Same-Sex Marriage: Pro and Con: A Reader - Softcover

Sullivan, Andrew

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1400078660 ISBN 13: 9781400078660

Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2004

Synopsis

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.

About this title

Review

At the end of Virtually Normal, Andrew Sullivan called for the legalization of gay and lesbian marriages as a recognition of an individual's right to enter into a committed relationship with the person he or she loves. Same-Sex Marriage: Pro and Con is, as the title suggests, a collection of arguments for and against such unions. Sullivan provides little commentary, allowing the various authors gathered here to speak for themselves. No matter which side one supports on this issue, this anthology will enable both an intellectual support of one's own beliefs and a better, fuller understanding of the contrary position.

About the Author

Andrew Sullivan is a senior editor at The New Republic, where he was editor from 1991-1996; a columnist for Time magazine; and daily writer for www.andresullivan.com, one of the most influential political weblogs.  He is the author of Virtually Normal: An Argument About Homosexuality.  He holds a B.A. in modern history and modern languages from Oxford University and Ph.D. in political science from Harvard University. He lives in Washington D.C., and Providencetown, Massachusetts.

About this edition

• Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 1400078660
• ISBN 13: 9781400078660
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 416