Breaking the Wedding Vows: Woman-Centered Critiques of Marriage, 1963-1982 John Spiers Clemson University, [email protected]

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Breaking the Wedding Vows: Woman-Centered Critiques of Marriage, 1963-1982 John Spiers Clemson University, Jspiers@Clemson.Edu Clemson University TigerPrints All Theses Theses 5-2007 Breaking the Wedding Vows: Woman-Centered Critiques of Marriage, 1963-1982 John Spiers Clemson University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_theses Part of the United States History Commons Recommended Citation Spiers, John, "Breaking the Wedding Vows: Woman-Centered Critiques of Marriage, 1963-1982" (2007). All Theses. 81. https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_theses/81 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Theses at TigerPrints. It has been accepted for inclusion in All Theses by an authorized administrator of TigerPrints. For more information, please contact [email protected]. BREAKING THE WEDDING VOWS: WOMAN-CENTERED CRITIQUES OF MARRIAGE, 1963-1982 A Thesis Presented to the Graduate School of Clemson University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts History by John Henry Spiers III May 2007 Accepted by: Megan Taylor Shockley, Committee Chair Joanna Grisinger Abel A. Bartley ABSTRACT This thesis explores woman-centered critiques of marriage during the period of second-wave feminism from 1963 to 1982. It explores the social and cultural, economic, sexual, and legal critiques of marriage that feminists posed and the messages about marriage that filtered down into a collection of popular magazines geared specifically to a female audience. It argues that feminists, operating through intersecting and diverging motives, interests, and agendas, posed numerous and wide-ranging critiques of marriage as a personal relationship and politicized institution. It asserts that while popular women’s magazines were affected by the claims of feminists, these magazines generally remained conservative in the content, form, and language of the articles on marriage that they featured. This thesis provides a much needed treatment of a topic important to many feminists and an issue central to understanding women’s status in American society. iv DEDICATION To Jennifer, who when I began this project was my fiancée and who, when I completed it, was my wife. The support, encouragement, and interest she shared as I pursued this subject inspired my own enthusiasm. She has helped to show me the promises, problems, and pitfalls of feminist analyses of marriage and reminded me of when my actions failed to match with my convictions. For the many ways she has made my life more interesting and fuller, I am forever grateful. v vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Writing a thesis is a collective effort. Along the way, I have benefited from the guidance, expertise, and encouragement of outstanding faculty. My primary reason for coming to Clemson University was to work with Megan Taylor Shockley. During my time here, her insight and enthusiasm have provided me with a challenging example to follow. My appreciation, understanding, and contributions to the field of women’s and gender history have grown by leaps and bounds under her tutelage. I am indebted to Abel Bartley, under whom I completed coursework that ignited my interests in African American and urban history. His sincere interest in my research and his confidence in me as a scholar have been vital to my success at Clemson. I am greatly appreciative of the keen mind and attention to detail that Joanna Grisinger has brought to shaping my conceptualization of legal history. Her ability to pull me in the right direction has proved imminently helpful. Many other people have worked with me to make researching and writing this thesis much less difficult than it would have been without their aid. The interlibrary loan staff of Cooper Library simplified the hassles of borrowing research materials from other institutions. Conversations with my colleagues in the history department, particularly Reed Peeples and Carol Longenecker, provided me with delightful reprieves from academic work and fresh perspectives on my work. For the community of students and scholars that I found here, I am much obliged for their kindness, generosity, and insight. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page TITLE PAGE.......................................................................................................... i ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................. iii DEDICATION....................................................................................................... v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................ vii INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................ 1 CHAPTER 1............................................................................................................ 39 CHAPTER 2............................................................................................................ 65 CHAPTER 3............................................................................................................ 85 CHAPTER 4............................................................................................................ 99 CHAPTER 5............................................................................................................ 119 CONCLUSION ...................................................................................................... 147 BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................. 