Symposium on Abolishing Civil Marriage: Introduction

This introduction sets the stage for discussion of two papers that make different arguments for the abolition of civil marriage: Edward A. Zelinsky, Deregulating Marriage: The Pro-Marriage Case for Abolishing Civil Marriage, 27 Cardozo L. Rev. 1161-1220 (2006), and Daniel A. Crane, A “Judeo-Christian” Argument for Privatizing Marriage, id. at 1221-1259. While the institution of marriage has undergone substantial changes over the last one hundred years in terms of who may marry, the benefits and duties of marriage, the rules for dissolving marriage, and the social assumptions relating to marriage, its adaptability and elasticity has been demonstrated by the fact that it has survived. The author posits that at this current revolutionary moment in family law, in which a legal and political battle has emerged around same-sex relationship recognition, it is not surprising for scholars to ask deep and foundational questions about marriage and the state’s role in it