An excerpt from a post by Bob Ellis at BarbWire.com:
What does it mean to state that something is “legal”?The dictionary defines “legal” as
1: of or relating to law2a: deriving authority from or founded on lawThere are no laws whatsoever which compel governments in those states to recognize counterfeit marriage. Neither the state legislatures nor the people themselves (through ballot initiatives) have passed constitutionally-compliant laws requiring governments to recognize counterfeit marriages in those states. Therefore, governments are under no obligation whatsoever to recognize counterfeit marriages. We do not have a form of government where a group of people get to dictate their will to the people; that is an oligarchy.
On the contrary, there are laws in those states which specifically spell out what every civilization around the world for thousands of years has understood instinctively: that marriage can only be formed by a man and a woman.
What is legal in those states? Only genuine marriages formed by a man and a woman. To attempt to coerce or force people to accept something which violates duly-passed law is itself by definition illegal, and as such carries with it an obligation to be resisted.
Do we in the United States have an oligarchical form of government?
Do we in the United States have a dictatorship?
We have neither of these forms of government. What type of government do we have in the United States?
The U.S. Constitution guarantees a republican form of government. Article IV Section 4 of the Constitution says:
The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government
What is a republican form of government? It is the type of government found in a republic. What is a republic?
According to the dictionary, a republic is:
a country that is governed by elected representatives and by an elected leader (such as a president) rather than by a king or queen
1a (1) : a government having a chief of state who is not a monarch and who in modern times is usually a president (2) : a political unit (as a nation) having such a form of government
b (1) : a government in which supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives responsible to them and governing according to law (2) : a political unit (as a nation) having such a form of government
A republican form of government establishes that the legislative body crafts laws, which are then signed into law and enforced by the executive branch, and then adjudicated on by the judicial branch.
What’s more, in a constitutional republic like we have in the United States, our republican form of government must operate according to the dictates, parameters and limitations of its constitution, which is the highest law of a constitutional republic.
No law mandating government recognition of counterfeit marriage has followed this process in the affected states, therefore there is no legal requirement for governments in those states to recognize counterfeit marriage as if it was real marriage.
Read the entire article: BarbWire.com