155 2 INTRODUCTION In a letter to Time printed in its March 20, 1972, issue, Virginia Hanson questioned both her own marriage and marriage as a societal institution: “I’d always accepted the role of wife and mother [… but now] [w]omen are at last emerging from their cocoon and saying ‘why?’”1 The inclusion of Virginia Hanson’s reflection in the March 20, 1972 special issue of Time magazine focused on “The American Woman” suggested that women’s movements of the 1960s and 1970s had provoked a strong gender consciousness and encouraged women in mainstream society to challenge traditional gender roles. In these years, marriage represented an important, though hotly contested, focal point for uncovering and analyzing the discrimination that women faced along the lines of gender, race and ethnicity, class, and sexual orientation. In posing their critiques, feminists drew upon their own experiences with and their understanding of marriage as an institution with sociocultural, psychological, economic, sexual, and legal dimensions. In popular women’s periodicals, these feminist critiques were reworked in ways that retained an emphasis on personalizing women’s experiences but stripped away claims for sweeping societal change in response. Framework This study explores ‘woman-centered critiques of marriage’ during the period from 1963-1982. By adopting a ‘woman-centered approach,’ this thesis examines how women specifically identified as gendered beings in posing 1 (Mrs.) Virginia Hanson, letter to Time (20 March 1972), 6. critiques to marriage. While this study emphasizes the centrality of gender in informing feminist and popular critiques of marriage, it does so without narrowly confining itself to one facet of a woman’s identity. Other social constructions including but not limited to race and ethnicity, class, and sexual orientation played important roles in qualifying critiques to marriage.2 In employing the paradigm of woman-centered to frame the attention given to critiques and challenges to marriage, this thesis explores the claims and proposals of feminist activists and the messages that filtered into a collection of popular women’s magazines geared specifically to a female audience. The use of a woman-centered approach recognizes the importance of the dialogue between feminists and non-activists, what they shared and where they differed. While feminists provided important challenges to the institution of marriage, it remained the task of mainstream, non-feminist women, to negotiate what claims, critiques, and changes they embraced. Despite the prominence give to critiquing marriage in this era, no unified, consensus analysis of marriage as a personal relationship and politicized institution existed in feminist circles, much less in popular women’s magazines. Instead, diverse groups of women, operating through intersecting and diverging motives, interests, and agendas, critiqued marriage from several perspectives. 2 Nancy Cott makes the claim that marriage “is the vehicle through which the apparatus of state can shape the gender order.” See Nancy F Cott, Public Vows: A History of Marriage and the Nation (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002), 3. 2 Scope and Focus This thesis concentrates on the era from the debut of Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique in 1963 to the ultimate failure of the Equal Rights Amendment in 1982. This period, considered by several scholars as that of ‘second-wave feminism,’ arose following the decline in sustained and organized women’s activism after passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. It represented an unprecedented level of organizing at the local, regional, and national levels to challenge a multitude of barriers to women’s full participation in American society. While characterizing who and what precisely constituted ‘second wave’ feminism remains difficult, some general trends are evident. In comparison to earlier periods of women’s activism, this era featured greater diversity in opinions and political actions. It challenged the alleged privileges given to women
Recommended publications
  • Feminism & Philosophy Vol.5 No.1
    APA Newsletters Volume 05, Number 1 Fall 2005 NEWSLETTER ON FEMINISM AND PHILOSOPHY FROM THE EDITOR, SALLY J. SCHOLZ NEWS FROM THE COMMITTEE ON THE STATUS OF WOMEN, ROSEMARIE TONG ARTICLES MARILYN FISCHER “Feminism and the Art of Interpretation: Or, Reading the First Wave to Think about the Second and Third Waves” JENNIFER PURVIS “A ‘Time’ for Change: Negotiating the Space of a Third Wave Political Moment” LAURIE CALHOUN “Feminism is a Humanism” LOUISE ANTONY “When is Philosophy Feminist?” ANN FERGUSON “Is Feminist Philosophy Still Philosophy?” OFELIA SCHUTTE “Feminist Ethics and Transnational Injustice: Two Methodological Suggestions” JEFFREY A. GAUTHIER “Feminism and Philosophy: Getting It and Getting It Right” SARA BEARDSWORTH “A French Feminism” © 2005 by The American Philosophical Association ISSN: 1067-9464 BOOK REVIEWS Robin Fiore and Hilde Lindemann Nelson: Recognition, Responsibility, and Rights: Feminist Ethics and Social Theory REVIEWED BY CHRISTINE M. KOGGEL Diana Tietjens Meyers: Being Yourself: Essays on Identity, Action, and Social Life REVIEWED BY CHERYL L. HUGHES Beth Kiyoko Jamieson: Real Choices: Feminism, Freedom, and the Limits of the Law REVIEWED BY ZAHRA MEGHANI Alan Soble: The Philosophy of Sex: Contemporary Readings REVIEWED BY KATHRYN J. NORLOCK Penny Florence: Sexed Universals in Contemporary Art REVIEWED BY TANYA M. LOUGHEAD CONTRIBUTORS ANNOUNCEMENTS APA NEWSLETTER ON Feminism and Philosophy Sally J. Scholz, Editor Fall 2005 Volume 05, Number 1 objective claims, Beardsworth demonstrates Kristeva’s ROM THE DITOR “maternal feminine” as “an experience that binds experience F E to experience” and refuses to be “turned into an abstraction.” Both reconfigure the ground of moral theory by highlighting the cultural bias or particularity encompassed in claims of Feminism, like philosophy, can be done in a variety of different objectivity or universality.
