Once again, I find myself taking a current events topic to make a commentary post about how society functions in the Earth Union. Marriage is a contentious issue, at least in my native country, to say the very least. (But then there’s scarcely a topic that isn’t fraught with bitter and irreconcilable differences in these troubled and sharply polarized times.) I’m going to begin with the disclaimer that I don’t consider this the ideal solution for the real world or even for the fictional world portrayed. This is simply the solution employed by the government of the Earth Union, for better or for worse.

One way the Earth Union chose to sidestep the controversy was by removing marriage as a legal construct. That isn’t to say there’s no marriage. It’s just not something the government chooses to define. That isn’t to say there’s no government involvement either. You see, the legal construct is domestic partnership and this has no real value judgment applied to it. Any two adult citizens can enter into a domestic partnership and for such matters as taxation, division of property, inheritance rights and visitation rights, it is more or less analogous to the legal trappings of marriage (at least in the American context). A domestic partnership need not involve any sexual relationship or even cohabitation. (Cohabitation at least is typically implied but not strictly necessary.) For instance, a single parent may choose to forge a domestic partnership with an adult child to extend insurance coverage. (You have a five-year grace period after reaching the age of majority [20] to remain under your parents’ insurance, but should a parent enter into a domestic partnership with an adult child, that insurance coverage could remain shared.) The conventional concept of marriage as a union between man and woman for the purpose of procreation does not need to be covered by a domestic partnership. Unless otherwise waived, biological parents have full rights to their offspring regardless of domestic partnership status. This would mean that technically polygamy is legal in the Union. You could, for instance, have a domestic partnership with your first wife and still maintain parental rights to your children by additional wives, but these additional wives wouldn’t enjoy the same legal protections as the wife who is also your legally sanctioned domestic partner. The most an additional wife could claim from you is child support. They would have no automatic rights of inheritance (though these could be secured by a legally binding will) or visitation in such instances as hospitalization (or the related authority on life-or-death decisions in the case of incapacitation unless granted by some additional contract). Officially, the Union discourages polygamy, but the government tends to turn a blind eye when it’s practiced.

Marriage as a religious or secular rite is entirely superfluous as far as the law is concerned in the strictest sense, so the government pretty well leaves it alone. Matters like age of consent and the like are a whole ‘nother can of worms and I don’t plan on getting into it here. However, as marriage doesn’t have the legal standing of a domestic partnership, you couldn’t get away with child marriage, at least not if the marriage is intended to be consummated. No matter the rite or ceremony, age of consent laws would still apply and marriage alone wouldn’t give legal sanction to a sexual relationship involving a minor.

You may find this an elegant solution for a one-world government to smoothe over the range of cultural differences across the world or you may see it as a corrupt and/or morally repugnant system prone to abuse. As I said in the initial disclaimer, I don’t necessarily consider it to be an ideal solution. It’s just the solution the Union opted to go with. I sometimes feel like I’m poking at a hornet’s nest bringing up hot-button issues like this, but maybe some of you will find it an interesting intellectual exercise. More to come, I’m sure.

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