Gay Marriage: Why It Is Good for Gays, Good for Straights, and Good for America

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Macmillan, Apr 7, 2004 - Political Science - 207 pages
A leading Washington journalist argues that gay marriage is the best way to preserve and protect society's most essential institution

Two people meet and fall in love. They get married, they become upstanding members of their community, they care for each other when one falls ill, they grow old together. What's wrong with this picture? Nothing, says Jonathan Rauch, and that's the point. If the two people are of the same sex, why should this chain of events be any less desirable? Marriage is more than a bond between individuals; it also links them to the community at large. Excluding some people from the prospect of marriage not only is harmful to them, but is also corrosive of the institution itself.
The controversy over gay marriage has reached a critical point in American political life as liberals and conservatives have begun to mobilize around this issue, pro and con. But no one has come forward with a compelling, comprehensive, and readable case for gay marriage-until now.
Jonathan Rauch, one of our most original and incisive social commentators, has written a clear and honest manifesto explaining why gay marriage is important-even crucial-to the health of marriage in America today. Rauch grounds his argument in commonsense, mainstream values and confronting the social conservatives on their own turf. Gay marriage, he shows, is a "win-win-win" for strengthening the bonds that tie us together and for remaining true to our national heritage of fairness and humaneness toward all.

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About the author (2004)

Jonathan Rauch is a correspondent for "The Atlantic Monthly" and a senior writer and columnist for "National Journal." He is the author of several books on public policy, culture, and economics, including most recently "Government's End: Why Washington Stopped Working." He is a writer in residence at the Brookings Institution, and his work has appeared in "The New Republic, The Economist, Harper's, Fortune, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal," and" Slate," among other publications. He lives outside Washington, D.C.