    [Show full text]
  • Sidney Abbott: Sappho's 'Right-On Woman'
    IN MEMORIAM Sidney Abbott: Sappho’s ‘Right-On Woman’ IRENE JAVORS tional Organization for Women (NOW), becoming a leading spokeswoman for lesbian rights on the organization’s pan- IDNEY ABBOTT, well-known lesbian feminist ac- els. At the time, Betty Friedan, the president of NOW, did tivist, died in a fire on April 15, 2015, in her home in not support Sidney’s efforts. Friedan feared that if NOW SSouthold, Long Island. She was 77. Those of us who openly supported lesbian rights, it could compromise the knew her remember Sidney as a pio- larger agenda of women’s equality, neer in several fields of endeavor, as and she dubbed the lesbian presence someone who helped to liberate con- in NOW as “the lavender menace,” sciousness from age-old shackles of ig- an epithet that would become famous norance and prejudice. and infamous. Born on July 11, 1937, in Washing- In 1970, Sidney joined with other ton, D.C., Sidney grew up in a military lesbian feminists to form the group family. Her father, Ward, a West Point “Lavender Menace.” They protested graduate, had served as an aide to Gen- the exclusion of lesbian issues from eral Douglas MacArthur in World War the mainstream feminist agenda. She II. He was a distant descendant of also was a member of the group Rad- Philip Livingston, one of the signers of icalesbians. In 1970, they distributed the Declaration of Independence. a manifesto titled “The Woman-Iden- Abbott studied at Smith College tified Woman” at a meeting of the but ultimately completed her under- Second Congress to Unite Women in graduate studies at the University of NYC to protest the exclusion of les- New Mexico, with a degree in art his- bian speakers.
    [Show full text]
  • For Love and for Justice: Narratives of Lesbian Activism
    City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects 2-2014 For Love and for Justice: Narratives of Lesbian Activism Kelly Anderson Graduate Center, City University of New York How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/8 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] For Love and For Justice: Narratives of Lesbian Activism By Kelly Anderson A dissertation submitted to the faculty of The Graduate Center, City University of New York in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History 2014 © 2014 KELLY ANDERSON All Rights Reserved ii This manuscript has been read and accepted for the Graduate Faculty in History in satisfaction of the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Blanche Wiesen Cook Chair of Examining Committee Helena Rosenblatt Executive Officer Bonnie Anderson Bettina Aptheker Gerald Markowitz Barbara Welter Supervisory Committee THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK iii Abstract For Love and for Justice: Narratives of Lesbian Activism By Kelly Anderson Adviser: Professor Blanche Wiesen Cook This dissertation explores the role of lesbians in the U.S. second wave feminist movement, arguing that the history of women’s liberation is more diverse, more intersectional,
    [Show full text]
  • I. This Term Is Borrowed from the Title of Betty Friedan's Book, First
    Notes POST·WAR CONSERVATISM AND THE FEMININE MYSTIQUE I. This term is borrowed from the title of Betty Friedan's book, first published in 1963, in order not to confuse the post-Second World War ideology of women's role and place with such nineteenth-century terms as 'woman's sphere'. Although this volume owes to Freidan's book far more than its title, it does not necessarily agree with either its emphasis or its solutions. 2. Quoted in Sandra Dijkstra, 'Simone de Beauvoir and Betty Friedan: The Politics of Omission', Feminist Studies, VI, 2 (Summer 1980), 290. 3. Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English, For Her Own Good: 150 Years of the Experts' Advice to Women (Garden City, New York: Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1978), pp. 216-17. 4. Richard J. Barnet, Roots of War (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1973), pp 48-9, 118, 109. First published by Atheneum Publishers, New York, 1972. 5. Quoted in William H. Chafe, The American Woman: Her Changing Social, Economic, and Political Roles, 1920-1970 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1972), p. 187. 6. Mary P. Ryan, Womanhood in America: From Colonial Times to the Present, 2nd edn (New York and London: New Viewpoints/A division of Franklin Watts, 1979), p. 173. 7. Ferdinand Lundberg and Marynia F. Farnham, MD, Modern Woman: The Lost Sex (New York and London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1947), p. 319. 8. Lillian Hellman, An Unfinished Woman: A Memoir (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1969), pp. 5-6. 9. Barbara Charlesworth Gelpi and Albert Gelpi (eds), Adrienne Rich's Poetry (New York: W.W.
