Brainstorming

If marriage were a right...

I think that in the country we have confused rights, duties and privileges. A right is something like the freedom to worship. I can worship who and when I choose, or I can choose not to worship at all. That is a right. An example of a duty is paying taxes. A privilege is something that you have to ask the permission of the government before you can do it. For example, driving a car and practicing medicine are privileges. If I were to abuse my driving privilege by driving intoxicated, that privilege can be revoked. The permission of the government to perform such an activity is called license.

Because marriage is a privilege and not a right, the government grants a license to a persons to get married. This license has nothing to do with love or sex or the ability to breed, but it is a license to form the business relationship of marriage. Some states recognize common law marriage, when two people can move in together and if they can stand each other for a length of time, then they are married in the eyes of the law.

If marriage were a right, the government would have no business issuing a license to couple who want to get married. All that they would need is a certificate recognizing the marriage.

If marriage were a right, it would be unconstitutional for people to file their taxes with "married filed jointly" or "married filed separately" declared. If would be unconstitutional for the government to even ask. You could still use "head of household" if you had children under the age of 18 living with you, but otherwise, we would all have to file our taxes as individuals.

If marriage were a right, your company would have to offer benefits to individuals and not to families. If would be unlawful for them to discriminate.

It would be unlawful to favor married couples for adoption, housing, schooling or anything. There would be no perks from the government or from your place of employment for being married at all.

Marriage would be like voting. You would register your marriage, but there would be no perks from the government or from the work place or in real-estate whatsoever.