HERALD POLL: Time to legalize polygamy? Read Comments for the great responses published 6-25-06
NOTE: GREAT Responses under Comments
http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/182840/
HERALD POLL: Time to legalize polygamy?
Daily Herald
It has been five years since a Provo jury found polygamist Tom Green guilty of bigamy and failing to support the children of his five wives. Green was the first polygamist to be prosecuted in a half-century.
At the time, anti-polygamy groups predicted an increase in prosecutions. But so far, the predicted flood has been more of a trickle. The only other polygamist to be prosecuted since Green was Rodney Holm, a police officer in the polygamist enclave of Hildale. Warren Jeffs, the leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, is a federal fugitive, fleeing charges that he arranged to marry underage girls to older men.
The state attorney general's office said it will not prosecute polygamists who engaged in the practice as consenting adults, instead concentrating on the statutory rape incidents, such as Green's 1986 marriage to then-13-year-old Linda Kunz, who remains an outspoken supporter of her husband.
But what should Utah do about polygamists?
On the one hand, Utah's laws are perfectly clear -- polygamy is illegal. It is part of the state Constitution, a provision that the federal government required as a condition of Utah statehood. If people are breaking the law, they need to be prosecuted or the law is meaningless.
While the cohabitation statute has made prosecuting polygamy difficult, the bigamy approach used in Green's case offers a workable way to do it. And just targeting Green, Utah's most celebrated polygamist at the time, while ignoring thousands of others lends credence to claims that his was merely a show trial on the eve of the 2002 Winter Olympics.
Seems to us that the cost of prosecutions doesn't justify the result in many cases, and we're not just talking about the dollars and cents spent on the trials. When the FLDS's Short Creek enclave on the Utah-Arizona border was raided in the 1950s, it became an ugly public relations nightmare for Arizona and Utah authorities, who were seen breaking up families.
Not everybody who practices polygamy is as creepy as Jeffs. For many, it's simply a family structure that works.
While there are many polygamists who rely on welfare to support their broods, throwing them into jail does not solve that problem. Instead, it takes away what little support the family had, and it casts the wives and children on the welfare system.
Anti-polygamy statutes further isolate these odd, little communities. Child rape, domestic violence and welfare fraud tend to thrive when victims fear going to police because they will be deemed felons themselves solely because of an unusual lifestyle.
So what should be done?
Legalizing polygamy, or at least downgrading it under the law, may be the best way out. Sporadic enforcement has made it virtually legal anyway, and removing any unenforced law from the books makes sense. Polygamy is no different, despite the preference of the majority of Utahns for "one man, one woman" marriage. At least one justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, reportedly said that she believes polygamy is legal under the Constitution.
The unevenness of enforcement is unfair. And besides, other forms of polygamy between consenting adults are widespread and never draw prosecutors' attention. They go unpunished even when pregnancy and children are involved. And they have names -- premarital sex and adultery.
Unfortunately these forms of polygamy are all too common. The difference is that we don't arrest people for them. Society looks the other way while bemoaning the problems they create.
The greater irresponsibility -- and danger to society -- is in the promiscuous, not in the polygamists, who at least stick together to provide some framework of family.
Downgrading the offense would help encourage victims in polygamous relationships to report serious crimes. In turn, many abuses would be stamped out.
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What do you think?
What should Utah do about polygamy? Send your comments to dhpolls@heraldextra.com or call 344-2942. Please leave your name, hometown and phone number with your comments. E-mail comments should not exceed 100 words; voice-mail comments should be no longer than 30 seconds. Anonymous and unverifiable responses will not be published.
The Daily Herald will publish comments on June 25.
http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/183949/
Anti-polygamy statutes assault civil liberties
Daily Herald
Editor's note: The Daily Herald recently asked readers what Utah should do about polygamy. Here are the comments we received:
Polygamy should be decriminalized. Historical attempts to stamp out this entire culture failed, and resulted in egregious violations of human rights upon men, women and children. It's time for society to stop repeating history, and do the right thing for this vulnerable minority group.
Mary Batchelor
Sandy
Past attempts to stamp out polygamy ended in disaster
The Daily Herald's reasoning for legalizing polygamy is right on target. In the late 1990's former Utah Rep. Dave Zolman expressed similar views. Unfortunately, he lost re-election and was ridiculed for his suggestion that Utah owed polygamists an apology for its raids against them. Most Utahns today don't know our state government and the FBI raided dozens of polygamists' homes in the early morning hours of March 7, 1944. The children in those homes, like the children of the 1953 Arizona raid, never forgot the trauma they experienced. Lest we repeat history, Utah should decriminalize polygamy -- the sooner, the better.
Marianne Watson,
South Jordan
State only prosecutes those who call lovers 'wives'
Utah's bigamy statute is absurd because it criminalizes people's thoughts. If you're married, and you sleep with an extra bed partner, and in your mind she is your mistress, Utah prosecutors look the other way. If you think she is your plural wife, it's a felony (five years). Attorney General Mark Shurtleff knows this and that's why virtually no one gets charged. If it weren't for the local and national resentment of its practitioners, polygamy would have been legal long ago. You have highlighted one of the greatest hypocrisies in American history.
Gary Batchelor,
Sandy
Polygamy prosecutions encourage secrecy, abuse
I strongly favor decriminalizing (not legalizing) polygamy for many reasons, two of which were stated in the Daily Herald, Jan. 28, 2004, editorial, "Time to Repeal Polygamy Laws:"
"Repeal of Utah's polygamy laws makes sense not only because they are not vigorously enforced but because doing so would remove a barrier to the reporting of crimes from within the polygamist culture."