    [Show full text]
  • Exclusionary Equality and the Case for Same-Sex Families: a Reworking of Martha Fineman's Re-Visioned Family Law
    Seattle Journal for Social Justice Volume 2 Issue 2 Article 25 May 2004 Exclusionary Equality and the Case for Same-Sex Families: A Reworking of Martha Fineman's Re-visioned Family Law Zachary A. Kramer Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.law.seattleu.edu/sjsj Recommended Citation Kramer, Zachary A. (2004) "Exclusionary Equality and the Case for Same-Sex Families: A Reworking of Martha Fineman's Re-visioned Family Law," Seattle Journal for Social Justice: Vol. 2 : Iss. 2 , Article 25. Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.seattleu.edu/sjsj/vol2/iss2/25 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Publications and Programs at Seattle University School of Law Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Seattle Journal for Social Justice by an authorized editor of Seattle University School of Law Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. 505 EXCLUSIONARY EQUALITY AND THE CASE FOR SAME-SEX FAMILIES: A Reworking of Martha Fineman’s Re-visioned Family Law Zachary A. Kramer1 I. INTRODUCTION For many years now, scholars, activists, and even the general public have debated the legal issues related to same-sex families.2 This debate, while ostensibly academic, has become far more acute in the wake of a handful of groundbreaking court decisions. The first of these cases is the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Lawrence v. Texas.3 In Lawrence, the Court struck down Texas’s criminal sodomy law and overruled its decision in Bowers v. Hardwick,4
    [Show full text]
  • Marriage, Cohabitation, and the Welfare of Children
    File: Document1 Created on: 11/14/2012 2:49:00 PM Last Printed: 3/14/2013 5:23:00 PM MARRIAGE, COHABITATION, AND THE WELFARE OF CHILDREN ∗ Mark Strasser I. INTRODUCTION ................................................................ 101 II. WHAT DOES THE DATA SHOW AND WHAT IMPLICATIONS MIGHT THEY HAVE .................................................................. 102 A. Economic Factors ........................................................ 105 B. Biological Connection? ................................................. 106 C. Marriage in the Blended Family ....................................... 109 D. The Indirect Benefits of Marriage? ................................... 115 E. The Legal Recognition of Same-Sex Unions ......................... 118 III. CONCLUSION ................................................................. 121 I. INTRODUCTION The divorce rate is high in the United States,1 and the rate of non- marital cohabitation continues to grow.2 More and more children are growing up in nontraditional homes,3 and there is a growing debate about whether children are harmed when raised in a non-marital setting. A re- lated debate involves what steps, if any, can and should be taken to en- hance the welfare of those children living in a non-marital home if, in- deed, they are suffering opportunity costs by virtue of being raised in such a setting. ∗ Trustees Professor of Law, Capital University Law School, Columbus, Ohio. I would like to thank Professor Margaret Cordray for her helpful discussions of these and related issues. 1. See Valarie King, Stepfamily Formation: Implications for Adolescent Ties to Mothers, Nonre- sident Fathers, and Stepfathers, 71 J. MAR. & FAM. 954, 954 (2009) (“[A]lmost half of marriages [are] likely to end in divorce . .”). 2. Julie E. Artis, Maternal Cohabitation and Child Well-Being Among Kindergarten Children, 69 J. MARRIAGE & FAM. 222, 222 (2007) (“One of the most notable changes in family life over the last several decades is the rapid rise of cohabitation.”).
