secrecy and scandal. Until recently, legal positions across the western world reflected the legacies of the British and French empires, as well as Christianity, particularly Catholicism. In recent years, however, there has been a revolution in attitudes towards same-sex relationships. This poses hitherto unanswered questions: what historical complexities lie behind the revolutionary shift from punitive attitudes to legal endorsement of same-sex relationships? Given the cultural variety of historical attitudes to same-sex relationships, why has their legal acceptance been so international? The essays in this volume provide answers to these questions, offering the first international overview of the topic. While other studies have attempted to explain the change in legal and social treatment of same-sex relationships in a national context, or within a shorter time frame, this is the first volume to examine the topic from the French Revolution to the present day, bringing together a diverse array of perspectives over a range of countries. It is an important volume for students and scholars of queer history, the history of sexuality, law and sociology.
A history of the government's regulation of sexual behavior traces the historical purposes behind the prohibition against sodomy in early America and continues with a discussion of how the law was referenced in different contexts in later years, covering such topics as the McCarthy era, the sexual revolution of the 1960s, and the 2003 Supreme Court decision to decriminalize private sex between consenting adults. 20,000 first printing.
Compares today’s same-sex marriage movement to the experiences of black people in the mid-nineteenth century. The staggering string of victories by the gay rights movement’s campaign for marriage equality raises questions not only about how gay people have been able to successfully deploy marriage to elevate their social and legal reputation, but also what kind of freedom and equality the ability to marry can mobilize. Wedlocked turns to history to compare today’s same-sex marriage movement to the experiences of newly emancipated black people in the mid-nineteenth century, when they were able to legally marry for the first time. Maintaining that the transition to greater freedom was both wondrous and perilous for newly emancipated people, Katherine Franke relates stories of former slaves’ involvements with marriage and draws lessons that serve as cautionary tales for today’s marriage rights movements. While “be careful what you wish for” is a prominent theme, they also teach us how the rights-bearing subject is inevitably shaped by the very rights they bear, often in ways that reinforce racialized gender norms and stereotypes. Franke further illuminates how the racialization of same-sex marriage has redounded to the benefit of the gay rights movement while contributing to the ongoing subordination of people of color and the diminishing reproductive rights of women. Like same-sex couples today, freed African-American men and women experienced a shift in status from outlaws to in-laws, from living outside the law to finding their private lives organized by law and state licensure. Their experiences teach us the potential and the perils of being subject to legal regulation: rights—and specifically the right to marriage—can both burden and set you free.
Inspired by recent adoptions of same-sex marriage, From Sodomy Laws to Same-Sex Marriage provides international perspectives on the legal and social history of same-sex relationships from the early 19th century to the present. Its emphasis is on areas where the impetus for change has been most noticeable: Europe, the Americas, and Australasia. From Sodom and Gomorrah to Britain's sodomy laws and continental Europe's abhorrence of sexual acts 'against nature', the history of same-sex love traditionally ranged from fire and brimstone maledictions to secrecy and scandal. Until recently, legal positions across the western world reflected the legacies of the British and French empires, as well as Christianity, particularly Catholicism. In recent years, however, there has been a revolution in attitudes towards same-sex relationships. This poses hitherto unanswered questions: what historical complexities lie behind the revolutionary shift from punitive attitudes to legal endorsement of same-sex relationships? Given the cultural variety of historical attitudes to same-sex relationships, why has their legal acceptance been so international? The essays in this volume provide answers to these questions, offering the first international overview of the topic. While other studies have attempted to explain the change in legal and social treatment of same-sex relationships in a national context, or within a shorter time frame, this is the first volume to examine the topic from the French Revolution to the present day, bringing together a diverse array of perspectives over a range of countries. It is an important volume for students and scholars of queer history, the history of sexuality, law and sociology.
Third, same-sex marriage would help civilize America. A civilized polity assures equality for all its citizens. Without full access to the institutions of civic life, gays and lesbians cannot be full participants in the American experience. Gays and lesbians love their country, and have contributed in every way to its flourishing.
Tracing the Court's deliberations, Richards shows how Lawrence unambiguously establishes that the right to a private life is an innately human right and that our constitutional right to privacy rests on the moral bedrock of equal protection. He shifts from the law to literature, and from the Courts to the wider culture, to offer an analysis of the relevant arguments, going beneath their surface to link them to the emotional and moral foundations of the controversies raging around these decisions.
During the past three decades, nations all over the world have been debating whether to allow same-sex couples to marry, or at least grant these couples various rights associated with marriage. In Equality for Same-Sex Couples, Yuval Merin presents the first comparative study of the legal regulation of same-sex partnerships worldwide, as well as a unique survey of the status of same-sex couples in Europe. Merin begins by providing a historical overview of the transformation of marriage from antiquity to the present. He then identifies and critically compares four principal models for the legal regulation and recognition of same-sex partnerships: civil marriage, registered partnership, domestic partnership, and cohabitation. Merin concludes that all of the models except civil marriage discriminate against gays and lesbians just as the "separate but equal" doctrine discriminated against African Americans; thus, so-called alternatives to marriage, even if they provide the same rights and benefits as marriage, are inherently unequal and therefore unconstitutional.
This text provides a comprehensive analysis of the legal issues concerning gender and sexual nonconformity in the United States. The text is split into three parts covering the post-Civil war period to the 1980s, contemporary issues and legal arguments.
The rhetoric and emotion surrounding the same-sex marriage debate tends to obscure the facts and figures. Tracing the development of same-sex marriage in the United States and its deployment as a political tool, Sean Cahill lays out the current situation in plain language and explains what's at stake.
With same-sex marriage igniting a firestorm of controversy in the press and in the courts, in legislative chambers and in living rooms, Andrew Sullivan, a pioneering voice in the debate, has brought together two thousand years of argument in an anthology of historic inclusiveness and evenhandedness. Among the selections included here: - The 2003 Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruling in support of same-sex marriage - Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion and Justice Scalia’s dissent in the 2003 landmark Supreme Court decision striking down anti-sodomy laws - President George W. Bush’s call for a Federal Marriage Amendment - John Kerry’s Senate speech urging defeat of the Defense of Marriage Act - Harvard historian Nancy F. Cott's testimony before the Vermont House Judiciary Committee - Reverend Peter J. Gomes on the distinction between civil and religious marriage - Stanley Kurtz on the politics of gay marriage - Evan Wolfson on the popularity of the right to marry among lesbians and gay men - New York Times op-ed columnist David Brooks’ conservative case for same-sex marriage - Excerpts from Genesis, Leviticus, and other essential biblical texts - Aristophanes’s classic theory of same-sex love, from Plato’s Symposium - Hannah Arendt on marriage as a fundamental right - Camille Paglia’s skepticism Representing the full range of perspectives and the most cogent and arresting arguments, Same-Sex Marriage is essential to a balanced understanding of the most pressing cultural question we face today.