Polygamy encourages commitment and responsibility, not promiscuity and abandonment.
Anne Wilde,
Salt Lake City
Polygamy proper only between consenting adults
While I support the idea of a man having more than one wife, I do not support child brides nor any kind of sexual abuses whether in a polygamous relationship or monogamous. Plural marriage should be legalized simply on the grounds that it is a lifestyle consenting adults want to live. Why should a monogamous person or a gay person be entitled to any more rights then a polygamist? In America all men are created equal. Laws should be made to protect the freedom and safety of all people, not their individual religious views.
Mark Easterday,
Bonnieville, Ky
Idylic image of polygamy ignores abusive reality
Every one of the men that practice polygamy is as creepy as Warren Jeffs. I don't think most of the women and children realize living this way is abusive. They are being brainwashed and if the women decide to leave and go back into society they will realize soon enough what kind of life they have been coerced into living. They will never be the same. When you have had a family member that has been there and then left, you know. My stomach churns and I get sick all over every time I read the papers about this situation.
Rachel Jeppson,
Orem
Outlawing polygamy height of governmental hypocrisy
It seems that a polygamist is only a criminal if he or she is involved in the lifestyle for religious purposes. Any other man or woman involved in multiple relationships of an intimate nature, regardless of the length of time, are considered part of the "modern" men and women of America. Decriminalization would protect the freedoms of families who practice plural marriage as part of a sincere faith or as a lifestyle of personal choice. It would also open up polygamist societies, serving to address the concerns of the people who are worried about "abuses that go unreported."
Polly Hammon,
Centennial Park
Divorce more dangerous to families than polygamy
Polygamy has existed in Utah side by side with monogamy for nearly 160 years, with no demonstrable injury to the institution of marriage. The state does not punish fornication, or adultery for that matter, and specifically allows "no-fault divorce" which is undoubtedly destructive to families and to marriage as an institution. A man can practice "serial polygamy" with impunity. He can legally have as many wives as he wants, and have children with all of them, just as long as he is willing, with the state's permission if not its blessing, to destroy one family before beginning the next one.
Mark Hansen
Salt Lake City
LDS Church only obstacle to legalizing plural marriage
The upside to legalization: Millions saved in welfare fraud, openness to mainstream education, abuses manifesting themselves, positive contributions to society and dissolved paranoia on both sides of the fence; harmful results of prosecution removed.
The only problem is the LDS Church's influence in Utah politics. By ignoring its own heritage and scriptures, the Church denies plural marriage as a law of God. The church sanctions monogamous marriages only. Legalizing polygamy is not the problem, the position of the Church is.
Ezra Draper,
Bonners Ferry, Idaho
Government out of bounds regulating lifestyle choices
At least take the criminal status of it off the books. As an alternative lifestyle between consenting adults there is no harm done. There is family structure for the children. The negative press we hear about is from disgruntled people that have left. Take a poll of monogamists who have had a terrible relationship and see if they were happy in it. Does monogamist Mark Hacking's actions mean that all monogamists are bad? No. Decriminalize polygamy and leave all consenting adults alone -- polygamist, monogamist, bisexual or gay. Keep government out of the bedroom.
Deborah Cawley,
Riverton
Legalizing polygamy protects religious liberty
I agree that it is time to legalize polygamy. A person should be able to live his religious beliefs without fear of going to jail.
Gurnie L. Cook
Kannapolis, N.C.
Government needs courage to enforce polygamy laws
They should enforce the law and prosecute every single person who is breaking the law. Of course the state will never do that. It knows the people would overthrow the government if it did. So governments prefer to enforce the laws selectively on individual scapegoats in hopes of intimidating the rest of society, who are mostly cowards.
Jeff Evans,
Orem
This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page A5.
Legalize "FAMILIES" not "POLYGAMY"
This is just putting into print some of the discussion we had in the chat room the other day. I think that if we focus on the idea that FAMILIES that support each other, build dreams, raise children in love, etc.... and point out that positive families come in many forms (extended, like the "Waltons"; long-term room mates; and yes, polygamy, etc)... that it will take the negative ammo away from the media and the close-minded politicians and talk-show hosts; how foolish they will look if they come down AGAINST loving and supportive FAMILIES.... yes, of course, abuse is and should be illegal, but that is a LEGAL issue SEPARATE from supporting a supportive FAMILY... In short, I suspect that all of us "pro-poly" people are actually more accurately "Pro-family", in which our hearts should be allowed to love and cherish and support each other... regardless of how many supportive loving hearts have come together... I suspect that my tired brain could perhaps say this more clearly, but tossing this out for discussion... Thomas
Not Sure I Understand Some of the Comments
" And besides, other forms of polygamy between consenting adults are widespread and never draw prosecutors' attention. They go unpunished even when pregnancy and children are involved. And they have names -- premarital sex and adultery...Unfortunately these forms of polygamy are all too common."
I think I get what the author is trying to say, but wow, the way he said it makes no sense. It would appear there was probably an editorial slip there as well on the newspapers end, and I would think they are going to hear about it.
Premarital sex and adultery could be in the form of a polygamous situation if there are enough people involved but to classify them all as forms of polygamy is inaccurate at best.
It should be interesting to see what type of comments the Daily Herald gets back and are willing to publish on June 25th. It would be even more interesting to see what comments they are unwilling to publish (grins)