    [Show full text]
  • The Home in Kate Chopin's Short Fiction Senior Paper Presented In
    Patriarchal Representation and Domestic Liberation: The Home in Kate Chopin’s Short Fiction Senior Paper Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For a Degree Bachelor of Arts with A Major in Literature at The University of North Carolina at Asheville Fall 2009 By VICTORIA HICKS ____________________ Thesis Director Dr. Blake Hobby ____________________ Thesis Advisor Dr. Erica Abrams Locklear Hicks 2 “Today a woman who is lucky in her choice of a husband can have both—marriage and self-direction. But since in Chopin’s fictional world that option does not exist, she makes a powerful plea for it” (McMahan 35). Kate Chopin, a pioneering feminist writer, was writing at a time when women were confined to the private sphere of the home and were often denied participation in the public. Patriarchal attitudes dominated the minds of American people in the nineteenth century and Chopin’s work encouraged women to look at their situations from a critical point of view, one in which women were unfairly treated because of their status as female. In her short fiction, Kate Chopin portrays the oppression of women in the patriarchal society of nineteenth-century America through the quintessential Southern plantation home. By representing the domestic sphere, Chopin portrays women unable to fully embrace their own feminine ideas and express their own desires. A constant image in her stories, the plantation home is an image of domesticity that locates Chopin’s desire for women trapped in the private sphere to be able to have voice, portraying their fears and delusions as tied to a patriarchal society.
    [Show full text]
  • In the Design Professions: an Intersectional Feminist Study of the Women's School of Planning and Architecture (1974-1981)
    University of Massachusetts Amherst ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst Doctoral Dissertations Dissertations and Theses Fall November 2014 Project Space(s) in the Design Professions: An Intersectional Feminist Study of the Women's School of Planning and Architecture (1974-1981) Elizabeth Cahn University of Massachusetts Amherst Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_2 Part of the Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, Urban, Community and Regional Planning Commons, and the Urban Studies and Planning Commons Recommended Citation Cahn, Elizabeth, "Project Space(s) in the Design Professions: An Intersectional Feminist Study of the Women's School of Planning and Architecture (1974-1981)" (2014). Doctoral Dissertations. 160. https://doi.org/10.7275/6044908.0 https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_2/160 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Dissertations and Theses at ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. For more information, please contact [email protected]. PROJECT SPACE(S) IN THE DESIGN PROFESSIONS: AN INTERSECTIONAL FEMINIST STUDY OF THE WOMEN’S SCHOOL OF PLANNING AND ARCHITECTURE (1974-1981) A Dissertation Presented by ELIZABETH CAHN Submitted to the Graduate School of the University of Massachusetts Amherst in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY September 2014 Regional Planning © Copyright by Elizabeth Cahn 2014 All Rights Reserved PROJECT SPACE(S) IN THE DESIGN PROFESSIONS: AN INTERSECTIONAL FEMINIST STUDY OF THE WOMEN’S SCHOOL OF PLANNING AND ARCHITECTURE (1974-1981) A Dissertation Presented by ELIZABETH CAHN Approved as to style and content by: _________________________________ Mark T.
    [Show full text]
  • Kate Millett Memorial Service
    Dignity: A Journal on Sexual Exploitation and Violence Volume 5 Issue 2 Kate Millett Memorial Issue Article 14 10-2020 Reflections By Linda Clarke: Kate Millett Memorial Service Linda Clarke [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/dignity Recommended Citation Clarke, Linda (2020) "Reflections By Linda Clarke: Kate Millett Memorial Service," Dignity: A Journal on Sexual Exploitation and Violence: Vol. 5: Iss. 2, Article 14. DOI: 10.23860/dignity.2020.05.02.14 Available at: https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/dignity/vol5/iss2/14https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/dignity/ vol5/iss2/14 This Kate Millett Memorial Issue is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@URI. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dignity: A Journal on Sexual Exploitation and Violence by an authorized editor of DigitalCommons@URI. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Reflections By Linda Clarke: Kate Millett Memorial Service Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License. This kate millett memorial issue is available in Dignity: A Journal on Sexual Exploitation and Violence: https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/dignity/vol5/iss2/14 Clarke: Reflections By Linda Clarke: Kate Millett Memorial Service Volume 5, Issue 2, Article 14, 2020 https://doi.org/10.23860/dignity.2020.05.02.14 REFLECTIONS BY LINDA CLARKE: KATE MILLETT MEMORIAL Linda Clarke Farm Mother HEN KATE MILLETT AND I MET almost 50 years ago, she was feverishly busy, cheerful, interviewing prostitutes from the back of her Buick con- W vertible, tearing wallpaper off the old walls of a farmhouse, walking to Albany in support of gay candidates, and planning a movie about three women liv- ing in America.
