Monday, February 20, 2006
New book includes deep critique of unilateral divorce
A very interesting review by Albert Mohler of a new book chapter by economist Jennifer Roback Morse:
Excerpts:
"Jennifer Roback Morse's essay, 'Why Unilateral Divorce Has No Place in a Free Society,' is published in The Meaning of Marriage: Family, State, Market, and Morals, edited by Robert P. George and Jean Bethke Elshtain (Spence Publishing Company, Dallas, 2006).
...
Jennifer Roback Morse, a research fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University, has been tracing the effects of no-fault divorce throughout the culture. ...
...
"Most significant to Morse's argument is the fact that government is not needed in order for marriage to emerge. "Marriage is an organic, pre-political institution that emerges spontaneously from society," she argues. Furthermore, the actual operation of marriage as an institution depends only to a very small extent upon government at all. "This culture around marriage may have some legal or governmental elements," she acknowledges. "But in most times and places, the greater part of that cultural machinery is more informal than legal and is based more on kinship than on law."
...
"... one of Morse's central concerns appears--where the informal culture of marriage fails, the government must step in with litigation, laws, supervision, and bureaucratic intrusion. Inevitably, this means "a disaster for the cause of limited government."
...
"Where this informal and very natural pattern of home life is not preserved, the state must enter the picture. As always, the state enters clumsily and at great cost. Spending just a couple of hours observing a divorce court or custody hearing will be sufficient to prove the point--government simply cannot replace what the breakup of marriage destroys."
I look forward to reading the book. ¶ 10:49 AM
Excerpts:
"Jennifer Roback Morse's essay, 'Why Unilateral Divorce Has No Place in a Free Society,' is published in The Meaning of Marriage: Family, State, Market, and Morals, edited by Robert P. George and Jean Bethke Elshtain (Spence Publishing Company, Dallas, 2006).
...
Jennifer Roback Morse, a research fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University, has been tracing the effects of no-fault divorce throughout the culture. ...
...
"Most significant to Morse's argument is the fact that government is not needed in order for marriage to emerge. "Marriage is an organic, pre-political institution that emerges spontaneously from society," she argues. Furthermore, the actual operation of marriage as an institution depends only to a very small extent upon government at all. "This culture around marriage may have some legal or governmental elements," she acknowledges. "But in most times and places, the greater part of that cultural machinery is more informal than legal and is based more on kinship than on law."
...
"... one of Morse's central concerns appears--where the informal culture of marriage fails, the government must step in with litigation, laws, supervision, and bureaucratic intrusion. Inevitably, this means "a disaster for the cause of limited government."
...
"Where this informal and very natural pattern of home life is not preserved, the state must enter the picture. As always, the state enters clumsily and at great cost. Spending just a couple of hours observing a divorce court or custody hearing will be sufficient to prove the point--government simply cannot replace what the breakup of marriage destroys."
I look forward to reading the book. ¶ 10:49 AM