    [Show full text]
  • The Overlooked Public Health Argument for Same-Sex Marriage
    Beyond Rights and Morality: The Overlooked Public Health Argument for Same-Sex Marriage John G. Culhane* I. INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................... 7 II. PUBLIC HEALTH AND ITS CONNECTION TO MARRIAGE: PRELIMINARIES ................................................................................... 12 III. MARRIAGE AND PUBLIC HEALTH: THE MISSING ANALYSIS ............. 16 IV. THE MUTUALLY REINFORCING PUBLIC AND PRIVATE BENEFITS OF MARRIAGE .................................................................... 23 A. The Argument for Marriage ..................................................... 24 B. Marriage Equality and Its Effects on Couples, Children, and Society ................................................................ 29 C. Applying the Data and Observations ....................................... 35 V. CONCLUSION ...................................................................................... 37 I. INTRODUCTION As the debate about marriage equality1 has made its way through the courts, most of the discussion and analysis has focused on rights; specifically, whether denying same-sex couples entry into the institution of marriage violates constitutional guarantees of equal protection and * © 2008 John G. Culhane. Professor of Law and Director, Health Law Institute, Widener University School of Law; Lecturer, Yale University School of Public Health. I am grateful to my two excellent research assistants, Janine Hochberg and Jonathan Harting. Thanks also to the editors
    [Show full text]
  • The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013: the Equality and Human Rights Implications for Marriage and the Law in England and Wales
    GUIDANCE The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013: The Equality and Human Rights Implications for Marriage and the Law in England and Wales Equality and Human Rights Commission www.equalityhumanrights.com What is the purpose of this publication? This publication provides guidance on the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 which extends marriage to same sex couples in England and Wales. It explains the changes introduced by the Act, and how it relates to equality and human rights law. Who is it for? This document is useful for same sex couples, employers, employees, service providers, customers, public authorities and their service users, religious organisations and their officials, as well as schools, their employees, pupils, governors and teachers. What is inside? This guide covers: • The application of the Act • The requirements for a marriage • The impact on same sex couples • The impact on a married person who wishes to change legal gender • The impact on religious organisations • The impact on registrars • The impact on premises shared by religious organisations • Equality and human rights law and freedom of expression • The impact on school education • Possible future changes When was it published? This guide was first published in March 2014. Why has the Commission produced it? The Equality and Human Rights Commission has responsibility for the promotion and enforcement of equality and human rights laws in England, Scotland and Wales. What formats are available? This Guide is available as a PDF file (in English) and as a Microsoft Word file (in English or Welsh) from www.equalityhumanrights.com. The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013: The Equality and Human Rights Implications for Marriage and the Law in England and Wales Introduction The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 (the Act) extends marriage to same sex couples in England and Wales.
    [Show full text]
  • Lawyering for Marriage Equality
    LAWYERING FOR MARRIAGE EQUALITY Scott L. Cummings Douglas NeJaime Critics of litigation seeking to establish the right of same-sex couples to marry argue that it has produced a backlash undercutting the movement for marriage equality. In this account, movement lawyers emerge as agents of backlash: naively turning to the courts ahead of public opinion, ignoring more productive political alternatives, and ultimately hurting the very cause they purport to advance by securing a court victory that mobilizes opponents to repeal it. This Article challenges the backlash thesis through a close analysis of the Californiacase, which contradicts the portrait of movement lawyers as unsophisticatedrights crusaders and casts doubt on the causal claim that court decisions upholding same-sex couples' right to marry have harmed the movement. INTRO DUCTIO N ....................................................................................................................1236 I. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK: THE BACKLASH DEBATE ............................................. 1242 II. CASE STUDY: THE CALIFORNIA MARRIAGE EQUALITY MOVEMENT ....................... 1247 A. The Lessons of Litigation Past: Before California ............................................. 1248 B. Litigation Avoidance: The Legislative Pursuit of Domestic Partnership ........ 1251 1. After Hawaii: The California No-Litigation Strategy .............................. 1251 2. Legislative Incrementalism and Countermobilization: From Domestic Partner Registry to Proposition 22 ...........................................
    [Show full text]